PHILADELPHIA CITY HALL TOUR 8-noframe

f all the rooms in City Hall, room 201 has probably had the most troubled history.

ocated at the head of the ceremonial north entrance, John McArthur originally designed it in 1873 to be the Governor's Reception and Councils' Conversation Hall. With entrances into chambers for the Select Council on its west, and the Common Council to the east, Conversation Hall was to be the joint meeting area for the councils.

t was planned to be a grand, five story Baroque space of richly colored, sculpted granite and brownstone. A soaring stairwell, in the apse of the tower, would contain two grand stairs of granite leading to a balcony overlooking the assembly area. The room, as designed, was actually built and completed in early 1883, one of the first interior spaces completed in the new City Hall. Unfortunately, construction emphasis shifted to other areas of the building and the adjoining council chambers remained only as drawings.

y 1884, councils were getting frustrated with their unbuilt chambers, and requested space on the fourth floor to be readied for them in 1885. The building commisssion and Powell agreed to this request as a serious structural miscalculation was making itself evident about this time as well. The weight of the massive tower above Conversation Hall was causing the lower walls to bulge. Powell's solution to this problem was the removal of the massive granite staircases, the infill of open anterooms with additional masonry, and the replacement of the balcony with a complete floor - effectively cutting the grand, five story hall in half. Since the councils were now already occupying the fourth floor, the upper half was to eventually be used as their Caucus room. The lower half, room 201, became a leftover space and has remained so ever since.

rom 1883 to 1914, Conversation Hall was usually vacant or used occasionally by the Mayor. Municipal court tried to use it for trials from 1914 to 1930, but heat was a problem and it reverted to its use as an often vacant and occasional meeting room until 1951. Serving as a drafting room for the City's Transit division until 1955, it underwent a major transformation and was subdivided into two smaller floors and several offices for use by the Director of Commerce and the City Representive. Vacated again in 1966 it suffered its final indignity as it was used to store trash for removal through the north portal.

inally, in 1982, the treasure beneath the trash was again remembered. A privately financed project restored Conversation Hall to it's former condition, and while it still gets only occassional use, we can at least get an idea of the magnificence of the space that John McArthur had originally designed.

ooking toward the balcony entrance and the north portal, we can see the huge, polished, marble columns that rise up from the crypt below to support the tower above. An ornate chandelier, carefully protected in the 1955 renovation, accents the coffered ceiling that is frescoed in black and gold. The floor is covered in an intricate pattern of tiny mosaic tiles. Notice too, the filled archways that William Bleddyn Powell used to correct the structural problems.

urning to our south, we can see the apse where the grand stairways once rose up to a balcony. A statue of George Washington now occupies the chamber, simply because it can remain here safe and undisturbed.

e'll shortly be looking at the other half of this grand space up on the fourth floor, but first we must take a brief climb up through the NORTHEAST STAIRTOWER.