This week’s Back to the Present photograph, provided by the Menominee Range Historical Foundation Museum, is a 1908 view of Norway City Hall.

The 1908 postcard, postmarked Norway, Mich., July 1, 1912, shows the former City Hall, at the southwest corner of Nelson Street that is now Main Street.

The building housed the city offices, police and fire departments. When this photograph was taken, probably shortly after the building opened, the First National Bank was in the northeast corner of the first floor.

Madame Ernestine Schumann-Heink, one of the world’s greatest contraltos, opened the hall’s auditorium with a concert on the evening of March 26, 1908. The famed singer was paid $1,000 for her performance and a Steinway piano was shipped from Milwaukee, as the company provided a piano for all her concerts, as well as a tuner who was a member of her party.

Schumann-Heink sang about half of the program in German and the rest in Italian, English and French.