Out with the Old 8th: A teeming neighborhood once stood on the grounds of the Capitol complex.

The Pennsylvania Capitol complex occupies approximately 45 acres of ground, mainly to the south and east of the main Capitol building. The sheer size of the buildings and scope of the plan took almost three-quarters of a century to fully develop, but, prior to 1917, the area east of the Capitol was Harrisburg’s 8^th Ward, a densely populated neighborhood.

During the course of the later 19^th century, the 8^th Ward had gained a reputation as one of the “seedier” areas of Harrisburg, full of saloons, gambling dens and houses of prostitution.

But the crowded, narrow alleys and maze of streets also housed thousands of people and many businesses, including the State Street Market and numerous shops, hotels, small manufacturers and synagogues. It consisted of a largely poor, multi-ethnic population that became increasingly African American over time. After the Capitol’s completion in 1906, the “old 8^th” must have looked, to some civic-minded residents, even more squalid by comparison.

So, in 1911, the commonwealth and the city came to an agreement in which the state would gradually buy up the houses, stores, churches and properties within the 8^th ward and raze them to make room for future government buildings. This, it was argued, would serve both Harrisburg in eliminating a vast portion of outdated, often cramped tenements, while allowing architect Arnold W. Brunner to develop an overall plan for a campus of state buildings. By 1917, most of the buying and demolition were complete and, aside from a few homes and churches, barren lots and weeds were all that remained of the “old 8^th.”

The South Office Building was built first in the early 1920s, along with four barrack-like temporary buildings for other state agencies. The North Office was completed in 1929, the Forum (or Education Building) in 1931 and the Finance Building in 1940. The Soldiers’ and Sailors’ Memorial Bridge was planned in honor of all Pennsylvania’s veterans in 1919, but was not completed until 1930.

Arnold Brunner passed away in 1925, well before most of the complex buildings were even begun, and William Gehron and Sydney Ross completed his design. In the 1930s, Fisher Plaza and Soldiers’ and Sailors’ Grove were laid out, but the final piece of Brunner’s plan came in the mid-1980s, when a large, open parking lot was replaced with the Capitol’s East Wing.

The Capitol complex is one of the largest and most successful campaigns of governmental civic building in the United States and a National Historic Landmark, but the history and photographs of the 8^th Ward are equally as important—a view of what is lost, for better or worse, in favor of progress.

Jason Wilson is a historian for the Capitol Preservation Committee.

The lighter photographs show the dense neighborhood shortly before its destruction, with the Capitol dome looming over it. The darker shots depict the “old 8^th” after most of it had been razed to make way for the expansion of the Capitol complex. Photos supplied by the Historic Harrisburg Association and the Capitol Preservation Committee.