[124] Fairfax County Board of Supervisors, Minute Book, v. 36, 313; v. 39, 544. On April 7, 1965 the Board of Supervisors voted to construct a new office building and authorize a referendum for a $5,500,000 bond issue for this project. The bonds were approved by the voters, and the building was built on a 35-acre tract belonging to Mary Ambler, which was condemned by the city and then purchased by the county from the condemnor. The architect for the project was William Vosbeck, and the contractor was the Blake Construction Company, Fairfax County Board of Supervisors, _Annual Report_, 1968, p. 4. CHAPTER VII THE ARCHITECTURE OF THE COURTHOUSE AND ITS RELATED BUILDINGS 1. THE COURTHOUSE COMPLEX Among the courthouses built in England's North American colonies, those of Virginia developed characteristics which expressed peculiarly well the prevailing patterns of landholding and manner of conducting local government. Unlike New England, where each small community had its frame meeting house, containing within its walls "all the ideals, political, moral, intellectual and religious of the people who attended,"[125] the seats of county government in colonial Virginia were centrally located in rural settings. A few county courthouses grew into regional centers of commerce, industry and finance; but most remained independent and apart from any surrounding community, and some may still be seen today standing "as solitary sentinels, symbolic of government."[126] It was also characteristic of Virginia that these courthouses were not single buildings, but were complexes of several structures. The typical courthouse compound was enclosed by a brick wall, inside which were a courthouse, a jail, a clerk's office, and, sometimes, a row or cluster of offices for lawyers. Invariably, also, an inn or ordinary occupied a site within the compound or immediately adjacent to it. This style of courthouse may be found through Virginia, dating from earliest colonial times; and, although many fine courthouses are found in the early architecture of Delaware, Maryland, Pennsylvania and North Carolina, none of these areas developed the design concept of a courthouse compound.