Where they just a Midwest "thing'?

Yep. I saw my sister bench 235.

Still working on mine.

We had 3.
The sacred basketball court.

Then the "Little Gym" and "The Pit". Those were in the basement, as were the locker rooms.


That school is over 130 years old. None of the much newer ones around
here have a basement that I'm aware of. If they do, it's for housing
utility mechanical systems. Most are just 2 story buildings.

Gyms as in school building gyms.

Oh, yeah that one was different.
The Crossing Guards sometimes used that one.

Had a weight room and rifle range in the basement of my highschool. Those were the good days long past.

My high school basement had a swimming pool and the ROTC rifle range.

Wrestling room and weight room in the basement when I was in school

Played an away basketball game in South Sioux City in the late 60s. Basement gym, back boards bolted to the walls with a padded mat on the wall to run into. Out of bounds was the wall. Ceiling was low so you couldn't put much arc on your shot.

We had one in grade school that had been the high school gym in the 1930s. It hadn't been remodeled since new when I was there.....It looked like one of the photos in the thread. As I hear, it still looks about thew same.