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(Carol M. Highsmith Archive, Prints and Photographs Division, Library of Congress) -
Centrville, MD Town Hall (Lisa Pfueller Davidson and Catherine C. Lavoie)
After a 1902 fire destroyed several blocks, a fashionable new building was constructed for the Queen Anne National Bank at the east end of Lawyers’ Row. The bank moved out of their fire-damaged late-nineteenth-century two-story building at 105 Lawyers’ Row, which was repaired to serve for many years as the offices of the Centreville Observer newspaper. The new classical bank, constructed of orange Roman bricks, has limestone accents and features round stained glass windows with the dates 1884 (founding of the bank) and 1903. The bank failed during the Great Depression, and in 1936 the building and lot were sold to the Town Commissioners of Centreville. A clock tower was added to the building’s east corner at an unknown date, perhaps after conversion to the town hall.
Also noteworthy is the adjacent Centreville National Bank (1903–1904; 107 N. Commerce Street) built in the aftermath of the 1902 fire and using a similar classical approach and materials. Designed by Hill and Thompson of Newark, New Jersey, it replaced the previous 1876 bank by J. Crawford Neilson.