The Way Community Center

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The Way was a Northside community center established in the aftermath of the urban unrest of 1966  resulting from racial and economic inequalities. In its wake, city leaders came together to create a space in the neighborhood devoted to cultivating racial pride among African-American youths. Music was a focus, and the center even had a house band, The Family (which included Sonny Thompson, a mentor to Prince who joined Prince’s band The New Power Generation in the 1990s). The building sported practice spaces that attracted musicians who would later be famous: Jimmy Jam, Terry Lewis, André Cymone, and Prince. The current building on the site—the Fourth Precinct headquarters of the Minneapolis Police—was the site of Black Lives Matter protests over the 2015 police killing of Jamar Clark, an African American man.