Built in 1849, the three-story McAdams and Morford Building in front of you is also known as Melodeon Hall. Look up at the Italianate cast iron facade that was added after 1857; in 2017 a vehicle damaged the building and repair workers uncovered arches from that cast iron facade that had been hidden by previous remodeling. For more than a century the corner retail space was home to druggists McAdams & Morford, who occupied it from 1898 to 1994.
Inside, Lexington's Melodeon Hall once seated 300 patrons; in 1861 Robert Jefferson Breckinridge addressed a gathering here, and his remarks helped to preserve Kentucky as a Union state during the American Civil War, although Kentucky maintained separate Union and Confederate state governments during the war. The building also housed the University of Kentucky (Transylvania University) Commercial College for 35 years under the direction of Wilbur R. Smith; in 1908 the college was incorporated separately as the Wilbur R. Smith Business College. Even pop culture nods appear here: the McAdams and Morford logo is on the cover of the 2000 album The Sickness by Disturbed.
Notice the cast iron arches uncovered in 2017 — hidden for decades beneath the Italianate facade added after 1857.