Butte had over eighty working mines and a teeming population by 1890. The resulting flurry of industrial and commercial activity initiated a building boom, prompting Mayor Henry Mueller to oversee the construction of this handsome three-story Richardsonian Romanesque-inspired municipal building in 1891. The tall, narrow edifice of brick and stone features a clock tower, arched entrance, and arched windows with stained glass transoms. Butte’s last standing example of nineteenth-century civic architecture, this noble hall served as the seat of city government from 1891 until consolidation of city-county governments in 1977.