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Virginia: Valley, Piedmont, Southside & Southwest » Shenandoah Valley » Rockbridge County » Lexington (Independent City) and Vicinity » Knights of Pythias Hall

Knights of Pythias Hall

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1926. Opposite 210 N. Main St.
  • (Photograph by D Hughes)
  • (Photograph by Mark Mones)
  • (Photograph by Mark Mones)
  • (Photograph by Mark Mones)
  • (Photograph by Mark Mones)

This building has served as a center for Lexington's African American community. Built by a black chapter of the Knights of Pythias, it has housed various businesses on the ground floor and a large lodge hall on the second. The hall was also used for church meetings, dances, and indoor basketball games at various points in its history. The simple, but massive, rectangular building is marked by a stepped parapet on the front and an identification stone recording its date and origins. The most distinguishing feature is its rock-faced concrete-block exterior, a relatively new material in the 1920s. It offered the appearance of rusticated stone at a fraction of the cost. The building was moved in October 2014 to make room for a new indoor training facility for the Virginia Military Institute.

Writing Credits

Author: 
Anne Carter Lee
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Data

What's Nearby

University Chapel
Willson-Walker House
Washington and Lee University
McCampbell Inn (Central Hotel)
Alexander-Withrow House

Citation

Anne Carter Lee, "Knights of Pythias Hall", [Lexington, Virginia], SAH Archipedia, eds. Gabrielle Esperdy and Karen Kingsley, Charlottesville: UVaP, 2012—, http://sah-archipedia.org/buildings/VA-02-RB19.

Print Source

Cover: Buildings of Virginia vol 2

Buildings of Virginia: Valley, Piedmont, Southside, and Southwest, Anne Carter Lee and contributors. Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press, 2015, 130-130.

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