South Bend’s Century Center

^{By Travis Childs, Archivist and St. Joseph County Historian at The History Museum, South Bend.}

The land on which the Century Center now sits was land where the industrial story of South Bend began. Early in the history of South Bend, two races were dug off the St. Joseph River to provide water power and entice business owners to move their production facilities to the city. The West Race is the canal that runs along the east side of the Century Center facility.

Most of those original factory buildings stood either on the Century Center site or on what is called Island Park. In the later age of electricity, James Oliver, founder of the Oliver Farm Equipment Company, harnessed the West Race’s waterpower for a hydroelectric plant, which is now a walkway to the island. Also close is the soil where the first trading post was built in 1823 and where a fort was built during an invasion of the Blackhawk Indians in 1832.

Beneath the south parking lot is land that hosted South Bend’s first school, established in 1831, and later the first Thomas Jefferson School, which remained for more than a hundred years until 1974 when it was torn down for the Century Center complex.

In 1873, the South Bend city water works used the West Race water for power and to fill a newly constructed water tower called the Standpipe. This needle-like structure was a landmark in South Bend until 1930, when it was dismantled after it was no longer needed. The standpipe stood approximately where the south entrance doors to the Century Center are located.

As South Bend grew, the cultural community increasingly became interested in a civic or cultural center for the enjoyment and edification of the residents. Other South Bend leaders dreamed of a convention hall that would bring people into South Bend. Still others longed for a large municipal auditorium or arena. These dreams became a reality in the 1970s, as the Century Center was proposed and funded by both public and private sources.

In 1973, the nationally known architecture firm of Johnson-Burgee of New York City was selected to design a distinctive building using the St. Joseph River and the West Race. On January 8, 1974, Johnson and Burgee unveiled the scale model of the new Century Center building. In June 1974, Sollitt Construction Company was hired as the construction manager to oversee the building of the new facility. Forty contractors worked throughout 1975, through 1976, and on through a spectacularly hot summer of 1977.

The Century Center was built with 1,200,000 bricks. That’s more than enough bricks to connect South Bend with Indianapolis with the bricks laid end-to-end, about 153 miles. The facility has 43,000 square feet of glass, enough for a picture window 10 feet by 15 feet and installed in 286 houses. It also has 11,820 cubic yards of concrete, which is enough to pave a sidewalk from South Bend to Elkhart. The sidewalk would weigh 22,000 tons. There are also 1,450 tons of steel that make up the Century Center building, which is heavier than the Queen Elizabeth passenger ship. Hidden behind the walls of the 224,000 square foot Century Center are 125 miles of electrical wiring, four miles of plumbing pipe, 143 miles of telephone wire and 3.5 miles of air and heating ducts.

On November 1, 1977, the $14 million complex ($85 million in 2026 money) opened its doors for the first time.

^{Photos by The History Museum, used with permission. Source:The History Museum}