September 10, 201311 yr A succinct, yet most veracious demonstration of Ohio from last century. Interesting enough, I believe the Madison County Courthouse design was a smaller replication of this building.
September 11, 201311 yr ^I can totally see that. "You don't just walk into a bar and mix it up by calling a girl fat" - buildingcincinnati speaking about new forumers
September 12, 201311 yr A similar fate befell the Marion County Courthouse (1876-1963), in Indianapolis. Demolition, late 1962, with the City-County Building, which was the tallest building in the city for most of the 1960s.
September 12, 201311 yr Now I'm even MORE sad at that Indianapolis one! "You don't just walk into a bar and mix it up by calling a girl fat" - buildingcincinnati speaking about new forumers
September 12, 201311 yr Looks like both buildings had their towers removed. Was there some defect that prevented this sort of architecture from surviving?
September 12, 201311 yr Looks like both buildings had their towers removed. Was there some defect that prevented this sort of architecture from surviving? i don't think the building's tower was removed in Indy - just a different angle. Also, i happen to think the defect lies elsewhere, not in the architecture...
September 13, 201311 yr ^If you scroll over, you can see a portion of Marion County's tower was removed as well. Many courthouse towers have been removed over the years (Grant Co, IN; Randolph Co, IN; Porter Co, IN; Lorain Co, OH; Defiance Co, OH; Jefferson Co, OH; and Clark Co, OH; are some I can think of off hand); sometimes it was modernization, sometimes fire or storm, sometimes a structural issue. I would not be surprised if historic buildings were not properly engineered, but many times that certainly meant that they were over-engineered.
March 1, 201411 yr 10TV posted a video from their video vault documenting the destruction of one of Columbus' lost treasures. From their 10tv.com: Video Vault: The Storied Past Of The Greater Columbus Convention Center COLUMBUS, Ohio - In 1965, Columbus’ Union Station was seeing little use. More than 10 years later, demolition of the 80-year-old building began. The demolition would make way for Battelle Hall, which would later become part of the Greater Columbus Convention Center, the site of this weekend’s Arnold Sports Festival. The main archway of Union Station was the only piece to be saved and now overlooks a park across from Nationwide Arena. http://www.10tv.com/content/sections/video/index.html?ooid=ZyZDd4azrISpCbhuhn-bEEYxfmNB-poY&cmpid=share
March 1, 201411 yr Fantastic! Thank you. "You don't just walk into a bar and mix it up by calling a girl fat" - buildingcincinnati speaking about new forumers
March 2, 201411 yr We could have had a convention center that looked like that. It was one of the three choices.
March 2, 201411 yr We could have had a convention center that looked like that. It was one of the three choices. Really? I didn't know that. Who in the Hell chose the monstrosity that we got stuck with?
March 3, 201411 yr BTW, some have asked me exactly where the station was. Union Station was a strange design because it had a colonnade facade along High Street (since mimicked by the cap over I-670). But the actual station building was off High Street, reached by a roadway and a walkway. Looking south along High Street toward downtown..... Here's a copyrighted graphic showing the High Street facade with the station building and accessways between them..... http://www.artistmichaeldickinson.com/ImagesLithographs/Closeups/UnionStationH.JPG Here is a graphic from the terrific site columbusrailroads.org if you want to learn about Columbus' railroad history..... Labels are here: http://tinyurl.com/l5sy3u4 "In the souls of the people the grapes of wrath are filling and growing heavy, growing heavy for the vintage." -- John Steinbeck
March 4, 201411 yr We could have had a convention center that looked like that. It was one of the three choices. Really? I didn't know that. Who in the Hell chose the monstrosity that we got stuck with? I don't remember. The Dispatch covered the proceedings obviously. The renderings aren't on the internet at all. Apparently the OSU library system has those at least.
March 8, 201411 yr Columbus really had a lot of stations. There was one just west of Union Station, one just east of the 670 and 71 interchange, one in Franklinton and a small one at Grandview.
March 18, 201411 yr SMH......why Lord, why???? Just imagine if we would have preserved some that history! Columbus is like an old refrigerator, can't keep $h!t
March 19, 201411 yr Wow, that is a really weird design... The reason why it was set east of High Street like that is because the busiest passenger rail service at Columbus, the Pennsylvania Railroad, had its St. Louis-New York City mainline curve southwest of High Street. So having the main station building be placed right on High or even underneath it wasn't possible. Railroads often placed stations where it best suited their operations, rather than customers. Of course, many times a city built up around a station wherever it was located. That didn't happen at Columbus because of the many freight houses surrounding it and I think the city felt the station colonnade along High Street was sufficient integration in the urbanscape. One place there a city didn't build up around a station was Buffalo's Central Station, which was built in 1929 several miles east of downtown. I suspect a second downtown would have risen around that station had it been built a decade earlier. But the Great Depression, followed by WWII followed by the postwar sprawl all be prevented Buffalo's station area from becoming anything resembling a supportive land use. "In the souls of the people the grapes of wrath are filling and growing heavy, growing heavy for the vintage." -- John Steinbeck
January 15, 201510 yr Miami University Libraries has a large collection of old Ohio postcards on Flickr. Here are some of their Columbus postcards. More can be found here https://www.flickr.com/photos/muohio_digital_collections/ Birds Eye View West, Columbus, O. by Miami U. Libraries - Digital Collections, on Flickr High St. at Night by Miami U. Libraries - Digital Collections, on Flickr View of South High St. by Miami U. Libraries - Digital Collections, on Flickr View from Capitol Showing Business Section by Miami U. Libraries - Digital Collections, on Flickr Ohio State Capitol by Miami U. Libraries - Digital Collections, on Flickr High Street showing Neil House by Miami U. Libraries - Digital Collections, on Flickr Franklin-County Court House by Miami U. Libraries - Digital Collections, on Flickr Post Office and Custom House by Miami U. Libraries - Digital Collections, on Flickr Columbus City Hall by Miami U. Libraries - Digital Collections, on Flickr
January 15, 201510 yr Thanks for these vintage postcards and the links, Eridony. I really do like these idealized snapshots of the past. And when I say "idealized", that first postcard of "Birds Eye View West" really shows it. This is a 1909 view from approximately where the LeVeque Tower is now (it wasn't built until 1927). But it looks toward the Broad Street Bridge, the Scioto River and the Scioto Peninsula in Franklinton. Looks ideal with all the quaint brick buildings lining the river, doesn't it? Well, those quaint brick buildings were industrial buildings. What kind of industry? Think tanneries and rendering factories. Think sewage and industrial waste draining directly into the Scioto River. Then think what that area must've looked like only 4 years later, after the Great Flood of 1913 roared though there!! I also liked the handwritten note on the "Ohio State Capitol" postcard. Couldn't make out all the writing, but I think it said "this is a beautiful place, but the (something) look (something) to me". An early 20th century version of a messageboard post! Huzzah!!!
January 15, 201510 yr Thanks for these vintage postcards and the links, Eridony. I really do like these idealized snapshots of the past. And when I say "idealized", that first postcard of "Birds Eye View West" really shows it. This is a 1909 view from approximately where the LeVeque Tower is now (it wasn't built until 1927). But it looks toward the Broad Street Bridge, the Scioto River and the Scioto Peninsula in Franklinton. Looks ideal with all the quaint brick buildings lining the river, doesn't it? Well, those quaint brick buildings were industrial buildings. What kind of industry? Think tanneries and rendering factories. Think sewage and industrial waste draining directly into the Scioto River. Then think what that area must've looked like only 4 years later, after the Great Flood of 1913 roared though there!! I also liked the handwritten note on the "Ohio State Capitol" postcard. Couldn't make out all the writing, but I think it said "this is a beautiful place, but the (something) look (something) to me". An early 20th century version of a messageboard post! Huzzah!!! Yes that first one is definitely Broad Street with industrial buildings where COSI and Vets Memorial are today. In fact if you look all the way on the right you see a railroad bridge that is still there today.
January 16, 201510 yr Great stuff! "You don't just walk into a bar and mix it up by calling a girl fat" - buildingcincinnati speaking about new forumers
January 16, 201510 yr And it's fun to try to guess the years. The one looking south on High, with the Statehouse to the right would be from about 1903 or 1904 because only one of the narrow Frank Packard towers is standing on Broad at High. I believe the second one was built about 1905. And the shot of the Post Office/Customs House is from before the addition and change in style, which I believe was done in the 1890s.
January 11, 20178 yr Quite an impressive photo of central Columbus in 1955. http://www.racked.com/2017/1/10/14214976/columbus-ohio-mall-shopping-limited-abercrombie "You don't just walk into a bar and mix it up by calling a girl fat" - buildingcincinnati speaking about new forumers
January 12, 20178 yr The Beacon Building is not there yet. Are you sure it's 1955? That's what it was quoted as being but I also was skeptical of that date. "You don't just walk into a bar and mix it up by calling a girl fat" - buildingcincinnati speaking about new forumers
January 12, 20178 yr Skyline shot! https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/ *Ding ding* http://columbusneighborhoods.org/ The ORIGINAL cap (without Stack City Burgers)... http://www.shorpy.com/ What goes up...will come down :( https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/ "You don't just walk into a bar and mix it up by calling a girl fat" - buildingcincinnati speaking about new forumers
January 12, 20178 yr Oh, St. John's isn't being torn down after all. http://www.dispatch.com/content/stories/local/2016/08/31/St.-John-to-stay.html#
January 12, 20178 yr Even that article can't hide at least, "- not in the forseeable future,". I give it 10 years (though I HOPE I'm wrong). "You don't just walk into a bar and mix it up by calling a girl fat" - buildingcincinnati speaking about new forumers
January 12, 20178 yr I barely recognize anything in that shot. If it wasn't for the Statehouse I'd be totally lost.
January 12, 20178 yr I don't think I've ever seen any photos of Union Station other than Burnham's colonnade along High... was the actual station building anything special? “To an Ohio resident - wherever he lives - some other part of his state seems unreal.”
January 15, 20178 yr I'm pretty sure that is the Ohio Bell building. My sister was working there back then, when it was brand new. We thought it was the cat's a$$. I still like that building. Just look at the area around Nationwide.....nothing! The old train station was still standing and it was a total mess. No matter what anyone says, the area between Chestnut and Goodale was a wreck. The bridge over High Street was in such disrepair that you could see the rails through the cracks and missing cement int he sidewalk and railings, the once glorious face of the train station was crumbling and completely neglected by everyone, especially the city. Inside the train station was worse--the plaster was falling everywhere and there were plastic sheets stretched over holes in the ceiling etc. But the floors had the highest gloss I've ever seen! Go figure. The saving grace of the whole area was the Moneypenny Hammond building on the west side of the viaduct, which was torn down when they rebuilt High Street. C'est la vie. The are south of Broad Street had not a single high rise. SoMa (my version of South of Main) was a disaster as well. The area around the once unbelievable courthouse had become something of an urban blight on the way to an ever improving German Village. The Southern Hotel was a fleabag, and really run down. The courthouse itself had so many modifications and "modernizations" that it was barely recognizable from earlier photographs. The tower had been removed decades before and the mansard roofs had been modified, with stucco boxes on top. Inside the courthouse was amazing though. Totally untouched! Plus, where the current courthouse now is, was a row of wooden, completely dilapidated, rotting, battleship gray painted buildings which were largely abandoned throughout the 60s and early 70s. Other than that the downtown was faboo. Actually, downtown was terrific. Nothing much in the skyscraper department, but street level was really pretty busy. There were lots of great stores, lots of great restaurants (especially if you like greasy spoons, like I do), and surprisingly good architecture, much of which has been torn down in the name of progress--aka City Center. Back to sorting old pictures and I'll see what I can come up with. You really piqued my interest with the mention of the Moneypenny Hammond Building. I found a page with some pictures of the west side of High Street from that era including the Monypeny Hammond Co. Building on Columbus Railroads (can't post link due to low post count, but as a long time lurker I'm going to work on that). What a great building.
March 4, 20178 yr My old barbershop gone :(. "You don't just walk into a bar and mix it up by calling a girl fat" - buildingcincinnati speaking about new forumers
March 4, 20178 yr Yikes. I remember it looking like that but I guess I hadn't thought about it, lately. So much has changed in just a decade.
June 12, 20178 yr Yesterday I was driving thru some of those parts of town and saw new developments going on, interesting.
August 8, 20177 yr "You don't just walk into a bar and mix it up by calling a girl fat" - buildingcincinnati speaking about new forumers
April 24, 20187 yr A LeVeque tribute: And, yeah... "You don't just walk into a bar and mix it up by calling a girl fat" - buildingcincinnati speaking about new forumers
April 27, 20187 yr I've done a lot of searching for pictures of some of the towers that were constructed during the late 80s and early 90s but I have had a surprisingly difficult time finding anything. Even pictures of Miranova Tower have been hard to find (I've only found one). I think I've seen one early-construction picture of Huntington Center going up. I haven't been able to find anything of Riffe Tower, the Franklin County Courthouse tower, Three Nationwide Plaza, or the William Green building. Does anyone have any of these type of pictures, or know where I could easily find them?
June 22, 20186 yr A McTreasure Map! "You don't just walk into a bar and mix it up by calling a girl fat" - buildingcincinnati speaking about new forumers
June 22, 20186 yr Man, Eastland Mall, Northland Mall, Westland Mall, and City Center all on that map. I guess in the 1990s we were a lot more mall focused!
June 22, 20186 yr Man, Eastland Mall, Northland Mall, Westland Mall, and City Center all on that map. I guess in the 1990s we were a lot more mall focused! It seems that a given metro area can only support maybe 1/3 to 1/2 of the malls it could support 20 or 30 years ago, but that the malls that still survive are doing fine. That is why there are so many dead malls everywhere.
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