Chautauqua Hall of Brotherhood served as the grand entrance to a 4,000-seat auditorium opened in 1909 for major lectures and special events of the Florida Chautauqua Assembly, replacing a 2,500-seat tabernacle considered too small for the crowds. From 1909 onward, the structure and auditorium welcomed resort and campus guests attending lectures by figures including Vice President Thomas Marshall and William Jennings Bryan, while the second floor housed classes in culinary art and other educational programs, and evenings featured concerts by internationally recognized musicians and orchestras such as the Carrico Orchestra. Resort and campus leaders designed the wooden entrance to resemble the United States Capitol, and fundraising for the new auditorium included sponsored columns backed by Cornelias Vanderbilt, U.S. Senators George Wetmore of Rhode Island and Chauncey Defew of New York, and other notable Americans. In 1898, while the old tabernacle still stood, former Confederate Lieutenant General John B. Gordon laid the cornerstone as a gesture of goodwill to southern area residents, drawing Civil War veterans from North and South to his two-hour orientation; Gordon had commanded one wing of General Robert E. Lee’s army just before Appomattox. When the building finally opened in 1909, nearly ten years after the cornerstone ceremony, its dome was dedicated to “the Soldiers and Sailors of the Republic,” the lantern above the dome to “The Light of Christian Truth,” and the exterior columns to the presidents of the United States. Hurricane Boise destroyed the auditorium section in 1975, and Chautauqua Hall of Brotherhood remains the only structure on the Florida Chautauqua resort and campus grounds individually listed on the National Register of Historic Places, while the other buildings are contributing structures within the registered grounds.