Two years ago, we wrote about poor old Washington Hall (and poor old Oddfellows Hall and poor old Eagles Aerie #1):

A mile and a half south, in an office on the corner of 14th Avenue and East Fir Street, Charles Adams is sitting in his office in Washington Hall, waiting to talk to a developer. Adams is a lawyer, a wearer of suits and signet rings, and he presides over the Sons of Haiti, an African-American Masonic lodge. A few of the younger Sons, some with dreadlocks, sit quietly. They're waiting for Mark Blatter, a developer from Historic Seattle, to discuss the sale of Washington Hall.

The Hall is a dilapidated building with a dignified history. W. E. B. Du Bois, Marcus Garvey, and Martin Luther King Jr. spoke in its theater and Count Basie played there, as did Ella Fitzgerald, Duke Ellington, Ray Charles, and Jimi Hendrix.

It was built as a community center by a Danish brotherhood, with meeting halls and one-room apartments for new immigrants. In 1973, the Danes sold the building to the Sons of Haiti, who kept the building active, leasing to tenants like On the Boards. But the Sons have grown too small for Washington Hall and let it fall into disrepair. Now there are missing windows, pigeon shit on the inside, and, on the outside, soft green columns of moss and ferns growing up the brick toward the leaky roof. A few people still cling to their one-room apartments; an Ethiopian church rents the drafty theater.

For awhile, it looked like 4Culture and Historic Seattle would buy the building from the Sons of Haiti. Then it looked like the Sons were going to sell to a developer who'd probably tear it down.

Today, 4Culture and Historic Seattle announced that they've won, and bought the building for $1,500,000. The old girl needs a lot of work—a lot of work—but she'll be a hardscrabble looker when she's done, a beauty queen from Seattle's brick-and-timber days.

It will, eventually, become a rehearsal and performance space. (Others who performed there not listed above: Mahalia Jackson, Billie Holiday, and Spalding Grey.)

Good news.