Pintala Grange Hall - Montgomery, Alabama - Grange Halls on Waymarking.com

Pintlala, Alabama, is located south of Montgomery, Alabama, in rural Montgomery County. Around 1874 or 1875, the people of the community built a Grange Hall for meetings of the organization. According to the historical marker at the original site: "The National Grange of the Patrons of Husbandry was organized in 1867 to provide economic, social and cultural improvements for farmers and their families. Pintlala's Grange Hall was erected circa 1875 on land adjacent to this marker. By the 1890s the popularity of the Grange began to wane. On July 21-23, 1891 the last meeting of the Alabama Granges took place in Pintlala. The Federal Land Bank was organized as the National Farm Loan Association of Pintlala on August 17, 1917. Grange Hall was the site of their regular meetings."

After the last meeting of the Grange, the people decided to keep using the hall. Among other uses, it became the local school. The historical marker notes: "From circa 1880 to 1922 school was held in one room of Grange Hall for seven months a year. Pintlala School was built and opened in 1923 and the Board of Education purchased the Grange property. The building was used for home economics classes and, from 1931 to 1952, served as home for Pintlala School caretakers. Over the years it was site of community dances, a meeting place for Boy and Girl Scouts, and the Pintlala Baptist Church (1960). Vacant and deteriorating, the building was given to the Landmarks Foundation and moved in 1978 to Old Alabama Town, Montgomery, Alabama."

More information on the Pintlala Grange Hall and the move to Montgomery can be found in "Old Alabama Town: An Illustrated Guide," by Mary Ann Neeley (The University of Alabama Press, 2002, ISBN 0-8173-1179-3 ).

"From its organization in 1873, the Pintlala Grange followed the path of other and throughout the next twenty years welcomed men and women into membership; in fact, the Grange was one of the first national groups, with the exception of churches and social clubs, to have women as individual members. The rolls note "farmer's wife," "teacher," and "farmer's daughter." The meetings, conducted according to certain rules and rites, focused on programs designed to inform and to bring people together. There were frequent picnics, dinners, and singings; the Pintlala inventories list paraphernalia for rituals and utensils for social affairs.

The Grange did not, theoretically, have a political agenda, but its members did hold public office and there was cooperation between it and the Farmers Alliance on certain issues. Failing to solve the many agricultural problems, by the 1890s the Grange was all but dead; however, it had paved the way for the Alliance, the Farmers' Wheel, and the Populist Party movement in Alabama. The last state meeting of the Grange took place in the Pintlala Grange Hall in 1892, but the building's agricultural usefulness did not end there. In 1917 the Federal Land Bank Association organized as the National Farm Loan Association of Pintlala whose members consisted of borrowers on farm property in Montgomery' Lowndes, and Crenshaw Counties under the provisions of the Federal Land Loan Act. Meetings of this group, which became the Alabama Farm Bureau, continued for several years in Pintlala, thus giving the Grange Hall another distinction in agricultural history.

The Grange Hall was also the school, and until 1922, the building served as the elementary facility for the area. Later it was a residence, the community library, and a meeting place for Boy Scouts and other groups; several people remembered going to square dances there during the 1920s. In the late 1970s, the Board of Education gave the by the? abandoned structure to Landmarks Foundation which brought it to Old Alabama Town. Restored, it has a vital role as Grange Hall School, a specialized program for elementary classes. This building in many ways exemplifies the agricultural dilemmas faced by southern farmers attempting to cope with the new order in the post-Civil War era. The Grange was perhaps most beneficial because of its focus on educational and social goals and in proving that farmers could work together for the common good."

County: Montgomery Chapter Name (number): Pintlala Grange No. 175 Is The Chapter Active?: No

Visit Instructions:
To post a visit to an existing Grange Hall waymark, you will need to post a picture of the front of the building, with the name of the chapter in the background if that is possible. Including your gps device in the picture is not neccesary, but wouldn't be cause for disapproval. If your Grange Hall has any unusual or unique features that you feel others would enjoy viewing, additional pictures are always welcome.

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Date Logged Log User Rating   06/02/2019 ORDIMIC visited it