Erie County Savings Bank
16 Niagara Street, Shelton Square, Buffalo, NY
Demolished 1968
History Beneath Illustrations
1905 photo Postcard "This building is of pink granite from Jonesboro, Maine." - Juanita and Steve Maine Quarry Historians Postcard Postcard Postcard Postcard Postcard Salvaged carved granite face Ad |
September 11, 1890 to June 1893 | |
Architect: |
George B. Post (also designed the Statler
Hotel on Delaware Avenue) A competition was held among 24 architects. See Johanna Hays, Louise Blanchard Bethune: Architect Extraordinaire and First American Woman Architect, Practiced in Buffalo, New York, pp. 202-203 (online Nov. 2012) |
Style: |
Richardsonian Romanesque |
General setting and orientation: |
Bank faced northeast on Niagara Street. Bounded on the west by Pearl Street, on the south by Church Street, and on the east by Main Street |
Entrance: |
Niagara Street. Round compound archway, surmounted by a balustrade flanked by bronze lions. |
Wall construction: |
Slightly dressed, red granite, ashlar masonry walls backed by brick |
Stonework: |
Pink granite from Jonesboro, Maine. Charles Athern, sculptor. (Source: Juanita and Steve, Maine Quarry Historians) |
Structural system, framing: |
Although the exterior walls were load-bearing, the building had an interior steel framing system |
Consulting engineer in charge of electrical installation: |
Thomas A. Edison |
Height: |
Nine stories high on Main Street side; ten stories high on the Pearl Street side |
Foundation: |
Concrete; 7 - 13 feet thick |
Prior building on the site: |
"Old First" Presbyterian Church |
Demolition date: |
The building was demolished for the Harrison and Abramovitz-designed Erie Saving Bank/Main Place Mall Tower on Main at Church Streets in Buffalo in 1968 |
Photos and history: |
HABS Survey/Historic
American Engineering Record - Erie County Savings Bank 12 photos, 6 data pages. TYPE: Erie County Savings Bank |
TEXT SOURCE: |
Susan R. Slade, 1973 on Historic
American Buildings Survey/Historic American Engineering Record - Erie County Savings
Bank 12 photos, 6 data pages. |
The bank was a
glorious castle like building sitting prominently on Shelton Square at
Main and Niagara Streets until it was demolished to make way for the Main Place Mall and a new Erie County Savings Bank office tower.
It is one of Buffalo’s most lamented losses. It was demolished at
a time of vigorous “urban renewal” in which the goal was to seemingly
remove every trace of the historic city of Buffalo. The old bank building in pictures was dark and hulking. It was rendered in the Richardson Romanesque style, with heavily rusticated blocks of pinkish granite trimmed by delicate carvings. Its years of accumulated soot cast a quite dramatic contrast to the gleaming white One M&T Plaza, just across the street, which was completed just before demolition of the Erie Savings was started. - David Steele, "Erie County Savings" on Buffalo Rising, Jan. 30, 2017 |
Reprint Buffalo: Lake City in Niagara Land By Richard C. Brown and Bob Watson USA: Windsor Publications, 1981, p. 280 |
Page by Chuck LaChiusa
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