The new LOM building towers upon popular, historical soil. According to Bermuda Archives, the property was purchased in 1845 by James Richardson who built a large house in 1847.

The house, in a very fashionable location in those days on 27 Reid Street, was a grocery store on the lower floor and a boarding house on the second floor.

Eventually it passed to Nathaniel Butterfield and then to the Lee family.The founder of the Royal Gazette , Donald McPhee Lee lived in the house known then as "Orange House''. In 1853 the Royal Gazette was produced from this location for 68 years until 1921.

The book, "The Royal Gazette Ltd. 1828-1978'', describes that the printing office occupied the western portion of the house, the stationery department the corresponding corner, and the remainder of the building was used for residential purposes.

In 1900 the newspaper became semi-weekly, and the whole of the ground floor was given over to the paper.

According to the late Marion Robb, a Gazette reporter, the house was given its name "because many, many years ago the street was bordered with orange trees, which were afterwards replaced with `Pride of India' trees and there now remains nothing but an up-to-date concrete pavement with no relief at all such as these trees afforded.'' In recent years the building housed `The Bermuda Book Store', `GE Corner' and the `Bermuda Railway Company'.

"Orange House'' circa 1850: A 19th drawing of the original building at 27 Reid Street.