War Memorial Building (Nashville, Tennessee) - Live Music Venue in Nashville

The War Memorial Building is a state office building in Nashville, Tennessee. It contains a 2,000-seat performance hall called the War Memorial Auditorium.

Venue

War Memorial Building (Nashville, Tennessee)

Address

301 6th Avenue North

Town

Nashville, US

Capacity

2,000

The War Memorial Building is a state office building in Nashville, Tennessee. It contains a 2,000-seat performance hall called the War Memorial Auditorium. Built in 1925, it served as home of the Grand Ole Opry between 1939 and 1943. It is also known as the Tennessee War Memorial or simply the War Memorial. It is located across the street from, and is governed by, the Tennessee Performing Arts Center, and is also adjacent to the Tennessee State Capitol. It received an architectural award at the time of its construction, and was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 2017. After the conclusion of World War I, the Tennessee Historical Society, the Nashville Engineering Association, and veterans groups began plans to erect a building in Nashville to memorialize the soldiers who had lost their lives in the conflict. This effort soon found an ally with the Tennessee Capitol Association, which required space for state offices and the storage of states collection of memorabilia. While there was some public support for building a classical structure adjacent to the Parthenon in Centennial Park, Governor Albert H. Roberts supported construction of a building on land between Union, Sixth, Seventh, and Cedar (now Charlotte) streets, very close to the State Capitol building designed by William Strickland. Chapter 122 of The Public Acts of 1919, also known as the Tennessee Memorial Act, enabled the state to acquire this land and build a memorial hall for offices and public assembly. The act also included provisions for memorial parks to be constructed next to the building and ensured that the names of the 3,400 Tennesseans killed in World War I would be etched on the exterior of the hall. The cost of construction, which exceeded $2.5 million, was paid for with $600,000 from the city of Nashville, $1,000,000 from Davidson county, and $1 million from the state of Tennessee. A three-person committee of out-of-state architects was commissioned to choose an architect a