117 Lower Brick Row
Fort Riley, KS 66442, USA

Fort Riley, Building No. 117, 117 Lower Brick Row, Riley, Riley County, KS

Building #117 represents the brick double officers quarters constructed for non-commissioned officers during the late 1880`s expansion of Fort Riley. Its plain brick walls, brick segmental arch lintels and rock-faced limestone sills and foundation are repeated in the duplexes, Building #119 and #121 on Lower Brick Row along with the single quarters, Building #73, on Holbrook Avenue, and suggest their designation for use by non-commissioned officers. These buildings contrast markedly with both the smooth-face limestone quarters of the 1850s and the later rock-face limestone quarters of the late-nineteenth to early-twentieth centuries. Buildings #117, #119 and #121, all built in 1889, are unique because of their double facade design. They have an entry way on either side elevation, neither of which faces onto the street. Also, these buildings have a unique multi-gabled hipped roof not seen on any other quarters on post including Building #73 Holbrook. The main block has a hipped roof, but at each corner there is a front-facing gable roof. Historically, all the buildings of Lower Brick Row were built after the fort became designated as a school for the training of cavalry and light-artillery forces in 1886. Lower Brick Row`s out-of-the-way location, west of the main post, suggests the fort`s renewed vigor and physical expansion during the late-nineteenth century, and the military`s continuing effort to group officers of similar rank.