Franklin Hall, now the Palais Theatre, was built in the centre of the small riverside town of Franklin, in southern Tasmania, to hold 560 people. The arresting presence of the Theatre raises immediate questions in the mind of a thoughtful visitor: Why was it built? Why is it so large? What is its present purpose? How has it survived? This book, written to celebrate the Theatre’s centenary, aims to provide some of the answers. It explores the origin of Franklin Town Hall as the successor to the Huon Mechanics’ Institute of 1858, the enduring connections between the two buildings, the part both buildings on the same site have played in the lives of the local community, the ways in which the fortunes of the buildings have reflected the priorities and the aspirations of the people they served, the reasons for the survival of the building through a century of momentous change, and why it still fulfils the original purposes for which it was built.