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This frame T-shaped United Service Organizations (USO) building accommodated entertainment and recreation for the thousands of African Americans training at Camp Shelby during World War II. The federal government built the structure using a standardized plan, and the YMCA operated it. The USO club offered off-duty black soldiers “A Home Away from Home”: showers, food, games, a library, and dances. It also hosted national music groups and speakers, such as educator and civil rights activist Mary McLeod Bethune. A community center for many years after the war, the building was restored and opened in 2009 as the African American Military History Museum. The larger brick USO building (1942) for white service members at 220 W. Front Street has been converted into a civic center.