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Show A Cedar City 124th Anniversary Feature Social Hall -first public building Ward Hall in 1898. The schools were taken out of the Social Hall when the new schoolhouse was built in 1881 on the corner adjoining. ad-joining. (Corner of Center and First East.) The only physical evidence of this building today is half of the stone that, in all likelihood, was placed above the door with the name of the building and the date erected. When the building was torn down the stone was taken out to the old Main building on the College Campus. When Old Main burned the stone was in the fire but was found and saved and when the Iron Mission Park museum was opened it was placed in the museum. The word "Hall" and the date "1861" can still be read. Editor's Note: On the eve of the 124th Birthday Anniversary of Cedar City the following account ac-count of the defelopment of the "old Social Hall," is presented for the interest of our readers. The account was submitted for publication by the combined chapters of the Daughters of Utah Pioneers. The Social Hall was the first public building in Cedar City. It stood about where the parking lot for the State Bank of Southern Utah is located. The Pioneers and their children used and appreciated this building. Their grandchildren had faint memories of it and their great grandchildren say, "I didn't know there was such a building." According to the History of Iron County by Luella Dalton, the Social Hall was finished in 1862. From then on the people had a suitable recreation center. It was a long adobe building with a big fireplace in the west end, four big windows on each side, with a door to the east. As a meeting place for church, school, dancing, dan-cing, dramatics and civic affairs this building lasted and served the folks until the tabernacle was ready in 1888 for plastering, though the tabernacle had been used for religious purposes for some years previous. The Social Hall continued to serve for recreation and other types of affairs until it gave way to the Oh ! the Old Social Hall now so stricken with age and swiftly approaching decay, What a space it could fill in our history page of the days that have long passed away, Though humble in structure a stranger to fame, and crude in detail of design. It is dear to our hearts and long will its name be engraved on memories shrine, And could the historian its annuals repeat t'would the mind of the hearers enthrall, For romance and fiction can scarcely compete, with the past of the old Social Hall. v. Whenever the season of winter began, amusements were ever the range, Oh the plotting, the mischief, the frolic and fun, we had on that old mimic stage, We met there for pleasure, and listened with glee, perchance to the concert or play, And mans' the time we have right meanly, passed the long winter evening away. And Oh! how delightful the moments have fled, discussing the Banquet or Ball, For many a bounteous repast spread, And enjoyed in the old Social Hall. But Oh ! the old days brought their sorrow and care as well as their seasons of mirth, For oft the Angel of death would come there, and summon some loved one from earth' And then on the day we'd lay them away, To rest neath the cold peaceful sod, Ere we closed the coffin and bid them for aye, from the scenes where in life they had trod In grief we'd repair to the old meeting place, together the great and the small, And mingle farewells ore the dead loving face, Neath the roof of the old Social Hall. And when we have met on the Sabbath of rest, With spiritual strength to be fed, T'was there we were blessed with renewal of zest, for the labors and duties ahead, And Oh what a rapturous feeling then, did the hymn or anthem inspire, As the walls re-echoed again and again, to the strains of the old City Choir. And those who have traveled to lecture and preach, will often with humor recall, Their guisers and quades at their first maiden speals, on the stand in the old Social Hall. T'was in the old building the infantile mind, first studied the duties of youth, And there that tendrils were gently inclined, to seek after wisdom and truth, Our old city fathers often met there of yore, and reasoned and counseled and planned, For the good of our city, and laws by the score, were passed in that old Social stand, Our sons and our daughters now rising to fame, and grown up so comely and tall, Received their first blessing, as well as a name T'ween the walls of the old Social Hall. We may pull down the walls of the old stomping place, where so many fond scenes are confined, We may scatter its fragments till nothing be found, to bring the dead past to our minds, We may point to our church with its tall stately spire, Our halls and Academies too, We may ring out the old mills eager desire, to foster and build up the new, But still we'll remember through each changing scene, whatever in life may be fall, To ere keep a spot in our memory green, for the days of the old Social Hall. Composed by Edwin Charles Cox |
