There was once a time when every city had a market house.  Bustling with activity and color, they were rich community places, central to the urban life of the late nineteenth century.  Today, Centre Wheeling's two Market Houses remain such places.

Built in 1853, the Upper Market House is the only cast iron columned market house in the country.  The building has 54 hollow Roman Doric columns cast in Wheeling, Virginia.  Every other column innovatively acted as a downspout for the roof The building was constructed as an open market, but was enclosed in 1886.  This market house has been in continuous operation since the mid-nineteenth century.

The Lower Market House, built in 1890, is a Romanesque brick structure.  The central brick arches are adorned with four carved, round, concave, stone medallions.  Beaded mouldings contain a ram head, a bull head, a stallion head and a boar head, carved in full relief.

Flanking the two Market Houses are almost uninterrupted sequences of historic commercial buildings.  Many of these, along with the Market itself are listed on the National Register of Historic Places.