The Town Hall
113 West 43rd Street | also 123 West 43rd Street | Times Square | built 1921
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The city photographed every building for its tax records around 1940 and again in the 1980s. NYC Municipal Archives.
Written with AI from the source each entry cites, then fact-checked.
- 1920
Theodore Roosevelt Jr. lays the Town Hall cornerstone on behalf of his wife
In January 1920, with construction under way since October 10, 1919, Colonel Theodore Roosevelt Jr. laid the building's cornerstone in place of his wife. She was the grand-niece and namesake of Eleanor Butler Sanders, the founder of the League for Political Education, who had died in 1905. Contractor Russell B. Smith had begun demolishing the six dwellings on the site the previous July.
“Theodore Roosevelt, Jr., laid the cornerstone of the building for his wife who was the grand-niece and name-sake of the original founder…”
- 1921
Suffragists' League for Political Education opens the Town Hall
The Town Hall was built for the League for Political Education, founded in 1894 by suffragists who campaigned for women's votes. Designed by McKim, Mead & White in a Georgian Revival style, the 1,495-seat hall opened on January 12, 1921. From 1935 to 1956 it broadcast America's Town Meeting of the Air, an early public-affairs radio program.
Source: Wikipedia
- 1921
Police carry Margaret Sanger off the Town Hall stage
On November 13, 1921, birth control campaigner Margaret Sanger tried to speak about contraception at the Town Hall and was arrested and carried off the stage.
Source: Wikipedia
- 1934
Emma Goldman, back on a visa that bans political talks, appears at Town Hall
On February 3, 1934, the anarchist Emma Goldman made her first public appearance in the United States after 14 years of exile. She had been among the 249 aliens deported in 1919, and her 90-day visa barred political lecturing. At Town Hall she eulogized her mentor Peter Kropotkin, condemned Hitler and restated her commitment to anarchy.
Source: thetownhall.org
- 1935
America's Town Meeting of the Air begins broadcasting from Town Hall
On Thursday, May 30, 1935, a town crier's bell opened the first edition of America's Town Meeting of the Air, aired from 9:30 to 10:30 p.m. George V. Denny Jr., the League's associate director, had conceived the program in 1934 and persuaded the National Broadcasting Company to try it. Rather than a two-sided debate, each show gave listeners four points of view, and questions from across the country were relayed back to the speakers.
- 1935
Marian Anderson debuts at Town Hall after other venues turn her away
Contralto Marian Anderson had been refused bookings at several New York concert venues because of her race before she gave her Town Hall debut recital in December 1935. The performance was widely praised and helped establish her as one of the leading classical singers of her generation.
Source: Wikipedia
- 1945
Dizzy Gillespie and Charlie Parker play bebop's first public concert
On June 22, 1945, Dizzy Gillespie and Charlie Parker played a concert at the Town Hall that is counted as the first public performance of bebop. The hall had earlier hosted Pablo Casals's debut in 1923 and Paul Robeson singing spirituals in 1927.
Source: Wikipedia
- 1963
Bob Dylan plays his first major concert at Town Hall to more than a thousand people
On April 12, 1963, Bob Dylan, then 21, gave the first big concert of his career at Town Hall before a crowd of over a thousand. In his New York Times review Robert Shelton likened the singer from Hibbing, Minnesota, to a Holden Caulfield lost in the Dust Bowl, and thanked promoter Harold Leventhal for taking a chance on "a young giant."
Source: thetownhall.org
- 1964
Fannie Lou Hamer tells Town Hall of her beatings the day before her convention testimony
On August 21, 1964, Fannie Lou Hamer, a sharecropper and vice-chair of the Mississippi Freedom Party, filled Town Hall with her account of the brutal beatings police had given her over efforts to register Black voters. She spoke the day before she was to testify to the Credentials Committee at the Democratic National Convention, and asked whether this was America, where people could be beaten without federal intervention.
Source: thetownhall.org
- 1967
Leonard Cohen walks off stage mid-song at a Town Hall benefit, then Judy Collins brings him back
On April 30, 1967, Judy Collins invited her friend Leonard Cohen to perform at a Town Hall benefit for the National Committee for a Sane Nuclear Policy. Described as an unsure performer, Cohen got halfway through his first song before leaving the stage. Collins brought him back out to finish, and the audience responded with warm applause.
Source: thetownhall.org
- 1971
Norman Mailer debates feminist writers on the Town Hall stage
On April 30, 1971, author Norman Mailer joined a panel debate on women's liberation at Town Hall with feminist writers and activists including Germaine Greer and Jill Johnston. Filmmakers Chris Hegedus and D. A. Pennebaker documented the event, releasing it as the film Town Bloody Hall in 1979.
Source: Wikipedia
- 1978
The Landmarks Preservation Commission designates Town Hall a city landmark
On November 28, 1978, the Landmarks Preservation Commission designated Town Hall at 113-123 West 43rd Street a landmark. At the September 12 hearing, nineteen witnesses spoke in favor and none opposed. The report said the League for Political Education had asked McKim, Mead & White for a building holding a lecture auditorium, concert hall, cinema and clubhouse.
“Nineteen witnesses spoke in favor of designation. There were no speakers in opposition to designation.”
- 1984
Town Hall reopens after a two-and-a-half-month restoration
Town Hall shut in July 1984 for a renovation of about two and a half months. Crews cleaned the facade and refurbished the auditorium with new carpeting; since the building was a landmark, the seats were repaired rather than swapped out, and the back wall got a coating that protects the acoustics. The hall officially reopened on October 14, 1984.
Source: Wikipedia
Further reading
- The Town Hall (New York City)Wikipedia
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