The Marshall White Center is a community recreation center in Ogden named in honor of Utah’s first black police officer to be killed in the line of duty, Det. Sgt. Marshall N. White, a Military Veteran who’s watch ended October 18,1963.

The Marshall White Center opened its doors to the community it serves in 1968, becoming the first home to Ogden’s Head Start Program. For 51 years the center has been a multi-generational landmark in the lives Ogden City’s children – the Baby Boomers, Generation X and the Millennials. For 5 decades the facility has encapsulated the hearts of the inner-city youth  to whom it has provided a safe haven and often times  a place of refuge with a plethora of services including, but not limited to: Numerous programs providing youth with structured after school and summer programs, culinary classes, recreational classes with focus on health & fitness. The facility includes a gym complete with basketball court & boxing ring, a weight & exercise room, park grounds with tennis courts/basketball courts. Lastly but not least, there is an indoor pool that has been closed for more than year due to structural damage that would be catastrophic without repair. Estimates of restoration have been quoted at $500,000.00; an amount that the building’s owner/operator Ogden City Corp., has been reluctant to fund despite its FY 2020 City Budget of $186,178,525.00.

The Marshall White Center can be considered a vein in the community by continuously pumping hope and encouragement to the residents it serves by embracing the Senior Community, being known as home to the annual MLK Day Breakfast and keeps the spirit of service alive by welcoming the unsheltered for holiday meal service at Thanksgiving and Christmas. The time has come to pump that same hope back into the place that can only be compared to a “vital organ”, returning the love and nurturing it has offered by rendering the restoration and renovation it has earned in its service.