Old City Hall, Penn Square, Lancaster, Lancaster County, PA

Significance: 1. This is the sole Georgian style governmental structure from the eighteenth century now remaining in Lancaster City or County.
2. As built in 1795-1798, the Public Office (Old City Hall) illustrated the impact of Philadelphia based tastes on Lancaster architecture.
3. As built in 1795-1798, the building shows the almost total adoption of English architectural styles by Lancaster artisans of Germanic lineage.
4. As built in 1795-1798, the structure showed a transition from the Georgian style to the newer Federal style. Some aspects of this transitional style remain today; the overall form and character is in the Georgian tradition, whereas the pedimented doorway facing Penn Square shows the influence of the Federal style in its delicate moldings, thin pilasters, and use of oval and semicircular shapes.
5. As it now stands, this building represents the unified and cumulative creation of many prominent Lancaster craftsmen and architects, including the joiners John Lind and Jacob Flubacher in the 1790's, the contractor-builder Joshua W. Jack in the 1850s and the restoration work of architect, Melvern R. Evans in the 1920s.
6. In its context on the northwest corner of Lancaster's Penn Square, this building enjoys a unique proximity to several very important Lancaster buildings, including the following: the former Masonic Lodge Hall immediately adjacent on West King Street, built by the Lancaster joiner Gottlieb Sehner (Sener, Soehner) in 1798-1799; the 1889 Central Market built by John Adam...
Survey number: HABS PA-1343