Milwaukee City Conference

The Milwaukee City Conference (also known as "City Conference") is a high school athletic conference in Wisconsin. All full-time member institutions are located in the city of Milwaukee and are members of the Milwaukee Public Schools system.

The Milwaukee City Conference was founded in 1893,^[1] when Milwaukee opened a second public high school (South Division^[2]) and regular athletic competition was established between East Division and South Division High Schools. The first event between these two schools was a track meet in spring of 1894.^[3] A third member was added in the fall of 1894 when West Division High School opened, and two years later football became a conference sport when East Division and South Division met on the gridiron for the first time.^[4] In 1906, Boys Technical and Trade High School^[5] (now Bradley Tech) and North Division High School both opened, after which they became conference members.^[6][7] By 1920, the conference had added three more schools in Washington (1911),^[8] Bay View (1914)^[9] and Lincoln (1920).^[10] During this time period, the City Conference established themselves as a dominant force in track and field, taking the team title in twenty-five WIAA competitions between 1895 and 1929.^[11]

The City Conference added a ninth member in 1930, one year after the village of North Milwaukee was annexed into the City of Milwaukee.^[12][13] The village had its own high school prior to annexation, and after North Milwaukee High School was absorbed into MPS it became Custer High School in order to avoid confusion with North Division.^[14] One year later, interscholastic basketball was reinstated as a City Conference sport after it was discontinued during the early 1900s due to lack of adequate facilities.^[15][16] Three new high schools were built in consecutive years in the 1930s as Works Progress Administration projects: Juneau (1932),^[17] Pulaski (1933)^[18][19] and Rufus King (1934).^[20][21] All became members of the City Conference after opening and varsity competition coincided with each school's first senior class. Membership remained stable at twelve schools until the 1960s. John Marshall High School was opened as a combination junior/senior high school on the city's north side in 1961 (varsity competition began in 1963),^[22] and two high schools were added in 1966 as a direct result of Milwaukee’s annexation of unincorporated areas in the years prior:^[23][24] James Madison High School^[25] in the former town of Granville and Alexander Hamilton High School^[26] in the former town of Greenfield. Granville already had its own high school at this time, and when their district lost territory due to annexation, it was renamed Brown Deer High School after the village where it was located.^[27]

A few years after the opening of Hamilton and Madison, the City Conference's football roster subdivided along geographic lines for the 1971 season. Northern schools competed in the Gold Division and southern schools were placed in the Blue Division:^[28][29][30]

In 1979, Lincoln High School closed^[31] and Harold S. Vincent High School^[32][33] opened on the city's far northwest side as a replacement. In the years prior, realignment of the high school athletic conferences in southeastern Wisconsin was discussed extensively, driven mostly by the WIAA's desire to get the high schools in Racine and Kenosha into a larger conference after they were forced out of the Big Eight Conference in 1970.^[34][35] The five-member South Shore Conference was created as a result,^[36] and competition lasted for ten years before its dissolution.^[37] Two members of the South Shore (Kenosha Tremper and Racine Park) joined the City Conference, and four of the City Conference's smaller members joined the Suburban Conference (Juneau, Riverside, Rufus King and West Division).^[38] Due to the expansion of the conference's geographic footprint, the conference was briefly known as the Milwaukee Area Conference (MAC).^[39] The two-division football alignment was scrapped for the 1980 season, only to return for 1981 and continue until the next realignment. The newly renamed conference made a slight adjustment in 1983 when Kenosha Bradford joined from the Braveland Conference to replace Racine Park after their exit to the Suburban Conference.^[40] The high schools in Kenosha left the MAC in 1985, taking four schools on the south side of Milwaukee with them (Bay View, Hamilton, Pulaski and South Division) and rejoining with the Racine high schools to form the Big Nine Conference.^[41] During that same year, the four high schools who left for the Suburban Conference rejoined after it was realigned out of existence,^[42] and the MAC changed its name back to the Milwaukee City Conference. West Division also dropped their athletic program that year when they became the Milwaukee High School of the Arts.^[43] The four south side Milwaukee high schools that were placed in the Big Nine did not want this realignment and threatened to sue^[44] the WIAA to rejoin the City Conference.^[45][46] Their efforts were successful in 1993, as all four schools made their return to the conference.^[47]

With the City Conference made whole again after the 1993 realignment, new schools continued to join the conference after they opened. The conference was also partitioned into two divisions for football, named after former coaches Lisle Blackbourn (Washington) and James Richardson (Tech):^[48]

Milwaukee School of Languages and Wisconsin Conservatory of Lifelong Learning joined in 2000^[49] and 2001, respectively. Malcolm X Academy joined the City Conference in 2003 and left when it closed four years later. Solomon Juneau High School closed in 2006, reopening in 2012 as MacDowell Montessori School (the athletics program still competes under the Juneau banner). Reagan College Prep High School in the former Town of Lake took the place of Malcolm X Academy when it opened in 2007. Three more school openings rounded out the membership of the City Conference: Carmen in 2014, Golda Meir in 2016 and Audubon Tech in 2022.

In February 2019, the WIAA and the Wisconsin Football Coaches Association unveiled a sweeping football-only realignment for Wisconsin to begin with the 2020 football season and run on a two-year cycle.^[50] The City Conference maintained their alignment from the year before and it remained in place through the 2022-2023 realignment cycle.^[51][52] In 2024, Reagan Prep and Washington swapped divisions, with Reagan joining the Richardson Division and Washington taking their place in the Blackbourn Division.^[53] For the 2026-2027 competition cycle, the City Conference will be adding two new members. Full members Milwaukee School of Languages will become the eighth member of the Richardson Division, and Fuller Collegiate Academy will be joining as an affiliate member (primarily in the Lake City Conference) in the Blackbourn Division.^[54]

Several co-op teams exist in the conference. These co-op teams usually include a full-time member and an affiliate member. The "host" school is listed in bold.

• Bay View & Wisconsin Conservatory of Lifelong Learning (football, boys' & girls' tennis)
• Pulaski & Milwaukee High School of the Arts (football, girls' volleyball, baseball, boys' tennis, girls' soccer)
• Marshall & School Of Languages (football)
• Ronald W. Reagan & Wisconsin Conservatory of Lifelong Learning (girls' basketball)
• Madison, Marshall, & School Of Languages (boys' tennis)
• South Division & Bradley Tech (boys' tennis)
• Pulaski, Milwaukee High School of the Arts, and Ronald W. Reagan (girls' and boys' swimming)
• Riverside and Shorewood (wrestling)

 Blue Division  Gold Division  Blackbourn Division  Richardson Division

Milwaukee City Conference

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Location of Milwaukee City Conference full members:

1

Audubon Tech

2

Bay View

3

Bradley Tech

4

Carmen Northwest

5

Golda Meir

6

Hamilton

7

High School of the Arts

8

Juneau

9

Madison University

10

Marshall

11

North Division

12

Obama SCTE

13

Pulaski

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Reagan Prep

15

Riverside University

16

Rufus King

17

School of Languages

18

South Division

19

Vincent

20

Washington

21

Wisconsin Conservatory of Lifelong Learning

• Boys and girls
  • Basketball
  • Cross country
  • Swimming
  • Tennis
  • Track and field
• Boys only
  • Baseball
  • Football
  • Wrestling
• Girls only
  • Softball
  • Volleyball

The City Conference did not allow its teams to compete in the WIAA tournament until the 1951-52 season.

List of high school athletic conferences in Wisconsin

• Milwaukee City Conference pages at Wissports.net
  • Football (Blackbourn Division)
  • Football (Richardson Division)
  • Boys Basketball
  • Girls Basketball
• Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel Preps Plus Online