I Remember the Valhalla Hall

Hurt and bewildered, I must remember the Valhalla Hall as today the building is torn down.  It is so very sad that this old building is not a restoration. My first public appearance probably was at the Valhalla Hall, a song accompanied on the piano by my mother.  She was ten when she gave a piano solo at the hall, with much praise.   

2008

The Swedish Order of Valhalla was a men’s organization from 1884, they built the hall in 1905, it represented the architectural style of American Renaissance.  It served as an interim venue for First Swedish Lutheran Church of Tacoma when First Lutheran’s second building burned in November, 1924. The group sold the hall in the 1990s, in 2008 a group associated with the Allen AME leased the building to try to remodel it as a similar performance and activity hall.  The group removed the interior: that included removal of the original horsehair insulation, an architectural detail that had made activities at the hall hard to insure.

The Swedish Order of Valhalla was a men’s Masonic-type group.  The Order of Runeberg, the Swedish-Finnish Group my mother’s family could belong to,  in the 1960s began to  meet at the new, accessible Wild West VFW Hall because many of their members could no longer climb the stairs to the second floor where meetings and events were held.

2017

During the activity at MLK during the subarea plans I did enter comments about the hall and I allowed an interview for the project, which was included among others in a video about the history at the Tacoma MLK subarea.

The Allen AME fell short of attaining the necessary funding for their project, as far as I know the new project there will be a housing building that had promised to reflect the hall.  Some were uncertain that the new project intends to reflect the appearance of the old hall.  And now the hall is torn down. 

Stairs 1995

During interior removal

Since 2009 I have done some volunteer work at the Scandinavian Immigrant Experience Archives at Pacific Lutheran University, where the Valhalla Archives are kept,  with the guidance of the archivist I was able to help advance the Valhalla Papers preservation.