St. Paul. The GAR supported the project, with the agreement that a room in the capitol would be dedicated to veterans. Their request was honored; visitors to the capitol today can still see veteran-related artifacts on display in the rotunda. Although conclusive documentation cannot be found, it appears that a similar arrangement was made at the time that plans were being made for the Saint Louis County Courthouse: it would include a Soldiers Memorial Room. This is supported by the fact that Duluth was so large that it boasted three different GAR posts: Joshua B. Culver Post #128, Willis A. Gorman Post #13, and the Rutherford B. Hayes Post (which did not last long). , In his design, Burnham devoted a significant portion of the main floor of the new courthouse to the Soldiers Memorial Room. It comprised a library, stage, auditorium, dining room, and kitchen, and was furnished in a style consistent with the courthouse as a whole. The blueprints for the structure, drafted on oversized sheets of linen, are displayed at the Saint Louis County Courthouse. An elegant monument In the 1920s, the Soldiers Memorial Room started to be known as "Memorial Hall." Veteran activity at Memorial Hall was still significant, and the Joshua Culvar GAR Post decided to install a new flagpole outside the courthouse. Cass Gilbert—who had designed the U.S. Supreme Court building in Washington, D.C.—was hired to create it. The flagpole features a memorial at its base dedicated to the members of the post, the "Sailors and Soldiers Monument." Paul Wayland Bartlett, who is perhaps best known for sculpting the pediment for the House of Representatives at the U.S. Capitol building, also sculpted the image of a knight that sits at the front of the monument. Veteran interest declines With the passage of time came a reduction in the membership of the GAR posts. In 1926, the two remaining GAR posts merged to become the Gorman-Culver Post #13. The Hall also began to be used by United Spanish War veterans: in 1954, the John McEwen Camp No. 6 made use of the hall to celebrate their 56th anniversary. The veterans who returned from World War II did not embrace the hall as had previous veterans. Perhaps because of the existence of veteran organizations such as Veterans of Foreign Wars and American Legions, veteran use of the hall gradually dropped off. Simultaneously, local governmental pressure to