ATLANTA - Crews are battling a major blaze at an abandoned building on the campus of Morris Brown College.
The fire broke out around 7:50 a.m. at Gaines Hall, which is located on the 600 block of Martin Luther King Jr. Drive in northwest Atlanta,
Gaines Hall, once a thriving part of the Atlanta HBCU, has had multiple fire calls in the past 10 years.
The hall, which was built in 1869, was the oldest building on Morris Brown's campus and the first permanent building on its campus.
The brick building in recent years has been known to be a temporary shelter for homeless individuals.
The building caught fire twice in 2023 and once in 2015. At the time, the fire department wanted the building razed, but historical preservationists saved the structure. Two years after the fire, the building became the property of Clark Atlanta University.
The building was named one of the Georgia Trust for Historic Preservation's 2017 Places in Peril. Plans were made to renovate and restore it, but the work hadn't started yet.