What happens to old worn out Kingdom Halls?

gitasatsangha

Seems like there are differnet tier's of Kindgom Halls. The old hall I went too was orginally supposed to be large house, IIRC. When our congregation outgrew it, it was sold to a company next door that build coffins and caskets. so.. now it stores extra inventory. What a fitting end.

What type of hall did you go to? Did you all outgrow it, and what happened to it?

1: Grand Dames of the Witness world: (I.E. on par with the Stanely)

2: Assembly Halls

3: Rich Congregation Halls.. not built by the book, built to taste (and some of these are actually rather nice). The still look like kindgom halls.

4: Plain Jain Windowless Quicky Build Rancher (the majority I reckon.. nothing much to tell.. one size fits all..the blue izod shirt of Kindgom Halls)

5: Old Worn Out Hall from early seventies or even older

6: Older hall which wasn't even supposed to be a hall but which was converted into a a hall. (These get interesting.

7: Rented Property

8: Banquet Room (went to Memorial at one in a Ramada Inn once)

9: Mobil Home Trailer (once used occasionally in SW Virginia as halls.. probably before KH's needed liability insurance)

10: Someones home.

12: Third world lean-to thingy right outta the yearbook!

Stephanus

Here's the Austinmer/Bulli Kingdom Hall:

alt

Undecided

The old wornout JWs just keep going there.

Ken P.

asortafairytale

The hall I went to as a kid was an old stone building...don't know if it was originally supposed to be a kh or not. I do remember it had orange carpeting...yech.

They sold it in '95, or somewhere in there. It is a podiatrist office now. Now there is just a plain, old jw quicky.

~asortafairytale~

rocketman

Well, I know of one that is now a dentist's office.

asleif_dufansdottir

Ours was of the #5 variety...I don't know if it was originally built as a hall or something else. The embarrassment of the circuit...with blue carpeting and gold pews right out of the 70's...the congregation was too cheap to do a remodel (and get rid of windows), though I heard they *finally* got new carpet and maybe even chairs in the mid 90's. It was a small rural hall and it was hysterical to watch elder's wives from the big city, whose husband was there to give a talk, walk in, look around and drop their jaws...they couldn't believe the CO or Society or somebody didn't force the elders to remodel. It was pretty awful (the parking lot wasn't paved either!)

Here's something I was wondering just tonight...who gets the money if the hall is closed up and sold? The congregation members paid for the individual halls themselves, right? So who gets the $ if, for instance, the Society closes the hall up (as I heard they did every once in a while...in a single weekend everything was out and off of it that would declare it a KH, and the building and fixtures sold, the cong members sent off to other halls)? I'm guessing, of course, that the Society pockets the $ for the sale of everything, even though the congregation members paid for it. Am I right?

gitasatsangha

That's a good question. I think in the case where a congregation sells their hall and moves in with another hall, they keep the money, because they are still an NPO. That was my experience at one cong that did so. The elders sold the hall (to a coffin factory), then shared another cong's hall until their's was built (which took about three or four years due to inadequate funding).

The building committee loans are pretty strict. A congregation must follow their plans and advice to the T or they risk having to fund it all themselves. Which, in one case that I know of, they decided to do. This was in the eighties and the congregation was very wealthy.. full of phd's. One of the elders was a locally famous archetect who designed their Hall. It looked nice, had high ceiligns with very adequate sunlight. This man could have desigend churches! (chuckle)

I only know of one congregation that was forcibly dissolved by the Society, with its territory divied up among neighbors. I don't have the full details about it, except that a later CO called the people involved in the decision "Hatchet Men". As for what happened to their funds, and property, I dont know but no doubt it went to Brooklyn.

unclebruce

my old Kingdom Hall is now a Salvation Army Hall.

I wonder if the clashing cymbals and blasting trumpets have cleared the demons out yet?

I can't imagine the backroom of that bland place ever being clear of the stench of broken lives.

unclebruce

gcc2k

Some are sold to Babylon the Great to be used as churches or temples. That one never made any sense to me.

LDH

There is a HUGE KH in Fresno, CA on the corner of Cherry and American Avenues that was in use less than a year ago; today the sign is gone and it is overgrown.

I love it!

What happens to old worn out Kingdom Halls?

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