Our History
The Boys & Girls Club has a long history in this region! In 1944 the Concord Police Association opened the Addison Martin Boys Club in Concord. Named in honor of its first director, Patrolman Addison Martin of the Concord Police Department, the original clubhouse was located in St. Timothy’s Church on Highland Street. In 1983, the Concord Boys' Club became one of the first in the United States to formally add “& Girls” to its name, allowing girls to join as full members. Construction of the flagship clubhouse at Bradley Street was completed in 1987, with a renovation in 2012.In 2002 the New Visions Teen Center asked if the Concord Club would help run an afterschool program in Hopkinton founded by a group Owen and Rita French, Bill Chapin, Sr., Janet Kryzaniak and Karen and David Dufault. The program was located in the Contoocook Grange and later occupied a house on Park Avenue, thanks to a generous gift from the Slusser family, before moving to Maple Street School for practical reasons. We've enjoyed strong partnerships with the Concord, Hopkinton and Weare school systems. Our school-based sites at Broken Ground/MillBrook and Christa McAuliffe were launched in the early 2000's. The Boys & Girls Club at Weare Upper Elementary/Middle School was established in 2003. Soon after that, the Club ventured into early childhood education with a program Eastman School. In 2020 the Club opened a site at NHTI's child development center named after early childhood education-advocate Mary Stuart Gile. In 2022 we merged with Penacook Community Center.
In the Suncook region, the history starts in 2003, when the town of Allenstown reached out to see if the Concord Boys & Girls Club would consider running an after school program at their recreation center, which had closed due to lack of funding for staff. The town offered to pay building overhead and maintenance if the Club provided after school and summer programming. The recreation center consisted of a double-wide trailer adjacent to the basketball and skate park. For several years, this building overflowed with kids until a generous donor purchased another doublewide trailer. Several years later, CDFA tax credits helped build a new community center shared with the Allenstown Senior Center. A small preschool program was launched there shortly after. After years of transporting students from surrounding communities, the Club was able to branch out into the Epsom Elementary school in 2019 and Pittsfield Elementary School in 2022.
