Lackawanna County Courthouse (Scranton, Pennsylvania)

 courthouse, Romanesque (architecture), NRHP - National Register of Historic Places, 1884_construction

The Courthouse (1884). The courthouse is the original building built in the early 1880s for the new county in a highly decorative Romanesque style. The front is the north side toward Washington Street. There is a large projected square tower at right and a smaller projected turret tower at left . The square tower is very decorative with grillwork and raised and recessed stonework. Three elaborate, almost furniture-like, gables topped with finials decorate the complex roof line. Also to the left, the Linden Street side, is a squat, rectangular 1974 annex faced with stone and connected by a covered hallway.

Plans are currently (2006) afoot to raze this annex and return the courthouse and square to their original condition. A couple of the office buildings surrounding the square contain courthouse annexes. The interior has been renovated and modernized, and quoting Williams: "The interior changes, which evidently began in the 1960s, are one of the worst examples of courthouse modernization."

www.mapsofpa.com/countyseatsd.htm
www.lackawannacounty.org

The courthouse is currently undergoing major renovations. Photos 2,3,4 are from www.SurfScranton.com, contributed by the photographer.

200 Adams Avenue, Scranton PA 18503;
phone: 570-963-6800.