Town Hall

As stated in the chapter about the Martha-Mary Chapel, Henry Ford felt the Village Green would not be complete without a church and a town hall. The two buildings were almost built simultaneously in 1929 and faced each other across the green.
While the church was based on an actual church in Massachusetts, the town hall was a completely original design by Ed Cutler, a fair representation of the early 1800's Greek Revival style.In a typical village, it was at the town hall that the villagers met in formal session to debate their local problems and to vote and elect local and national representatives. It was the center of everything that went on in a small country community, and when village business was not being conducted, local and traveling performing groups used the stage to entertain with song, dance, and melodrama.Although at one time, during the 1940's and 1950's, this town hall was used as a school (as were many of the buildings in the Village - a unique "learning by doing" experiment Mr. Ford attempted and, to an extent, succeeded at), it is now used for the song, dance, and melodrama of which bring back the vaudeville days of old.



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