“I am heartbroken and disgusted by the senseless brutality that took the life of Wallace Broadnax, a dedicated, lifelong member of our community. Violence in our community is a public health crisis.” Gary mayor Jerome Prince
My heart sank and I let out a groan upon learning from a front-page headline that former Gary Roosevelt basketball star Wallace Broadnax had been fatally shot at a Clark gas station on the 2200 block of Grant Street shortly after 7 a.m. Saturday during a botched robbery by two juveniles now in custody. It was the twenty-first homicide in Gary since the beginning of the year. As a high school basketball fan, his name was familiar to me as a junior on the legendary squad that defeated Indianapolis Shortridge 68-60 at Hinkle Fieldhouse just three months after Richard Gordon Hatcher took office as the first Black mayor of a significantly sized city. Blaine Smith recalled that in NIPSCO’s downtown display window were life-size pictures of all the players, coaches, and managers. When civil rights leader Martin Luther King, Jr., was assassinated a few weeks later on April 4, 1968, Hatcher asked members of that team to help prevent young people from taking out their anger and frustration in acts of destruction. Aside from a few isolated acts, Gary was one of few American cities to avoid a riot during those terrible hours. In 1993 Broadnax and his teammates were inducted into the I ndiana Basketball Hall of Fame.
After graduating in 1969, Broadnax played basketball in Europe for a few years before returning to Gary, where he spent 25 years as an engineer in the fire department and also worked for Guy and Allen Funeral Home. Former colleague Mark Jones recalled that “Wally was an exemplary firefighter, a great engineer [who] got us to where we needed to be.” Retired fire captain William Todd told Bob Kasarda of the NWI Times: “Wally was a soft-spoken, well-mannered guy who would give you the shirt off his back.”
Those sentiments were echoed by nephew Anthony Broadnax, who told WGN’s Andy Koval after rushing to the scene of the tragedy, “He was backing away from these boys, they were pretty young and they just panicked, ran on foot, didn’t even get anything. Completely senseless. If they had asked for money, he would have given it to them. He wasn’t trying to tussle with these guys.” Anthony continued, “Back in 1968, Black teens took so much pride in their school and neighborhood because they weren’t allowed to live anywhere else in Gary. To think of harming someone elderly would have been unthinkable.” The nephew concluded: “Most of our family is Christian and from Gary. We know the hopelessness and causes that breeds these things. We are heartbroken and angry, but we understand where this comes from. Those boys have thrown their lives away.”
A member of the First Baptist Church, Broadnax leaves behind grieving widow Valerie, an Aunt Lulu, two brothers and a sister, four children, ten grandchildren, and, to quote the obituary, “a host of nieces, nephews, other relatives, and friends.” He’ll be sorely missed.
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