Built in 1917 by Columbia black businessman Fred McKinney, the two-story McKinney Building housed various businesses at street level, and when completed it was heralded as well finished and praised for being among the first to offer public restrooms. Its second floor, known as McKinney Hall, became in the 1920s-1940s the hottest spot in town for black musicians, with performers including Ella Fitzgerald, Dizzy Gillespie, Louis Armstrong, and Billie Holiday. Patrons entered by a back stairway and paid 25 cents at the door. After McKinney's death, the Hall closed, and in the 1950s the building was converted to a chicken hatchery while first-floor retail businesses included Tony's Pizza and Foster's Key and Repair, which repaired bicycles for black children at no charge.