Photo by Melissa Johnston
Fish fry and concerts. If you came of age in Milwaukee during the ’70s and ’80s, Turner Hall was a great place to eat on Friday nights. For children of the 21st century, Turner Hall Ballroom is a popular venue for music. Most Milwaukeeans who have frequented the venerable 1882 structure in the heart of Downtown have had only a vague idea—at best—that Turner Hall stands for more than fried fish and rock’n’roll.
Photo by Juan Miguel Martinez
Enter Emilio de Torre. He started work this summer as executive director of the Milwaukee Turners with the goal of fully reconnecting the organization with its past, rooted in a 19th-century German reform movement, while moving it into the future.
“The Turners have a rich history,” says de Torre. He points to a monument in the hall’s second floor landing, inscribed with the names of Turners who lost their lives in the Civil War (“the war against the rebellion” reads the caption in German) flanked by allegorical paintings of ladies Liberty and Justice encouraging a stolid Turner in the fight against the Confederacy. He also recounts that a contingent of Milwaukee Turners, known for their marksmanship, formed Abraham Lincoln’s bodyguard at his inauguration.
Photo by Melissa Johnston
The Turners supported trade union organizers and women’s voting rights. Milwaukee’s three Socialist mayors were members of the society. And yet, de Torre concedes, the Turners fell quiet for many years. “In my opinion, the Turners turned inward following the McCarthy-era.” He adds, “It’s time for the Milwaukee Turners to emerge from this chrysalis stage and use their location, history and influence to unify and strengthen Milwaukee.”
Community Asset
Chris Ahmuty, head of the Milwaukee Turners’ history committee, enjoys showing the artworks by early 20th-century Milwaukee painters adorning the ground floor tavern, now vacant but ready to resume business sometime next year. He points to a mural honoring the Turners’ German founder, known as Father Jahn, depicted as an Olympian decked in laurels and flanked by images representing the society’s mission to promote “a sound mind in a sound body”—a book and a lamp, barbells and fencing foils.
de Torre: “We have a lot to learn from our history—it’s the foundation for what we need to do to make Milwaukee better.”
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Photo by Melissa Johnston
Once, there were hundreds of Turner societies across the U.S., many of them founded, like the Milwaukee chapter, by German-speaking political refugees from a series of failed rebellions that shook Europe in 1848. Their number has been reduced to around two dozen, “but very few if any have as much going on in different areas as the Milwaukee Turners,” Ahmuty says. “We own our own building with no mortgage. We have continued to work for sound minds and bodies.” The Turners’ gym, one of America’s oldest, includes instructional rock climbing, bouldering, ice walls, a moon wall and a rock-climbing treadmill, as well as the weightlifting and gym mats that the original Turners knew so well. Ahmuty continues, “We’ve continued our civil engagement through lectures. The concerts by the Pabst Group follow along the cultural activities that used to happen in the Ballroom.”
In the early ’00s, the Turners organized the Fourth Street Forum, a series of public discussions on issues faced by Milwaukee that were broadcast for several years on Milwaukee PBS. De Torre plans to revive the series as the Vel Phillips Forum.
Photo by Melissa Johnston
Make Milwaukee Better
De Torre was already familiar to many Milwaukeeans before taking his new job at the Turners. He came to Milwaukee in 2006 as the local ACLU’s youth programs director. Previously, he taught public school and worked with the Boys & Girls Club in New York. “Education and youth empowerment provide community members opportunities to determine their own paths and their own community direction, rather than be pushed unknowingly or unwillingly down the wrong path,” he explains.
He laughs as he glances at the potted plant he tends on his desk. It once belonged to Milwaukee’s last socialist mayor, Frank Zeidler. The Milwaukee Turners’ legacy is “too rich and vibrant to be just a historical movement,” de Torre continues. “We have a lot to learn from our history—it’s the foundation for what we need to do to make Milwaukee better.” This summer, the Turners helped organize a food drive, and collaborations with many community groups are planned. As painting and rehabbing Turner Hall gains momentum under de Torre’s leadership, new programs have been added—all, alas, virtual given the pandemic.
Photo by Melissa Johnston
“We’ve just begun offering free yoga programs on Facebook,” he says. “Milwaukee’s own renowned Shakespearean actress, Malkia Stampley, is teaching this. We’ll be offering free arts with UW-Milwaukee art professor Jessica Meuninck-Ganger and others, rock climbing techniques with Kim Kosmitis (our rock-climbing gym is open under very limited and very sanitary conditions from 5 to 9 p.m.—appointment and masks only). The incredible Ambrose Wilson-Brown will teach mindfulness. We will eventually have children’s gymnastics and martial arts.”
The most important goal is to grow and diversify the Milwaukee Turners’ membership. Says de Torre, “We’ve recruited a new person into our ranks almost every dayI’ve been here—professors, students,journalists, organizers, activists, actors,athletes, attorneys, teachers, state representatives, the county executive, alderpeople, retirees, computer programmers, chemists, painters, Filipino, Latinx, black, white, multiracial, Jewish, Christian, Muslim, atheist... I smell a very diverse and inclusive Renaissance coming on, and it’s incredibly exciting because it represents what Milwaukee can be.”
David Luhrssen is co-author of A Time of Paradox: America Since 1890 and taught History of Wisconsin at Milwaukee Area Technical College.
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