Edward Harris, a leading Woonsocket industrialist, constructed the earliest part of the building in 1856, and it was known as the Harris Block, with stores on the first floor, and an auditorium hall seating 1,100 on the third floor.

This brick structure has elements of Italianate styling, including round-arch windows and a heavily dentilled cornice.

A major Richardsonian Romanesque addition, called the Granite Block, was made to the north of this structure in 1891.

In March 1860 Abraham Lincoln spoke to a packed crowd in Harris Hall, which at the time contained one of the largest assembly rooms in the state.

This article about a Registered Historic Place in Providence County, Rhode Island is a stub.