It is now known as the Juliette Hampton Morgan Memorial Library. When it was built in the early 1960s (?) as joint home of the Library and the Museum, the Library had only the downstairs, and its entrance faced Lawrence Street. When the Museum moved out to Blount Park, the Lawrence entrance was closed and the pictured new one was built to face the parking lot. During that early period,  the Library was quite small and its stacks were located in two 50-foot deep circular pits that were so scary that hardly anyone would brave the descent into them. Once I went all the way to the bottom of one – an eerie six levels down – and found nothing but trash and the smell of urine. Probably the Library Staff was afraid to venture that far below the ground. This site was the location of the girl’s high school in 1900 which became part of Lanier, and I have this dim memory from the 1950s that the old County “Museum of Fine Arts” was situated in a former house or school on this lot and facing High Street.

-Charles Humphries

At left, Montgomery native Juliette Hampton Morgan (1914-1957) was a librarian and civil rights advocate known for her letters to the Montgomery Advertiser attacking the city’s segregationist policies. Her public stance on civil rights attracted the scorn and abuse of white racists, leading to her apparent suicide.