Qualla: R. J. Reynolds Memorial Auditorium

R. J. Reynolds Memorial Auditorium: Introduction

Sat, 30 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Unknown photographer, Public domain. Katharine Smith Reynolds never saw a single performance in the auditorium she built. The dedication ceremony fell on May 8, 1924. She was hospitalized that day with a difficult pregnancy. She died on May 23, fifteen days after the ribbon was cut on the building she had spent five years willing into existence as a memorial to her first husband, R. J. Reynolds. The R. J. Reynolds Memorial Auditorium has stood on Silver Hill in Winston-Salem ever since, its three-story portico facing downtown, its columns echoing in the school song that students still sing under them.

Image: Unknown photographer | Public domain

R. J. Reynolds Memorial Auditorium: Silver Hill

Sat, 30 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Unknown photographer, Public domain. In 1919, the year after R. J. Reynolds died, his widow Katharine donated a large tract of land then known as Silver Hill to the City of Winston-Salem. The plan she developed was unusual for a memorial. Rather than a single monument, she wanted an entire civic complex: a grand hig...

Image: Unknown photographer | Public domain

R. J. Reynolds Memorial Auditorium: The Architect Who Designed Reynolda

Sat, 30 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Unknown photographer, Public domain. Katharine Reynolds hired Charles Barton Keen, the Philadelphia-trained architect who had designed the Reynolds family estate, Reynolda House, a few miles to the west. Keen took on both the high school and the auditorium, and the two buildings share a deliberate Georgian Revival v...

Image: Unknown photographer | Public domain

R. J. Reynolds Memorial Auditorium: Houdini in November

Sat, 30 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Unknown photographer, Public domain. A few weeks after the dedication, the first commencement of Richard J. Reynolds High School was held inside the auditorium that had been built before its students ever needed it. On November 24, 1924, the building hosted its first famous guest: Harry Houdini, then in the final st...

Image: Unknown photographer | Public domain

R. J. Reynolds Memorial Auditorium: The Grand Lobby

Sat, 30 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Unknown photographer, Public domain. Walk in from Reynolda Road and the Grand Lobby holds two large portraits, one of R. J. Reynolds and one of Katharine Smith Reynolds. Both were painted by Joe King, a Reynolds High graduate who later painted Queen Elizabeth II. Three marble statues, duplicates of famous Italian wo...

Image: Unknown photographer | Public domain

R. J. Reynolds Memorial Auditorium: Amid the Pines

Sat, 30 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Unknown photographer, Public domain. The traditions that Reynolds High students carry through the auditorium are unmistakably of a place. Before every performance, members of the student-run technical crew place roses under Katharine's portrait, in honor of her gift and, depending on which student you ask, to keep h...

Image: Unknown photographer | Public domain