Built in 1839 on the initiative of Quaker schoolmaster Benjamin Hallowell, it has been listed on the National Register of Historic Places since May 27, 1969, the year of its purchase by the city.

After the war, the Lyceum was dissolved and John Bathurst Daingerfield bought the building for his daughter Mary Helen and her husband, Philip Hooe, who was a descendant of the town's first mayor, merchant Robert Townshend Hooe.

[5] In 1937, a separate building was constructed about four blocks north (on the site of the former Quaker graveyard) to house the growing city's library, which was the scene of a sit-in in 1942 and now is one of several branches.

The Office of Historic Alexandria is accredited by the American Alliance of Museums and is a member of the International Coalition of Sites of Conscience.

This article about a property in Alexandria, Virginia on the National Register of Historic Places is a stub.