2. The Grand Dome Was Added Later

The current dome, with its coffered ceiling, was added in 1912, a little over a century after the completion of City Hall in a restoration by Grosvenor Atterbury – but it is actually the third dome to be in this space. The first was destroyed in an 1858 fire when fireworks were set off the roof. Atterbury replaced the dome with a structure of concrete, and lowered and widened the dome.

10 corinthian columns support this dome and the rotunda below is where Abraham Lincoln and Ulysses S. Grant both lay in state after their deaths. It was only in 1976, when City Hall was deemed an interior landmark that the rotunda became open to the public and protected from alterations.