Woonsocket City Hall

{{Use American English|date=July 2025}} {{Use mdy dates|date=March 2025}} {{Infobox NRHP | name = Woonsocket City Hall | nrhp_type = | image = Woonsocket City Hall 2015.jpg | caption = | location = 169 Main Street,<br/>Woonsocket, Rhode Island | coordinates = {{coord|42|0|8|N|71|30|53|W|display=inline,title}} | locmapin = Rhode Island#USA | area = | built = 1856 | builder = Albert B. Cole and Obadiah Slade (1856); Cutting & Bishop (1891) | architect = | architecture = Italianate | added = May 1, 1974 | refnum = 74000007 <ref name="nris">{{NRISref|2007a}}</ref> }}

The '''Woonsocket City Hall,''' (also known as the '''Harris Institute''') is located in Woonsocket, Rhode Island.

Edward Harris, a leading Woonsocket industrialist, constructed the earliest part of the building in 1856, and it was known as the Harris Block, with stores on the first floor, and an auditorium hall seating 1,100 on the third floor. This brick structure has elements of Italianate styling, including round-arch windows and a heavily dentilled cornice. A major Richardsonian Romanesque addition, called the Granite Block, was made to the north of this structure in 1891. In 1902 the city purchased the building for use as city hall.<ref name=NRHP>{{cite web|url=http://www.preservation.ri.gov/pdfs_zips_downloads/national_pdfs/woonsocket/woon_main-street-169_woonsocket-city-hall.pdf|title=NRHP nomination for Woonsocket City Hall|publisher=Rhode Island Preservation|accessdate=2014-08-09}}</ref>

The builders of the original building were Albert B. Cole of Woonsocket and a Mr. Slade of Providence,<ref name=NRHP/> probably Obadiah Slade, carpenter.<ref>Providence directories, 1850s</ref> The 1891 addition was built by Cutting & Bishop of Worcester.<ref>"J. W. Bishop & Co.," ''Architectural Record'' (July 1896): 112.</ref> The architect of neither section is known.<ref name=NRHP/>

The building served as the first public library in Rhode Island, housed on the second floor, which is now the Woonsocket Harris Public Library.

In March 1860 Abraham Lincoln spoke to a packed crowd in Harris Hall, which at the time contained one of the largest assembly rooms in the state.<ref>{{cite web|title=Abraham Lincoln and Rhode Island|url=http://abrahamlincolnsclassroom.org/abraham-lincoln-state-by-state/abraham-lincoln-and-rhode-island/|website=Abraham Lincoln's Classroom|publisher=The Lehman Institute|accessdate=16 September 2015}}</ref>

<gallery> Edward Harris Woonsocket businessman.jpg|Edward Harris, founder of the Harris Institute, the first public library in Rhode Island </gallery>

==References and external links== *[https://phfactor.blogspot.com/2008/02/woonsocket-city-hall-1985.html Erik Eckilson, "Woonsocket, My Town"] {{Reflist}} {{commonscat|Woonsocket City Hall}}

Category:City and town halls on the National Register of Historic Places in Rhode Island Category:Government buildings completed in 1856 Category:Buildings and structures in Woonsocket, Rhode Island Category:National Register of Historic Places in Woonsocket, Rhode Island Category:1856 establishments in Rhode Island