While Tab Recreation is considered a model of modern urban youth sports programming, its roots reach well into the past.

Tab began its outreach at 34th Street and Central Avenue in the 1920s after seeing a need for Sunday School on the city’s then-emerging northside.

The congregation quickly decided that athletics could offer an effective conduit for outreach. In 1939, this belief took shape as Tab’s Recreation Program.

With education as its primary goal, Tab Recreation’s focus was for all participants to attain some physical skills and learn poise, self-control and the art of teamwork.

Soon, programming was expanded to include all boys and girls regardless of athletic ability. This tradition continues today in a program in which all children who practice can play in games.

Over the years, Tab Recreation’s participants have gone on to achieve high personal and professional accomplishments. The program has served as a testing ground for future business, political and community leaders as well as a launching pad for future collegiate and professional athletes.