Nomination for West Fourth Street Historic District (Boundary Increase)

From the form

The catalogue entry the section above was filed under.

OMB No. 1024-0018 (Rev. 10-90) United States Department of the Interior National Park Service NATIONAL REGISTER OF HISTORIC PLACES REGISTRATION FORM This form is for use in nominating or requesting determinations for individual properties and districts. See instructions in How to Complete the National Register requested. If any item does not apply to the property being documented, enter "N/A" for "not applicable." For functions, architectural classification, materials, and areas of significance, enter only categories and subcategories from the instructions. Place additional entries and narrative items on continuation sheets (NPS 1. Name of Property other names/site numbern/a 2. Location street & number_1- 35, 2-18 West Fourth Street - n/a not for publication city or town_Cincinnati n/a vicinity state Ohio 3.

State/Federal Agency Certification and meets the procedural and professional requirements set forth in 36 CFR Part 60. In my opinion, the property Kmeets -does not meet the National Register Criteria. I recommend that this property be considered significant O nationally O statewide X locally. (O See continuation sheet for additional comments.) Signature of certifying official Ohio Historic Preservation Office, Ohio Historical Society State or Federal agency and bureau In my opinion, the property meets does not meet the National Register criteria. (-] See continuation sheet for additional comments.) Signature of commenting or other official 4. National Park Service Certification 1, hereby certify that this property is: entered in the National Register - See continuation sheet.

determined not eligible for the removed from the National Register other (explain): Date of Action Date National Register Department Head NPS Form 10-900 December 22, 200l historic name - West Fourth Street Historic District, Boundary Increase of Historic Places Registration Form (National Register Bulletin 16A). Complete each item by marking "x" in the appropriate box or by entering the information Form 10-900a). Use a typewriter, word processor, or computer, to complete all items. As the designated authority under the National Historic Preservation Act of1986, as amended, I hereby certify that this nomination O request for determination of eligibility meets the documentation standards for registering properties in the National Register of Historic Places 5.

Classification Ownership of Property Category of Property Number of Resources within Property (Check as many boxes as apply) (Do not include previously listed resources in the count) - x private - building(s) - x public-local x district - public-State - site - public-Federal Name of related multiple property listing Number of contributing resources previously listed in the 6. Function or Use Historic Functions Current Functions commerce/trade: department store commerce/trade: specialty store commerce/trade: business work in progress commerce/trade: financial institution 7.

Description Late Victorian: Renaissance Late Victorian: Eclectic Late 19 & Early 20t Century Revivals: stone, brick, terra cotta Tudor Revival stone, metal, terra cotta, Beaux Arts Late Victorian: Queen Anne (Describe the historic and current condition of the property on one or more continuation sheets.) roof object Foundation Noncontributing Total concrete walls structure limestone synthetics Materials other Architectural Classification Narrative Description National Register (Enter categories from instructions) (Check only one box) (Enter "N/A" if property is not part of a multiple property listing.) West Fourth Street Historic District, United States Department of the Interior National Park Service NATIONAL REGISTER OF HISTORIC PLACES CONTINUATION SHEET West Fourth Street Historic District, Boundary Increase Cincinnati, Hamilton County, Ohio Section 7.

Statement of Description Summary. This nomination proposes a boundary increase for the West Fourth Street Historic District, which was listed in the National Register of Historic Places in 1975. The original nominated area, which was bounded by Fifth, Plum and McFarland streets and Central Avenue, included 39 buildings dating from c. 1840 to 1902. In 1979 the district was expanded eastward to take in 11 additional buildings between Elm and Race streets, built from the 1880s through the 1930s. This proposed expansion area moves the district boundary one block east, to Vine Street: the city's north-south dividing line. It includes all the buildings located along West Fourth between Vine and Race, with the exception of one non-historic structure. All but one of the resources in the area proposed for expansion will contribute to the district's and an elaborate art tile storefront.

It will also provide a more complete picture of the architectural and commercial development of the Fourth Street shopping district. Fourth Street has long been considered the heart of downtown Cincinnati. The buildings in the Fourth Street Historic District survive as an intact remnant of Cincinnati's 19th and density, harmonious scale, pedestrian orientation, and consistent setback, or "street wall." The proposed boundary increase includes an eclectic group of seven, three- to six-story commercial buildings built from 1856 to 1916, and a 29-story office tower built in 1913. With facades of brick, cut stone, terra cotta and art tile, they reflect the Renaissance Revival, High Victorian Eclectic, Commercial Queen Anne, Tudor Revival and Beaux- Arts Classical styles. Most of the buildings have been have been in continuous use since construction.

The district extension's period of significance extends from to 1856 to Setting. Fourth Street, which extends across downtown from east to west, is the city's most urbane avenue. It is a narrow street closely lined with multi-story office and retail 1930, bracketed by construction dates and major renovations of contributing buildings. (8-86) including its second-tallest skyscraper, two rare 19"-century department store buildings, most significant commercial architecture of the mid-19th through early-20"-centuries, early-2o"-century downtown streetscape and skyline.

The district conveys the character and feeling typical of the city's turn-of-the-2o"-century downtown commercial district: buildings, creating a canyon-like effect unique in the city.The stylish, architect-designed significance.The inclusion of these historic properties will recognize some of the city's Known in the first half of the19"-century as the"principal thoroughfare of the city," Section Page United States Department of the Interior National Park Service NATIONAL REGISTER OF HISTORIC PLACES CONTINUATION SHEET West Fourth Street Historic District, Boundary Increase Cincinnati, Hamilton County, Ohio buildings of Fourth Street are built of costly materials. They reflect the street's preeminent position as the city's premier shopping and financial district in the late-19th_ and early-20*-centuries.

The district extends west from Vine Street, the city's "main street" and primary north-south thoroughfare, to Central Avenue, which marks the Excluded from the proposed district extension are two intrusive structures located at parking garage at the northwest corner. 2 West Fourth Street Rapp, Zettel & Rapp, architects Photo 7 Parcel 083-0001-0038-00 Prominently sited at the northwest corner of Fourth and Vine streets, this is a small-scale Beaux-Arts Classical bank building of smooth-dressed ashlar limestone. The central entrance, which faces Vine Street, is contained in a slightly projecting pavilion capped by a triangular pediment: a decorative element repeated at the fourth floor. The first level exhibits large rectangular windows and rusticated stonework. The upper stories are defined by large arcaded windows, a heavy entablature, and pilasters.

The much lower fourth story, which is set back from the building plane, is pierced by small rectangular sash. The David Hummel Company, Cincinnati-based masonry contractors, were contractors for the granite and other stonework. The building's storefront, like those of the adjacent 4-8 and 10-14 West Fourth, was recessed into the building plane in 1969 as part of an arcading project on the north side of Fourth between Vine and Race, intended to give pedestrians a sheltered space to walk in inclement weather. This remodeling was carried out as part of the Fourth Street Area's Pilot Renewal Project. The work was funded by the building owners. 1905 (8-86) Contributing western edge of the Central Business District.(See district map.) Fourth and Race:a1990 indoor shopping mall at the northeast corner and a 1960s 1.

German National Bank Building Section Page United States Department of the Interior National Park Service NATIONAL REGISTER OF HISTORIC PLACES CONTINUATION SHEET Section West Fourth Street Historic District, Boundary Increase Cincinnati, Hamilton County, Ohio 2. McElvey's Building 4-8 West Fourth Street c. 1857-1858 Walter & Wilson, architects Photo 7 Parcels 083-0001-0037-00, 083-0001-0036-00, 083-0001-0035-00 Central Business District. Built to five stories, it is a large, imposing Renaissance Revival commercial building distinguished by an arcaded façade of painted sandstone. "The graduated window fenestration is accentuated by a series of arched bays with Renaissance hoodmolds and keystone bosses. The face is also highlighted by continuous lintels and sills.

Above the entrance is a contemporary alteration with an arched bay containing the Herschede company logo" (Steve Gordon, Ohio Historic Inventory form, 1987). A bracketed cornice completes the structure. The easternmost 35 feet of the building was removed in 1903 to construct the German National Bank Building, and the first story has been extensively modified. The remainder of the building, however, is largely intact. Some of the upper-story windows retain their original 1/1 and 2/2 arched sashes, while others have been replaced with modern thermal units of various configurations.

In July 1857 the Cincinnati Commercial Gazette reported that a five-story, stone-fronted building with "arched, heavily molded windows" was being erected at the northwest (8-86) Contributing buildings, is a rare survivor of mid-19th-century commercial Cincinnati in the heart of the McElvey'Building, like the neighboring Shillito/McAlpin and Mitchell & Rammelsburg Archival postcard view of the German National Bank Building. Page _3_ United States Department of the Interior National Park Service NATIONAL REGISTER OF HISTORIC PLACES CONTINUATION SHEET Section Page West Fourth Street Historic District, Boundary Increase Cincinnati, Hamilton County, Ohio corner of Fourth and Vine streets. The building was to be 100 feet wide and contain four the effect will be similar to one superb building" (Cincinnati Commercial Gazette, July 9, 1902 view of Fourth Street, looking west from Vine.

10 West Fourth Street c. 1883; 1907; 1969 Frank Andrews, architect, 1907 renovation Parcel #083-0001-0034-00 Photo 8 The Woodruff/Gidding Building is a five-story edifice in the Commercial Queen Anne style, characterized by a variety of wall surface decoration, changes in wall plane and varied window treatments. The third through fifth floors, which have not been altered since their original construction, are a bold and lively composition of brick, stone and terra cotta, with little plain wall area. The upper zone is divided vertically into three bays by brick pilasters with foliate capitals, and horizontally by decorative spandrels of carved terra cotta. The center bay is recessed and features an angled oriole at the third story, with arcaded stone balustrade, and a large arched window at the fifth.

Double-hung wood windows with single-pane transoms are set in shallow spandrels defined by fluted and (8-86) 1857). Contributing 3. Woodruff/Gidding Building storefronts."When finished [it] will be among the city's most elaborately finished, so that McElvey's Building at right. buttoned colonnettes. An arcaded, corbelled cornice caps the façade. United States Department of the Interior National Park Service NATIONAL REGISTER OF HISTORIC PLACES CONTINUATION SHEET West Fourth Street Historic District, Boundary Increase Cincinnati, Hamilton County, Ohio appropriate setting for the exuberant, garland-trimmed tile storefront: a "rococo riot of colorful fruit, faces and flowers" (Cincinnati Enquirer, October 4, 2003). The tile and terra cotta enframement was produced by Cincinnati's own Rookwood Pottery.

It was Architect Frank Andrews and Rookwood designer John Wareham were commissioned by Gidding to design a storefront that would showcase their new business, which specialized John Wareham, was bright, colorful and a unique display of artistic craftsmanship. the dramatic upper section, large brackets with applied acanthus leaves are framed by feathered Indian heads. A central cartouche projects approximately four feet from the building plane. The cornice contains an urn with varied colors and floral accents, and a geometric element with floral insets and pediment. At either end are two large urn-like features, adorned with cherubs' heads that overlook the sidewalk below.

The 1907 storefront and the second floor were remodeled again in 1969 as part of a joint Woodruff/Gidding Building Annex.) A new brick panel was added above the storefront of 10-12, in the space formerly occupied by the original transoms. Despite these alterations, the Woodruff/Gidding Building's most significant features were retained; therefore it retains its integrity. The Woodruff/Gidding remodeling was hailed by City Manager William Wichman, "The real key to downtown rebuilding is private initiative and effort" (Cincinnati Post and Times-Star, September 7, 1966). The Rookwood tile façade was restored in 2003 after an inspection revealed it to be in from the Cincinnati Preservation Association in 2003. The tile work features a repeating fruit pattern with bright colors and floral borders.

In (8-86) The three-dimensional, almost sculptural quality of the building's upper stories is an deteriorated condition. The restoration project was honored with a Rehabilitation Award in"correct dress for women."The resulting design, designed by Rookwood president renovation with the recently acquired property at 14-18 West Fourth. (See Building #4, added when the J.M. Gidding Company remodeled the first and second floors in1907. Section ( Page United States Department of the Interior National Park Service NATIONAL REGISTER OF HISTORIC PLACES CONTINUATION SHEET Section Page West Fourth Street Historic District, Boundary Increase Cincinnati, Hamilton County, Ohio 1907 postcard view looking cast on Fourth from Race 4.

Woodruff/Gidding Building Annex (Jenny, Inc., Building) 14-18 West Fourth Street Daniel Burnham, architect Parcel 083-0001-0033-00 Photo 7 As originally constructed in the 1920s, this was a temple-front Neoclassical Revival edifice with stone façade. For many years it housed Jenny, Inc., a fashionable dress shop stores merged to form a new store called Gidding-Jenny. The two buildings were then unified with a common brick panel storefront. This new storefront treatment completely obliterated the original façade of 14-18 West Fourth. 9 West Fourth Street 1913; 1926 Cass Gilbert, architect (8-86) Noncontributing 5. Union Central Life Insurance Company Building 1920s; 1969 Woodruff/Gidding Building (with banner) at center, Woodruff/Gidding Annex at left. that was a competitor of the J.M.

Gidding Company next door.In the1960s the two United States Department of the Interior National Park Service NATIONAL REGISTER OF HISTORIC PLACES CONTINUATION SHEET West Fourth Street Historic District, Boundary Increase Cincinnati, Hamilton County, Ohio Parcel # 083-90001-0044-00 Photo 9 the world and the tallest building outside New York City. The Cincinnati Enquirer larveled at the huge sum spent for the project - some $3 million - and the technologic 'triumph' that had been achieved in the construction of the 'mammoth tower"" (Giglierano & Overmyer, p. 41) The Union Central Life Insurance Building is the last of Cincinnati's great turn-of-the- 20"-century skyscrapers and an outstanding example of the Neo-Classical Revival style. At 495 feet high, the building is the second-tallest in the city.

Rising from a marble-clad base, the 24-story structure is faced with gleaming white terra cotta and topped by an extravagant pyramidal roof. The heavily rusticated lower floors contain tall arched windows with low-relief metal panels and radiating voussoirs. The upper stories are lavished with foliated mutules, cartouches, dentil bands and egg-and-dart moldings. Perched atop the roof is the building's most distinctive feature: a small temple, built of copper, which conceals a smokestack. This architectural fancy is modeled on the tomb of King Mausolus in Asia Minor, one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World. The dramatic pyramid capital is one of the city' s most distinctive and recognizable The building has seen little alteration and retains a high degree of integrity. The west entrance was widened in the 1990s to comply with ADA requirements.

The terra cotta enframement was removed and new aluminum-and-glass doors installed, with the foliate design of the former surround etched on the glazing. The building's terra cotta cladding was restored in the 1990s after it became deteriorated. Gilbert, a New York-based architect of national repute. Gilbert worked with Garber & west of the Hudson River until 1930. In 1926, a Neo-Classical Revival-style rear addition - also designed by Garber & Woodward - was built on the site of the former Burnet House Hotel, a mid-19th-century hostelry. (8-86) Contributing silhouettes. "When it opened on May 1, 1913, Union Central's tower was the fifth-largest building in squared pilasters at the corners.

Woodward of Cincinnati to complete the structure.The building remained the tallest The Union Central Life building is the only building in Cincinnati designed by Cass Section Page Above the 23rd floor is a four-sided facade of massive Ionic columns in antis, with United States Department of the Interior National Park Service NATIONAL REGISTER OF HISTORIC PLACES CONTINUATION SHEET Section _7_ West Fourth Street Historic District, Boundary Increase Cincinnati, Hamilton County, Ohio For 51 years the building housed the offices of the Union Central Life Insurance Company, a Cincinnati-based company founded in 1867. In 1919 Central Trust Bank (later renamed PNC Bank) took part of the building for its headquarters. PNC remained in the building until they commissioned a new building at Fifth and Main streets in the 1980s. The building presently houses offices and ground-floor retail.

A postcard view of the Union Central Life Insurance Building. 6. Shillito/McAlpin's Building 13-17 West Fourth Street 1856-1857; 1891-1892; unknown This building was constructed in 1856-1857 for the John Shillito Dry Goods Company. In the 1870s both 13-17 and its neighbor, 19-25 West Fourth Street, were taken over by McAlpin's Department Store. The two buildings continued to function as one for over a Present appearance. Designed by Cincinnati architect James W. McLaughlin, the Shillito/McAlpin's Building is a refined and understated Renaissance Revival design, (8-86) Contributing century. Photos 1,2 Page _8 United States Department of the Interior National Park Service NATIONAL REGISTER OF HISTORIC PLACES CONTINUATION SHEET West Fourth Street Historic District, Boundary Increase Cincinnati, Hamilton County, Ohio rising six stories above street level.

It utilizes a symmetrical, three-part composition, horizontal definition, and belt courses of lacy Gothic Revival-style openwork encircle the building and the third and fifth-story levels. The windows exhibit full stone surrounds, with Greek Revival shouldered architraves used in the third story. Double-hung 2/2 wood sashes remain in place; the panes have been painted over. The windows are finished with flat lintels, or triangular or semicircular pediments; each story uses a different design. A projecting cornice of rich but restrained design, with regular modillions and a dentil band, completes the design. As built in 1856-1857, the building was four stories tall. It was remodeled in 1891-1892 to match the height of its taller neighbor at 19-25 West Fourth Street. Two additional stories were added and the original cornice was moved up to cap the new, six-story façade.

The first two stories were altered with large, plate-glass windows, and simple, altered in the 1970s with modern glass-and-aluminum storefronts, with granite facing and projecting metal canopies. The stone panels and canopies have since been removed, exposing the iron and steel structural frames of the storefronts. Both buildings are elevations, facing Ogden Place, have been bricked in, boarded, or altered to accommodate ventilation grilles or elevator shafts. Truck bays have been added in the first levels, and modern flush doors installed in the pedestrian entrances. The walls are covered with tan paint that is peeling.

Although the first-floor exterior has been altered, the Shillito/McAlpin's Building still reflects the architectural character that earned it praise in Sketches & Statistics of Cincinnati as "first class in beautify, magnitude and convenience" and "architecture considered to have hardly any rival in their line in any of the Eastern cities" (Charles Cist, Sketches & Statistics of Cincinnati, 1859). Interior. The interior of the Shillito/McAlpin's Building has been stripped to the bare walls in preparation for conversion to condominiums, and all later accretions have been removed. The first floor retains deep plaster cornices that are original to the structure. Plain steel columns, encased in drywall, and steel transverse beams carry the weight of the ceiling. An escalator, formerly placed against the west wall, has been removed, limestone with alternating quoins.

Simple, interior cornices and continuous sills add (8-86) with the center section slightly advanced. The upper stories are laid in smooth-dressed fluted Ionic pilasters of cast iron.While the columns remain in place, the bays have been bricked in. virtually unaltered above the second story.The windows and doors at the buildings'rear The storefronts of the Shillito/McAlpin's Building, as well as 19-25 West Fourth, were Section Page United States Department of the Interior National Park Service NATIONAL REGISTER OF HISTORIC PLACES CONTINUATION SHEET Section Page West Fourth Street Historic District, Boundary Increase Cincinnati, Hamilton County, Ohio frames remain in place, which are considerably more ornate on the first floor and upper- front spaces. These moldings decrease in elaboration on each level, with plain, Greek Revival woodwork used on the top floor. Original appearance.

The Shillito/McAlpin's Building in its original form is illustrated in the 1875 edition of D.J. Kenney's Illustrated Cincinnati, along with a view of the interior from just inside the central entrance. The storefront consisted of a cast-iron street- front with graceful arched entrances flanked by display windows in each of the three The first floor was divided front to back with rows of tall, cast-iron columns in a mid- Victorian variant of the Corinthian order, forming in effect a central nave with narrower aisles for this "Cathedral of Commerce." At the back, facing south, were tall windows The ceiling was crossed by transverse breams and garnished with delicate stenciling. The first and second floors housed retail salesrooms, with the third and fourth floors devoted to the wholesale trade. A carpet showroom was housed in the basement.

(The Shillito/McAlpin's Building in 1875, from Kenney's Illustrated Cincinnati) 1890s renovations. 1892, Shillito's was remodeled more drastically by McLaughlin, both to match the height of its neighbor and to modernize and enlarge the display areas on the (8-86) McLaughlin apparently altered the Shillito store slightly in 1879. Then, in 1891- leaving a gaping space that will be floored over. Some Italianate door- and window- divided horizontally.Narrow stairs arose along either the side walls from near the front. triple-bay sections, the center unit slightly projecting. United States Department of the Interior National Park Service NATIONAL REGISTER OF HISTORIC PLACES CONTINUATION SHEET Section ( Page West Fourth Street Historic District, Boundary Increase Cincinnati, Hamilton County, Ohio first two stories of the façade.

This change is portrayed in the large, updated 1893 edition of Kenny's Illustrated Cincinnati, which was published to coincide with the World's Columbian Exposition in Chicago in 1893. (Walter E. Langsam, "A Group of Historic Commercial Buildings in the Center of Downtown Cincinnati" in 1892 have been further confirmed by recent observations and analysis after 20**-century false fronts were removed. A top fifth floor was added with even plainer window frames than those on the fourth story, and the cornice was moved up to cap it, in alignment with the original Mitchell & Rammelsburg cornice. At the same time, the street-level storefronts were replaced to open them up for further display windows, and the second-floor front masonry wall was removed to allow for huge plate-glass windows that may have opened by means of pivots.

In so doing, the two lower stories' walls of glass were made comparable to - and in face even more transparent and "modern" than - those of Walter & Wilson's 1870s façade to the west. Each of the three main units of the Shillito building was now treated as a single opening, with plate-glass panels almost down to street level. The new transoms were framed by bands of small panes: doubtless "Luxfer Prism" or prismatic transom glass-blocks. The new central entrance under a curved or polygonal canopy was set dramatically into a slant-sided glass recess. The second story had even simpler triple fenestration in each bay. The slender pilaster strips that divided the units on the first two floors survive despite later alterations (ibid.). 7. Mitchell & Rammelsburg Building 19-25 West Fourth Street 1871-1872; c.

1900 Walter & Wilson, architects This six-story High Victorian Italianate edifice, built in 1871-1872 for the Mitchell & its older neighbor, the Shillito/McAlpin's Building, it is faced with smooth-dressed limestone. The surfaces of the unit piers are articulated as separate blocks of stone, with extensive stylized, incised floral and/or classical ornament in the Late Italianate or Neo- (8-86) Contributing Comparison of Kenny's engravings of the original Shillito building and as altered Photos 1, 3, 4 Rammelsburg Furniture Company, exudes Gilded Age exuberance and dynamism.Like Grec manner.

[2003]] United States Department of the Interior National Park Service NATIONAL REGISTER OF HISTORIC PLACES CONTINUATION SHEET West Fourth Street Historic District, Boundary Increase Cincinnati, Hamilton County, Ohio In contrast to the original Shillito building's single-story storefronts and entrances with their round arches and multiple divisions, the Mitchell & Rammelsburg building features two full stories of rectangular display-windows that fill the entire apertures between the incised floral or classical ornamentation. Centered in the second story is an arched stone pediment bearing a Grecian carved female head, similar to those depicted on Mitchell & Rammelsburg Furniture of the period. The intervening bays, which once contained large plate-glass display windows, have been infilled with concrete block.

The front consists of four central bays, divided vertically in groups of three, two, two, and three, with the central pair of bays treated as a single grand entrance, visually two sash, framed by engaged, half-round colonnettes with stylized, Neo-Grec capitals. The glass has been painted over. The double and triple units are separated by wider, flat pilaster-strips with diminutive pediments accenting the second-story cornice. The third to fifth floors also have rectangular openings with stylized piers. The top floor is distinguished by heavy, rhythmic round arches. At the fifth story is a shallow cornice with abbreviated mutules. Another modillioned cornice at the top supports a balustrade that once had conspicuous urns crowning the divisions between the bay units.

The western section of the building, at 25 West Fourth Street, is the most heavily altered minimal" Beaux Arts Classical style (ibid.), both to update it and to distinguish it from the rest of the 1870s block. The façade features groups of four double-hung sashes set in wide, shallow, square spandrels with "frames" of delicately carved stone. Cartouches eaturing lyres and harps adorn the piers, reflecting the building's use by a manufacture f musical instruments in the 1920s. As with the Shillito renovation. more glass wa Much of 25 West Fourth's second story was removed in the 1970s to accommodate an elevated walkway, which has since been removed; the opening has been filled with provided. (8-86) supports.The first two stories are defined by stone piers and spandrels with stylized, concrete block. The third through sixth stories, however, remain intact. of the district facades.

It was remodeled in the early-2o"h-century in a "stripped or Section Page stories high. The upper façade features grouped, recessed windows, which contain 2/2 United States Department of the Interior National Park Service NATIONAL REGISTER OF HISTORIC PLACES CONTINUATION SHEET Section West Fourth Street Historic District, Boundary Increase Cincinnati, Hamilton County, Ohio Postcard view of the south side of West Fourth Street, c. 1905. The Shillito/McAlpin and 8. Starr Piano Company Building 27 West Fourth Street 1916; 1930 Zettel & Rapp, architects Garber & Woodward, storefront remodeling, 1930 Photos 1, 4, 5 This slender building, only 26 feet wide, rises four stories above the street. The first story is faced with cream-colored marble, with bulkheads of black granite. It contains a display from any vantage point, these designs were intended to draw passers-by into the store.

Surrounding the storefront are finely detailed metal frames and moldings of The upper stories are styled in a Tudor Revival version of the Arts & Crafts style. The finished, russet-hued art tiles of geometrical design. A three-story angled oriole with diamond-pane clear glass, emblazoned with heraldic symbols, projects from the second through fourth stories. The glass and masonry details are deliberately aged and convey a sense of medieval handicraft. A deep cornice with mutules and large corner consoles projects from the top story. A square parapet with semicircular pediments conceals the Page_13 (8-86) Contributing roofline. Regency-inspired Art Deco design, highlighted by three-dimension winged griffins.

polygonal,"zigzag"storefront typical of the 1920s.By revealing only a part of the Mitchell &Rammelsburg buildings are visible at the center of the photo building's upper stores are clad in wire-cut "tapestry"brick, cream terra-cotta, and matte- United States Department of the Interior National Park Service NATIONAL REGISTER OF HISTORIC PLACES CONTINUATION SHEET Section Page West Fourth Street Historic District, Boundary Increase Cincinnati, Hamilton County, Ohio The building's original storefront featured a wide segmental arch framed by molded pilasters and crowned by a shallow cornice. Access to the interior of the store was through a single doorway to the left of a broad, semi-octagonal display window. This storefront was replaced with the present shopfront in the mid-20h-century.

The first floor of the building, which now houses the sales office for the condominium including pilasters with step-molded capitals, and plaster sunbursts. (A rendering of the Starr Piano Company Building, from the Cincinnati Enquirer, March 4, 1916.) 9. George Otte Carpet Store Building 29-35 West Fourth Street c. 1916; 1970s Anchoring the southwest corner of West Fourth and Race streets, this is a four-story Commercial style edifice with bold Beaux-Arts Classical stylistic finish.

It stands four (8-86) Contributing development, is a deep, narrow space that retains many original Art Deco details, Photos 1, 5, 6 reet Improvement Will Have Novel Featuret United States Department of the Interior National Park Service NATIONAL REGISTER OF HISTORIC PLACES CONTINUATION SHEET Page West Fourth Street Historic District, Boundary Increase Cincinnati, Hamilton County, Ohio stories high at the front and five at the rear. The foundation is composed of vertically scored limestone ashlar, laid in large blocks and painted charcoal gray. The basement level is pierced by large, 1/1 sash behind iron security grates. The first story is laid in smooth-dressed limestone that has been painted cream, with continuous sills of scored stone. The upper levels are covered in ivory terra-cotta. The building's two Fourth Street storefronts were greatly altered c.

1970, with new plate- glass windows and aluminum frames. The second and third stories are articulated by there, with larger units in the center; those of the second-story façade were replaced with aluminum units c. 1980. Two-story pilasters, with stylized capitals in a version of the Corinthian order, frame the façade. The fourth story culminates in a projecting cornice buildings appears to be virtually unaltered above the first floor apart from the replacement of some window sash and painting of the stonework. View of the Race Street elevation of the George Otte Carpet Store Building, 1920s. (8-86) pier-and-spandrel construction.Double-hung wood windows are placed in groups of with dentils. The flat roof is hidden behind a square parapet with paneled piers.

The Section / United States Department of the Interior National Park Service NATIONAL REGISTER OF HISTORIC PLACES CONTINUATION SHEET West Fourth Street Historic District, Boundary Increase Cincinnati, Hamilton County, Ohio Inventory of the West Fourth Street Historic District, Boundary Increase German National Bank 2 West Fourth Street Building (1905; 1969) McElvey's Building (1857- 10 West Fourth 1858; 1969) Woodruff/Gidding Building Commercial Queen Anne (1883; 1907; 1969) Annex (Jenny, Inc. Building (1913; 1926) Shillito/McAlpin's Building 13-17 West Fourth (1856-1857; 1891-1892; 1900; 1960s) Mitchell & Rammelsburg 19-25 West Fourth High Victorian Italianate Building (1871-1872; c.

Starr Piano Company Tudor Revival/English Arts Building (1916; 1970s) & Crafts George Otte Carpet Store (8-86) Section Page_16 Address Status Street Insurance Company Beaux-Arts Classical Renaissance Revival Union Central Life Name Neo-Classical Revival 8. Statement of Significance

Statement of significance

Applicable National Register Criteria Areas of Significance OA Property is associated with events that have made a significant contribution to the broad patterns of our -B Property is associated with the lives of persons significant in our past. *C x Property embodies the distinctive characteristics of a type, period, or method of construction or represents the work of a master, or possesses high artistic values, or represents a significant and distinguishable Period of Significance entity whose components lack individual distinction. - D Property has yielded, or is likely to yield information important in prehistory or history. Criteria Considerations Significant Dates (Mark "X" in all the boxes that apply.) 1856-1857, 1871-1872, 1883, 1907, 1913, 1916, 1930 -A owned by a religious institution or used for religious Significant Person - B removed from its original location.

(Complete if Criterion B is marked above) - C a birthplace or a grave Cultural Affiliation - D a cemetery. - E a reconstructed building, object, or structure. - F a commemorative property. -G less than 50 years of age or achieved significance within the past 50 years. See continuation sheet Narrative Statement of Significance (Explain the significance of the property on one or more continuation sheets.) 9.

The rest of the file

Bibliography, boundary description, and the people who prepared and reviewed the nomination.

Major Bibliographical References Cite the books, articles, and other sources used in preparing this form on one or more continuation sheets.) Previous documentation on file (NPS) - State Historic Preservation Office - Other State agency - preliminary determination of individual listing (36 CFR 67) - Federal agency has been requested - Local government - previously listed in the National Register - University - previously determined eligible by the National Register - Other - designated a National Historic Landmark -recorded by Historic American Buildings Survey Ohio Historic Preservation Office - recorded by Historic American Engineering Record Primary location of additional data 1856-1930 purposes. Bibliography architecture history.

Architect/Builder National Register listing) Name of repository: Property is: (Enter categories from instructions) West Fourth Street Historic District, Boundary Increase. Cincinnati, Hamilton County, Ohio. (Mark "x" in one or more boxes for the criteria qualifying the property for United States Department of the Interior National Park Service NATIONAL REGISTER OF HISTORIC PLACES CONTINUATION SHEET West Fourth Street Historic District, Boundary Increase Cincinnati, Hamilton County, Ohio Section 8. Statement of Significance Summary. The proposed West Fourth Street Historic District, Boundary Increase, meets Criterion C in the Area of Architecture for its contribution to the architectural development of retail buildings in downtown Cincinnati from the 1850s to the 1920s. It has been evaluated in the context, "Retail Architecture in Downtown Cincinnati, c. 1840- commercial architecture.

It is unique among the city's downtown commercial districts in era. Both were designed by major local architects and rank as outstanding examples of their respective styles. Other landmarks of the district include one of Cincinnati's most architecturally distinguished tall office buildings, the earliest surviving work of one of the city's most important 19*-century architectural firms, and one of the preeminent Rookwood Pottery installations in the country. Most of the buildings in the district are well-preserved externally. They retain such identifying features as decorative masonry work, parapets, cornices, art tile and metalwork, as well as original window sash and enframements. A cohesive entity, the district has only one intrusion and no vacant lots.

The proposed district boundary includes the parcels on which the buildings are located It excludes nearby buildings that do not contribute to the context under which the district is being nominated. The proposed district's period of significance extends from 1856 to 1930. It is bracketed by the construction date of the Shillito/McAlpin Building and by the 1930 renovation of the Starr Piano building. The original West Fourth Street Historic District was listed in the National Register in 1976. It included 39 buildings bounded by West Fifth Street, Plum Street, McFarland Street and Central Avenue. The nomination focused on a two-block area on the periphery multi-family residential architecture of the mid-to-late-19-century. Therefore, the with equally significant mercantile buildings were excluded from the district.

that it includes two rare surviving drygoods/department store buildings of the Victorian (8-86) The district was nominated as an example of cohesive, high-quality commercial and 1929." The district ranks among the city's most intact groupings of 19ih-century marginalized it and, by default, helped to preserve its Late Victorian character. of the Central Business District that had remained largely intact since the 1900s. It consisted of masonry bearing wall buildings in a variety of styles, from three to seven boundaries were chosen to reflect these qualities. In the process, three blocks to the east Section Page 1 stories in height.

As the 20"-century progressed, the block's peripheral location United States Department of the Interior National Park Service NATIONAL REGISTER OF HISTORIC PLACES CONTINUATION SHEET West Fourth Street Historic District, Boundary Increase Cincinnati, Hamilton County, Ohio The district was expanded in 1979 to take in additional blocks, between Plum and Race the boundary farther east, closer to the downtown core. In the process, it took in eleven additional buildings. These included Italianate and Renaissance Revival structures architecturally consistent with the original district, as well as Romanesque Revival and Gothic Revival edifices. It broadened the district's range of architectural expression by encompassing Commercial Style and Second Renaissance Revival buildings of the 1900s through the 1920s.

While a number of low-scale, masonry bearing wall buildings were included in the expansion area, the expanded boundary also took in larger, bulkier structures, some of steel-frame construction, including a thirteen-story office tower. In addition to mercantile buildings similar to those found in the 1976 boundary, some warehouse and industrial loft buildings were included. The district's period of Each building in the West Fourth Street Historic District, Boundary Increase, is an excellent example of its respective style. While each makes a unique contribution to the streetscape, the buildings are unified by scale, materials and form. Built from two to six stories, the retail and bank buildings exhibit the humane, pedestrian- commercial block form with highly glazed, pedestrian-oriented storefront, upper stories, and culminating cornice.

They are built of and adorned with masonry of varied colors and textures: dressed limestone and sandstone, highly glazed terra-cotta, matte-finish art tile, and wire-cut brick. While the Union Central Life Insurance Company Building towers Italianate and Renaissance Revival Styles Existing district. One of the predominant styles of the West Fourth Street Historic District Italianate commercial buildings emphasize height with their tall windows and vertical proportions. They are distinguished by bracketed cornices, generally of pressed metal, is the Italianate style, which enjoyed great popularity in Ohio from c. 1850-1880. (8-86) significance was extended to 1930 to recognize the architectural merit of these early-20th. Architectural Development classical vocabulary, rich ornamentation, and terra-cotta cladding. century buildings.

streets, whose period of significance is largely early-2o"h-century. This expansion moved over the other buildings on the block, it relates to the smaller, earlier buildings in its oriented scale of the traditional shopping district.They exemplify the two-part- Section Page 2 United States Department of the Interior National Park Service NATIONAL REGISTER OF HISTORIC PLACES CONTINUATION SHEET West Fourth Street Historic District, Boundary Increase Cincinnati, Hamilton County, Ohio and decorative projecting window heads. Masonry examples may be faced with stone and feature quoins, and window decoration that varies from floor to floor. Nine Italianate buildings can be found in the existing West Fourth Street district. They include the Kinsey Building at 327 West Fourth Street (1870s), the Meader Building at 113-121 (1876), the Gillman Building at 133 West Fourth Street (c.

1880) and the A.D. Lovell Building at 135 West Fourth Street (c. 1880). have smooth, symmetrical stone fronts. Carved stone trim often varies in design from Seven examples of the Renaissance Revival style can be found in the existing district. These include three of the city' s oldest apartment houses, all of which were built in the 1870s: the Sinton Flats, the Biltmore and the Lombardy. At the corner of Fourth and Plum streets is the high-style Cincinnati Gas, Light & Coke Company Building (1870), designed by architect James W. McLaughlin. This landmark example features a horizontal definition. Each story is differentiated with different window trim. Boundary increase.

In the proposed expansion area, the McElvey and Shillito/McAlpin buildings exemplify a restrained Italianate or Renaissance Revival style and form often commercial buildings with prominent Classical cornices were considered to evoke the combined residential and business palaces of such founders of modern banking and international business enterprise as the Medici family of Florence, Italy. Among the most influential examples of this antebellum style was the A.T. Stewart Dry Goods Store (1848-1850), or "Marble Dry Goods Palace," in New York City, so named for its marble façade. Moreover, there is a family tradition that the Shillito and Stewart families were so closely allied socially and commercially that John Shillito's youngest son was named after A.T. Stewart; he later became president of the Cincinnati company.

The Mitchell & Rammelsburg Building was described in 1894 as a "store and manufactory" that ranked as "one of the largest establishments of this kind in the United States." Six stories in height in front and seven in the back, it measured 100 by 150 feet. floors. (8-86) symmetrical stone facade with rusticated first story, with interior cornices providing Based on the urban architecture of 16"-century Italy, the Renaissance Revival style was floor to floor. Other ornamentation may include quoins, and horizontal banding between popular for Cincinnati commercial buildings from c.1845 to1885.Buildings in the style called a "commercial palace" or palazzo in the mid-19'h-century.

These flat-roofed Section 8 Page 3 United States Department of the Interior National Park Service NATIONAL REGISTER OF HISTORIC PLACES CONTINUATION SHEET West Fourth Street Historic District, Boundary Increase Cincinnati, Hamilton County, Ohio It was both broader and taller than the original Shillito building, with two extra façade stories. It exhibited much deeper and bolder articulation of the recessed window-bays above the storefronts. It also featured somewhat more up-to-date Late or High Victorian Although only less than fifteen years later in date, the Mitchell & Rammelsburg and restrained Shillito façade. Furthermore, Walter & Wilson's front makes the leap from the earlier façade's masonry dominated "marble palazzo" allusion to the interiors of the furniture (and clothing) workshops and retail spaces more According to architectural historian Walter E.

Langsam, the Shillito/McAlpin and Mitchell & Rammelsburg buildings are ...outstanding examples of early and late Italianate commercial design by two of the leading 19t-century Cincinnati architectural firms, each innovative and of Commercial Queen Anne Style The Woodruff/Gidding Building exemplifies the Commercial Queen Anne style, which enlivened Cincinnati business districts c. 1885 to 1899. Commercial Queen Anne contrasting materials, textures and colors, and varied window treatments. Corner Storefronts are defined by cast-iron piers and lintels, often with applied ornament in a seemingly limitless variety of patterns. One of the city's best examples of the style is the Morris Building on Plum Street, which is located in the original, 1976 boundary of the West Fourth Street district. Built in 1879, it is a brick edifice with central arcaded windows and a heavily corbelled cornice.

The Woodruff/Gidding Building's storefront is one of the country's finest surviving ensembles of Rookwood architectural tile. The elaborate design of the storefront with its (8-86) building is far more aggressive, even dynamic, compared to McLaughlin's refined national as well as local significance. (Langsam, ibid.) direct emphasis on the huge proportion of plain glass openings that illuminated Italianate ornamentation and treatment of the classical orders, which were only implied in buildings, like their residential counterparts, are typically richly embellished, with deeply and brilliantly than the Shillito's front would have allowed.... (Langsam, Section buildings may feature round, square or polygonal turrets, often with conical roofs. the Shillito facade.

Page 4_ United States Department of the Interior National Park Service NATIONAL REGISTER OF HISTORIC PLACES CONTINUATION SHEET West Fourth Street Historic District, Boundary Increase Cincinnati, Hamilton County, Ohio and unusual in the Rookwood oeuvre. The Rookwood Pottery was founded in Cincinnati in 1880. An architectural department commercial buildings across the country. While no comprehensive list of the pottery's architectural installations has yet been found, Rookwood faience is known to have been used in at least eighteen office buildings, seven churches, five banks, 18 hotels and restaurants, five theaters and seven railroad installations. The company's major commissions included Grand Central Terminal and several New York subway stations. A series of hotel projects were completed in the 1900s.

They included the dining rooms of the Sinton Hotel in Cincinnati, the Fort Pitt Hotel in Pittsburgh, and the Della Robbia Room and Bar in New York's Vanderbilt Hotel (all demolished). These tile ensembles included faience murals, low-relief wall panels, medallions, and ornamental open Sinton installation most closely resembled the Gidding façade. A bold frieze of overflowing cornucopias encircled the room, adorned with scrolled cartouches, keystones, sprays of leaves and dentil bands. Still extant is the Rathskellar Room in the Seelbach Hotel in Louisville (1905; National Register, 1975), which was installed in 1907. Housed in the basement of the hotel, the low ceiling is covered with broadly arched Romanesque ribbed vaults. The ceiling is covered in red-tinted Rookwood terra cotta and adorned by circular medallions with the hotel's founders were born.

Each tile was designed by hand and fired, then color with stylized detailing and subtle colors. These include the entranceway of the Dixie Terminal (1926-1927), the arcade of the Carew Tower (1930; National Historic Landmark), and the Rookwood Tea Room at Union Terminal (1931-1933; National Three-dimensional facades like that of the Woodruff/Gidding building were rare. A Louisville, Kentucky, restaurant called the Old Vienna Inn (demolished) also sported a (8-86) fruit and floral motifs, projecting cornice and large central cartouche is unique to the city Historic Landmark). Three Cincinnati buildings of the 1920s and 1930s feature flat, Art Deco-inspired tiles added and fired again, with an additional firing for each color (Peck, p. 162).

quatrefoil-like designs.The squat, sturdy columns are ringed by high-relief tile pelicans, grillework, as well as tile-covered walls, ceilings and supporting columns. Of these, the was added to the pottery in1902to produce the decorative flatware pieces used in a sign of good fortune. Wall tiles depict castles in the Rhenish region of Germany, where Section Page 5 United States Department of the Interior National Park Service NATIONAL REGISTER OF HISTORIC PLACES CONTINUATION SHEET Section Page 6 West Fourth Street Historic District, Boundary Increase Cincinnati, Hamilton County, Ohio tile façade similar to that of the Gidding building. No other comparable examples are known to survive. English Arts & Crafts/Tudor Revival Style English Arts & Crafts/Tudor Revival style.

As such, it reflects the influence of the "artistic store front" of the 1920s, designed to harmonize with suburban residential The Starr building is also noteworthy for its high-style Art Deco storefront, added in 1930. Several other outstanding examples, each unique in design, can be found elsewhere tower on East Fourth Street designed by Daniel Burnham, sports a richly detailed Deco storefront of brass and black granite added in a c. 1930 remodeling and expansion. A Norman Romanesque archway of carved limestone, with typically stylized details, graces the American Building, a 1928 Deco office building at the northern edge of downtown (Over-the-Rhine Historic District, National Register, 1983). Classical Revival Influences Existing district.

Many buildings in the existing district illustrate the prevalence of These buildings, built in the 1870s through the 1920s, display the diverse influences of the Beaux Arts, Neoclassical Revival and Second Renaissance Revival styles. While their interpretations vary, their shared classical vocabulary includes elements borrowed from Greek, Roman, French and Italian Renaissance architecture. These include rusticated The mansard-roofed Wells' Building at 346-348 West Fourth is a Second Empire apartment building built in 1876. It bears a wealth of classically derived ornamentation including an ornate stone frontispiece, triangular pediments and large fluted pilasters with elaborate capitals.

The Cincinnati Gas & Electric Company Building Addition at 323 Plum Street, built in 1902, is a Neo-Classical Revival edifice distinguished by giant pilasters, large scrolled brackets and carved stonework. The Insight Tower at Fourth and Race streets, built in 1927, exemplifies the Second Renaissance Revival style, with its rusticated limestone ashlar base, Roman Doric colonnade, and large round-arched openings enriched with voussoirs, cartouches and swags. (8-86) neighborhoods. stonework, columns, entablatures, swags, cartouches, voussoirs, keystones and rosettes. The Starr Piano Company Building is unique in downtown Cincinnati in its use of the in the central business district.

The Bartlett Building, a turn-of-the-20"h-century office United States Department of the Interior National Park Service NATIONAL REGISTER OF HISTORIC PLACES CONTINUATION SHEET West Fourth Street Historic District, Boundary Increase Cincinnati, Hamilton County, Ohio exemplify Beaux Arts Classicism, characterized by classical orders combined with exuberant decorative elements. The German National Bank Building, built in 1903, exemplifies the Beaux Arts style in its use of rusticated ashlar, large arcaded windows and a heavy entablature. The George F. Otte Carpets Company Building is a significant example of the Beaux Arts Classical style applied to a small-scale retail building.

Its three-part form, with well-defined base (storefront), shaft (second and third floors) and cornice, clearly evokes the Commercial Style, which in its various forms was used throughout downtown Cincinnati for office, manufacturing and retail buildings in the 1890s through the 1930s. Its bold, monumental Classicism is reminiscent of Cincinnati's Woodward High School (1908; Over-the-Rhine Historic District), also designed by architect Gustave Drach. century skyscrapers built on Fourth Street. All used a classical vocabulary, sometimes overlain with Art Deco or Modernist veneer. "In the first two decades of the twentieth century, more than a dozen major commercial and banking buildings were constructed downtown. The most notable of these were the Ingalls Building, the world's first reinforced concrete skyscraper, built in 1902-1903, and the Union Central Life Insurance Overmyer, p. 33).

the Union Savings Bank Building, the Traction Building and the Fourth National Bank Building, have a restrained Neo-Classical flavor. The First National Bank Building evokes the Chicago Style in its use of projecting tripartite windows. After slowing down during World War I, downtown construction resumed in the 1920s. The Dixie Terminal (1926-1927), a sober Second Renaissance Revival design dressed in limestone, was designed by Garber & Woodward. The partnership also worked with nationally known architect John Russell Pope on the Cincinnati Gas & Electric Building (1930), a bold Doric-Beaux Arts design with Art Deco flavor. Comparison With Other Retail Historic Districts The West Fourth Street Historic District is different in function and use from the city's (8-86) The Union Central Life Insurance Building was the last of the great turn-of-the-20th.

other downtown historic districts that feature 19"h- and early-20"h-century retail buildings. From 1901to1905,five Commercial Style skyscrapers designed by Chicago architect Boundary increase.Two relatively small-scale buildings in the proposed expansion area Building (later the Central Trust Tower), which opened in 1913"(Giglierano & Daniel Burnham were built along East Fourth and Fifth streets.Three of the buildings, Section Page 7 United States Department of the Interior National Park Service NATIONAL REGISTER OF HISTORIC PLACES CONTINUATION SHEET Section West Fourth Street Historic District, Boundary Increase Cincinnati, Hamilton County, Ohio buildings, its extensive use of costly materials such as stone, terra-cotta and art tile, and story residential and mercantile buildings, seven-to twelve-story loft warehouse and light industrial buildings, and tall office towers.

Multi-story, steel-frame office buildings of the extent, in the Main Street Historic District. The district is also notable for its grouping of late-19t*-century apartment buildings, which is unique in the central business district. The Ninth Street Historic District, listed in the Register in 1981, includes a diverse period of significance extends from 1840 to 1935. The Main Street Local Historic century. It features small-scale commercial/residential buildings, interspersed with a few larger-scale office buildings. The Court Street Local Historic District, designated in 1984, includes a three-block commercial area that developed along the Miami-Erie Canal in the 1830s. Most of the low-scale mixed-use buildings, many with upper-floor living units, 1995, is a retail and commercial corridor of 25 low-to mid-rise buildings ranging in height from two to twelve stories.

Most of the district buildings were constructed in the Moderne. The district's period of significance extends from 1877 to 1951. Development of the Fourth Street retail district. North of riverfront: houses, churches, shops. "Because it was centrally located, Fourth Long considered the heart of downtown Cincinnati, Fourth Street was known in the last (8-86) Historical Development District, designated in 1984, was developed from the mid-1800s through the early-20th- its remarkable height range.Buildings in the district encompass modest, two-and three- It is distinguished by its concentration of high-style, mid-19"h-century commercial institutional buildings, including a church, private clubs and apartment buildings.

Its early-20"b-century can be found only in the Race Street Historic District and, to a lesser collection -of mid-19th- through early-20"-century commercial, residential and Overmyer, p. 31). date from the second half of the 19"h-century.

The Race Street Historic District, listed in Street became increasingly important to the city's cultural and econic life"(Giglierano & early-2o"-century.Predominant styles are Renaissance Revival, Commercial and Art half of the19"-century as"the principal thoroughfare of the city."it served businessmen, Page 8 United States Department of the Interior National Park Service NATIONAL REGISTER OF HISTORIC PLACES CONTINUATION SHEET West Fourth Street Historic District, Boundary Increase Cincinnati, Hamilton County, Ohio shoppers and travelers and continued to be a cultural center in the second half of the 19th- inland from the riverfront, with commercial activities closest to the river and residential areas beyond to the north. By the Civil War, most of downtown was filled with substantial buildings housing a mix of dwellings, offfices, shops and theaters.

With the increased commerce on the Ohio River, the opening of the Covington Avenue, the Fourth Street corridor was ideally situated for development and investment. Wholesale, retail and banking concerns marched up the bluff above Second and Third Streets and westward from the courthouse area to set up shop in the Fourth Street area. The street, which had been the city' s most fashionable district. Many of the city's leading businesses were located along West Fourth Street during its boom years of 1870 to 1915. (Cincinnati Historic Conservation Office, "West Fourth Street Historic District Designation Report," 1985) D.J. Kenney, writing in the 1875 Illustrated Cincinnati, identified Fourth Street as the to be a cultural center. The city's leading hotels were likewise concentrated along Fourth Street, close to the public landing and rail depots.

By the 1870s, the business district began to expand into the downtown residential quarter others, such as the growing wholesale dry goods business of George Washington McAlpin. In 1873, the furniture manufacturing firm of Mitchell & Rammelsburg built a new retail store on Fourth. Five years later the H & S Pogue Company, established in 1863, built a new drygoods store (demolished) at the northeast corner of Fourth and Race streets. Fourth Street also boasted the offices and workshops of several nationally known During the 1890s Fourth and Fifth streets remained the two major streets where Cincinnati's most prominent merchants were located. The former's commerce included Company. (8-86) century. and Cincinnati Suspension bridge in1867, the expanding rail lines west of Central small shops and businesses, anchored by large dry good stores.

During the next 30 years, As the city's population grew rapidly during the 19"h-century, development pushed "principal street of the city." It served businessmen, shoppers and travelers and continued businesses, including the John Church Music Company and the John Holland Gold Pen north of Fourth Street. Some businesses, such as Shillito's dry goods store, moved to residential quarter in the 1840s, evolved into the primary retail and business Section Page 9 new quarters on Fifth, Sixth or Seventh streets. Their places were quickly taken by United States Department of the Interior National Park Service NATIONAL REGISTER OF HISTORIC PLACES CONTINUATION SHEET West Fourth Street Historic District, Boundary Increase Cincinnati, Hamilton County, Ohio a wave of construction by commercial and financial institutions radically altered the area between Fourth and Seventh streets.

The city's banks, brokerage houses and insurance repeated flooding and construct massive new buildings. Several commissioned nationally known architects, often working in partnership with leading Cincinnati designers, to construct the city's first collection of steel-frame skyscrapers, including the Union Central Life Insurance Building. Fourth Street between Main and Race streets became the city's premier commercial and finance district, a center for business and finance as well as retail, a character it retains to this day. Businesses of the West Fourth Street Historic District, Boundary Increase German National Bank Building, 2 West Fourth Street. The German National Bank, the bank commissioned the prominent German-American architectural partnership of Rapp, Zettel & Rapp to draw plans for new offices.

The new building was erected at a The bank changed its name to the Lincoln National Bank during World War I, when a late 1980s became a branch of AmeriTrust. A coffee bar and professional offfices now contained four storefronts. One of the earliest tenants was Suire & Eckstein's Drugs. In 1871 they commissioned architect James W. McLaughlin to remodel their store space; In 1884, Bell, Miller & Company, Wholesale and Retail Goods and Notions, were listed at this location (Robinson and Pidgeon, Atlas of the City of Cincinnati, Ohio, 1883-1884). Herschede's Jewelers, which was founded on Vine Street in 1877, remained at 4 West Fourth from 1939 through the 1990s. Bankhardt's Luggage Shop, one of downtown Cincinnati's oldest continuously operated businesses, has done business at 6 West Fourth since 1933. The company was founded in 1865 by Valentine Bankhardt, a manufacturer of travel trunks.

The firm later expanded its line to include luggage and travel cases, briefcases, personal leather goods and executive gifts. (8-86) the extent of the renovations is unknown (Walter E. Langsam, personal communication). which served Cincinnati's large Germanic community, was founded in 1873. In 1903, occupy the building. cost of $200,000, plus $250,000 for the land. Third Bank in 1955.

The building was subsequently acquired by Eagle Savings and in the wave of anti-German sentiment swept the city.Lincoln merged with Cincinnati's Fifth- McElvey's Building,4 West Fourth Street.As built in 1857, McElvey's Building Section Page 10 companies, formerly located along Third Street, moved up to higher ground to escape United States Department of the Interior National Park Service NATIONAL REGISTER OF HISTORIC PLACES CONTINUATION SHEET West Fourth Street Historic District, Boundary Increase Cincinnati, Hamilton County, Ohio J.M. Gidding & Company, 10-12 West Fourth Street. J.M. Gidding & Company was founded in 1907 by four brothers who moved to Cincinnati from Duluth, Minnesota. The new store was one of the first in Cincinnati to concentrate exclusively on women's nation's finest women's apparel shops.

Gidding's, as it was commonly called, catered to the wealthiest members of Cincinnati society and sold to many fashionable women of the American stage. It was considered a high-fashion store, and many designers sold their branches in New York City, Paris, Washington, D.C., and Duluth. by a conglomerate called Genesco, Inc., and two years later it merged with Jenny, Inc., a rival women's clothing shop that had been founded next door in 1921. After 88 years on After remaining vacant for several years, a commercial tenant now occupies the first- and second-floor space. Union Central Life Insurance Company, 1 West Fourth Street. The Union Central Life Insurance Company, which is still in operation, was founded in Cincinnati in 1867 by the Methodist Church, who successfully encouraged its ministers to sell policies.

Union Central Life purchased the Fourth and Vine property in 1911 after fire destroyed the previous building on the site: H.H. Richardson's Cincinnati Chamber of Commerce Building, which was built in 1885. Union Central then commissioned Cass Gilbert to erect a 29-story office tower on the property. The company remained the headquarters. They then sold the building to Central Trust Bank, who had taken part of the Fourth and Vine building for its headquarters in 1919. Shillito's and McAlpin's, 13-17 West Fourth Street. In 1830, John Shillito (1808- 1879) and his partners formed the John Shillito Company. Seeking a prestigious location, he moved to Fourth Street later that decade, erecting what was then considered "the most commodious dry good store west of the Alleghenies." In 1842, he became sole proprietor company commissioned a new store on West Seventh Street.

In 1879, Shillito's Fourth Street building was taken over by the wholesale dry goods firm (8-86) of McAlpin, Polk & Company. The proprietor, George Washington McAlpin (1827- Fourth Street, Gidding-Jenny closed in 1995 (Cincinnati Post, August 11, 1995, 1A:3). In the years after 1923, Gidding's had a succession of owners.It was acquired in 1961 clothing. The Gidding brothers succeeded in making the Cincinnati store one of the 1890),had been employed by the business since he was sixteen.In 1885, the company primary occupant of the building until 1964,when they built a new suburban of the business.A new store went up in 1857 but was outgrown in 20 years.

In 1877 the work there on consignment.The store was so successful that by1914 the brothers had Section Page 11 United States Department of the Interior National Park Service NATIONAL REGISTER OF HISTORIC PLACES CONTINUATION SHEET West Fourth Street Historic District, Boundary Increase Cincinnati, Hamilton County, Ohio was renamed the George W. McAlpin Company. Shortly after McAlpin's death, his expanded west into the adjacent space that had been the salesrooms of the Robert when financial difficulties brought about a sale of the business to Mercantile Stores of department-store chain based in Little Rock, Arkansas, in the 1990s (Giglierano & Mitchell & Rammelsburg Furniture Company, 19-25 West Fourth Street. The founded in 1836 by the Irish-American Robert Mitchell (1811-1899) and the German- American Frederick Rammelsburg (c. 1814-1863).

Incorporated as Mitchell & Rammelsburg after Rammelsburg's death, it was renamed the Robert Mitchell Furniture By 1875, Mitchell & Rammelsburg had grown to "mammoth" proportions. The firm now ranked as one of the largest furniture companies in the world, with branch stores in New that grew in proportion as fast as the city itself.... They manufacture furniture for 'the room, library, bedroom or dining-room that can be furnished." This description indicates the wide-and democratic-socio-economic spread of customers for Mid-Victorian mass- 25 West Fourth Street: Originally part of the Mitchell & Rammelsburg enterprise, this variety of retail businesses over the next three decades. As of 1921 it housed the Aeolian once again being used by the McAlpin store. Starr Piano Company Building, 27 West Fourth Street. automobiles (ibid.). (8-86) Overmyer).

younger brother, William, moved the company into retailing. In 1900, the company Company, manufacturers of conventional and player pianos, pipe organs and company utilized the assembly-line manufacturing technique in the furniture- produced machine goods (ibid.). New York (p. 42). Mercantile Stores, in turn, was taken over by Dillard's, a national and manufacturing, and customizing a wide range of household projects (1988). The Company in 1881. The company combined wholesale and retail distribution, designing million,' from the commonest table and chair to the finest suites for parlor, drawing- Mitchell Furniture Company.

McAlpin's was operated by family members until 1916, manufacturing process, decades before it was used by Henry Ford in the manufacture of section of the building was"detached"in the early-2o"-century and accommodated a phonographs.It was home to George F.Otte Carpetsin1931.By1938 the space was Mitchell & Rammelsburg Furniture Company, the building's original occupant, was Section Page 12 Orleans, Memphis and St. Louis. "Perhaps there is no other establishment in Cincinnati United States Department of the Interior National Park Service NATIONAL REGISTER OF HISTORIC PLACES CONTINUATION SHEET West Fourth Street Historic District, Boundary Increase Cincinnati, Hamilton County, Ohio Until the mid-twentieth century Fourth Street was the favorite location for many of the city's music dealers. On October 15, 1916, the Starr Music Company moved into this...building on Fourth Street.

Next door is the Aelion [sic] Music Company, whose building still exhibits raised violins on its pilasters. (Stephen C. Gordon, "Fourth Street Promenade" (n.d.) The building at 27 West Fourth Street was built in 1916 as a retail showroom for the Starr Piano Company of Richmond, Indiana. It was built on the site of the St. Nicholas Hotel, a Richmond businessmen, headed by James M. Starr. The Starr Piano Company, as it came to be known, was said to be the first piano company west of the Alleghany Mountains. Starr Piano grew steadily and incorporated in 1893. By 1912, the company was said to be the largest manufacturer of pianos in the world. The Cincinnati store was one of Portland, and San Francisco.

During the 1920s and 1930s, Gennett Records, a subsidiary of Starr, was a pioneer in recorded jazz (John K MacKenzie, "Historical Sketch: The An item about the Starr building, complete with rendering, appeared in the Cincinnati Enquirer prior to its construction. There is a marked tendency where new buildings are planned for the central section to get away from the formal or stereotyped order of a store building, and construction of a four-story home for the Starr Piano Company on the east 26 feet soon make their appearance on the market. The building will be of fireproof construction. It will be 26 x 130 feet and contain two basements. The exterior will have a balcony on the three upper floors, and the [illegible] will have a terra cotta ornamentation. (Cincinnati Enquirer, March 4, 1916) (8-86) of pianos in the early 1950s.

Plans for the improvement now being prepared by Zettel & Rapp, architects, will thirteen Starr retail outlets, including Birmingham, Boston, Chicago, Cincinnati, of the former St. Nicholas Hotel property, southwest [sic] corner of Fourth and famous 19"h-century hostelry. Starr Piano was founded in 1872 by a group of prominent Cleveland, Detroit, Indianapolis, Kansas City, Los Angeles, Nashville, New York, this idea will be followed by the Gennett Corporation of Richmond, Ind., in the Starr Piano Company and the Gennett Record Company"[n.d.]). Starr ceased production Race streets....

Section Page 13 United States Department of the Interior National Park Service NATIONAL REGISTER OF HISTORIC PLACES CONTINUATION SHEET West Fourth Street Historic District, Boundary Increase Cincinnati, Hamilton County, Ohio Williams' Cincinnati City Directories indicate that the Starr Piano store occupied 27 West Fourth until at least 1929. By 1938, the building was home to an Eastman Kodak store. As of 1949, Eastman Kodak shared the building with the Recordak Company, which specialized in microfilm filing systems. By 1959, the Loring Andrews Jewelry Newstedt's, another downtown jeweler, and become Newstedt Loring Andrews. The jewelry store remained at this address until it moved to the East Side neighborhood of Hyde Park in the 1990s. George F. Otte Carpet Company Building, 29-35 West Fourth Street.

Like the Starr building, the George Otte Carpets Company Building was built in 1916 on part of the King Browning Company, a woman's apparel shop; the Cincinnati Art Center (no individual directory listing); the Ziegler Gift Shop, and Otte Carpets. The Todd Brothers Apparel Company occupied the building from at least 1938 to 1959. Gattle's, purveyors of high-quality linens, is also listed here in 1949 and 1959. A Lane Bryant women's clothing store and a Frisch's family restaurant occupied the building until the 1990s. To date, however, his career has not been extensively researched. Andrews studied civil engineering at lowa State College and Cornell University and was trained in the office of William Miller in Ithaca, New York. He then worked for George P. Post in New York, Ohio. From 1905 to 1908 he practiced on his own in Cincinnati, and from 1908 to 1913 he partnered with H.E.

Kennedy in New York. Following a stint in road-building throughout the world, he resumed his architectural career in 1929. Andrews' major works include the Kentucky State Capitol (1905-1909) in Frankfort, a domed Beaux Arts monument, and the Arcade Building in Dayton, Ohio (National Register, 1975). In addition to the 1907 renovation of the Gidding store, Andrews was (8-86) architects and developers, especially of hotels"(Langsam, Biographical Dictionary, p. 8). Company occupied the whole building. In 1973, Loring Andrews merged with The architects Frank Mills Andrews (1867-1948) was "one of the most prolific early 20"h-century former St. Nicholas Hotel property.As of 1929, the building housed four retail stores: the also responsible for the Sinton Hotel (1907; demolished), located around the corner on Frank Andrews.

for Jennie & Mundy in Chicago, and for the National Cash Register Company in Dayton, Section _8 Designer of: Rookwood façade of Woodruff/Gidding Company Building. Page 14 United States Department of the Interior National Park Service NATIONAL REGISTER OF HISTORIC PLACES CONTINUATION SHEET Section West Fourth Street Historic District, Boundary Increase Cincinnati, Hamilton County, Ohio East Fifth Street. The Sinton project also made extensive use of Rookwood tiles. Andrew's firm also employed architectural faience in the Seelbach Hotel (National Register, 1975) in Louisville; the Hotel McAlpin in New York; and the Hotel Taft in New Haven, Connecticut. In these and other hotel developments, Andrews was associated with Charles P. Taft of Cincinnati (ibid.). Gustave W. Drach. Designer of: George F. Otte Carpet Company Building Gustave W.

Drach (1861-1940) was "one of the most respected and balanced (in clientele and types of projects)" architects in Cincinnati during the early-20t*-century (Langsam, Biographical Dictionary). Many of his works were large and functionally or technologically innovative, yet restrained in design. "[I]n 1904-1905 Drach had under construction 8 concrete structures of 2-10 stories totaling 75,000 square feet" (Langsam, Biographical Dictionary). His major works include the Cincinnati Water Works in Commercial-Style Textile Building at Fourth and Elm streets in the existing West Fourth Street Historic District (1979 boundary increase). Garber & Woodward Designers of: Union Central Life Insurance Company Annex Starr Piano Company Building storefront (1930) Garber (c.18/1-1950) and Clifford B.

Woodward, who were fellow-students and streets, which combined a transit terminal with a shopping arcade and office building. They worked with Cass Gilbert on the Union Central Life Insurance Company Building and designed the 1920s rear Annex. They also worked with John Russell Pope on the bolder Doric Beaux-Arts headquarters of the Cincinnati Gas & Electric Company, located at Fourth and Main streets. They collaborated with local firms on major hospitals, university buildings and other projects. Among their best works are many public schools (8-86) California, Ohio; the Beaux-Arts style Woodward High School (1908); and the brothers-in-law. They were"generally traditional in style and refinement of approach" (Langsam, Biographical Dictionary). The firm's massing was^often well-considered in relation to the site and intrinsically interesting"(ibid.).

Garber & Woodward designed This prominent and prolific architectural partnership was comprised of Frederick W. the Second Renaissance Revival-style Dixie Terminal Building at Fourth and Walnut Page 15 United States Department of the Interior National Park Service NATIONAL REGISTER OF HISTORIC PLACES CONTINUATION SHEET Section West Fourth Street Historic District, Boundary Increase Cincinnati, Hamilton County, Ohio throughout the city, several of which received attention in national architectural books Cass Gilbert (c. 1858-1934) exercised great influence on the development of architecture in the United States. Educated at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, he worked in the office of McKim, Mead & White after 1882.

He set up a "large and lucrative' as well as varied (if not particularly innovative) practice in New York City in 1887-1888" Gilbert is perhaps best known for his Gothicized skyscraper, the Woolworth Building, which was the world's tallest building at the time. "Gilbert is rated as a skyscraper pioneer, but the cladding of his buildings looked back to Neoclassicism rather than optimistic American sense that the nation was the heir of Greek Democracy, Roman law and Renaissance humanism" ("Cass Gilbert"). His lavish Beaux-Arts Baroque manner was deployed on a number of state capitols (including Minnesota and West Virginia), the former New York Custom House, the Detroit Public Library, and many other structures.

Gilbert's career has been somewhat under a cloud...until recent restorations and reassessment of the considerable merits of his work, in their appropriate adaptation of historic styles to modern types and scales of buildings, as well as occasional spectacularly effective compositions and spaces. (Langsam, Biographical Dictionary) James W. McLaughlin conventional styles, and for his structural and functional innovations" (Biographical (8-86) (Langsam, Biographical Dictionary). Page 16 Dictionary). During a long and distinguished career, he designed over a thousand and periodicals. projects.

These included the first purpose-built zoo buildings in America, the original Cass Gilbert McLaughlin was"known for his distinctive, hard-edged and bold approach to Designer of: Union Central Life Insurance Company Building Designer of: Shillito/McAlpin Building embracing modernity.""His public buildings in the Beaux Arts style reflect the United States Department of the Interior National Park Service NATIONAL REGISTER OF HISTORIC PLACES CONTINUATION SHEET Section West Fourth Street Historic District, Boundary Increase Cincinnati, Hamilton County, Ohio Cincinnati Art Museum and Art Academy of Cincinnati. He also designed the 1877-1878 "new" Shillito's store building at Seventh and Race streets, which may have inspired the first "Chicago-style" commercial structure in the Windy City. The Fourth Street Shillito store was one of McLaughlin's first commissions.

His family's connections with the Shillito enterprise may have helped him secure the commission: his Rapp, Zettel & Rapp. Cincinnati architect who specialized in large-scale commercial and industrial projects, particularly breweries. From 1903 to 1912, Walter L. Rapp practiced with his father and John Zettel, a talented draftsman about whom relatively little is known. The firm of Rapp, Zettel & Rapp secured a number of important commissions from Cincinnati's German-American community, including the former German National Bank (1903), alterations to Heuck's Opera House, and a factory for the Rudolph Wurlitzer Company (1909) in Tonawanda, New York. They also designed mansions and other projects for prominent Cincinnati families, which included several buildings for the Cincinnati Milling Machine Company (1907) in Oakley. Following his father's retirement, Walter L.

Rapp continued to practice with John Zettel from 1913 to 1930: the period of the Meacham from 1931 to 1958, Rapp designed grand suburban estates for aristocratic buildings (Langsam, Biographical Dictionary). Walter & Wilson. the firm of William Walter & James K. Wilson, with "typically robust character and individual character" (Langsam, Biographical Dictionary). William Walter (1815-1886), the first partner listed in the firm, was a son of Henry Walter, the architect of St. Peter in Chains Cathedral in Cincinnati and winner of the first prize in the competition for the partner and the more important figure in Cincinnati and American architecture. Walter & (8-86) Page 17 construction of the Starr Piano Company Building. In partnership with Standish The Mitchell & Rammelsburg Building is the "major surviving commercial building" of Ohio State Capitol in 1838. However, James K.

Wilson (1828-1984) was the designing Cincinnati families, for whom his father may have penned factories or commercial Walter L. Rapp was the son of George W. Rapp, a prolific late-19th and early-20"m-century father had been John Shillito's business partner when the drygoods business was founded (ibid.). Designer of: McElvey's Building, Mitchell & Rammelsburg Building United States Department of the Interior National Park Service NATIONAL REGISTER OF HISTORIC PLACES CONTINUATION SHEET West Fourth Street Historic District, Boundary Increase Cincinnati, Hamilton County, Ohio Wilson were responsible for the completion of the former Hamilton County Court House (demolished) shortly before the Civil War. Their surviving masterpieces are the post- Civil War Isaac M.

Wise Temple, a National Historic Landmark; the Administration Building and Dexter Mausoleum at Spring Grove Cemetery, and "Scarlet Oaks," the castle-like George Shoenbarger mansion in Clifton - all of which were innovative and of of the American Institute of Architects. He was also the teacher and employer of McLaughlin before the latter opened his own office in 1855. The proposed West Fourth Street Retail Historic District, Boundary Increase, retains a vacant parcels or parking lots. Therefore the district retains integrity of setting and contribute to its significance. While the first stories of most of the buildings are altered to some degree, all the buildings are largely intact above the storefront level. All retain a retail block in Cincinnati's downtown business district. Therefore it retains integrity of (8-86) Integrity fenestration.

As a result the district retains integrity of design, materials and feeling and association. great deal of historic fabric, including original wall treatments, ornamentation and location.All the buildings in the district, except for one heavily altered structure, workmanship. The district conveys the feeling and character of an early-2o"h-century high degree of integrity under all its aspects.It is a cohesive entity free of gaps from high quality (ibid.). Wilson was a founder and the first president of the Cincinnati chapter Section Page 18 NPS Form 10-900 (Rev. 10-90) United States Department of the Interior National Park Service NATIONAL REGISTER OF HISTORIC PLACES CONTINUATION SHEET Architect/Builder continued Andrews, Frank M. Burnham, Daniel Drach, Gustave W. Garber, Frederick W., & Clifford B. Woodward McLaughlin, James W. Walter, William, and James K.

Wilson Page Gilbert, Cass Section number_8 Rapp, George W., John Zettel & Walter L. Rapp 10. Geographical Data Acreage of Property about 2 acres Covington, KY, quadrangle UTM References (Place additional UTM references on a continuation sheet) 1 16 715030 4330583 - See continuation sheet. Verbal Boundary Description (Describe the boundaries of the property on a continuation sheet.) Boundary Justification (Explain why the boundaries were selected on a continuation sheet.) 11.

Form Prepared By organization Cincinnati Preservation Association Date March 21, 2006 street & number 342 West Fourth Street _telephone 513-721-4506 city or town Cincinnati _state Ohio Additional Documentation Submit the following items with the completed form: Continuation Sheets A USGS map (7.5 or 15 minute series) indicating the property's location A Sketch map for historic districts and properties having large acreage or numerous resources Representative black and white photographs of the property (Check with the SHPO or FPO for any additional items) Property Owner (Complete this item at the request of the SHPO or FPO.) name see attached street & number .telephone city or town zip code Reductions Project (1024-0018), Washington, DC 20503.

Photographs Maps zip code 45202 Additional items Zone Easting Northing West Fourth Street Historic name/title Margaret Warminski, Preservation Director listing or determine eligibility for listing, to list properties, and to amend existing listings. Response to this request is required to obtain a benefit in accordance with the National Historic Preservation Act, as amended (16 U.S.C. 470 et seq.). OMB No. 1024-0018 United States Department of the Interior National Park Service NATIONAL REGISTER OF HISTORIC PLACES CONTINUATION SHEET Section West Fourth Street Historic District, Boundary Increase Cincinnati, Hamilton County, Ohio Verbal Boundary Description: The West Fourth Street Historic District, Boundary Increase, is located within the corporate limits of Cincinnati.

Its property extends along both sides of West Fourth Street between Vine and Race streets. The boundary of the district is indicated on the 18, 13-17, 19-25, 27, and 29-35 West Fourth Street. It includes in their entirety 13 contiguous parcels on West Fourth Street between Vine and Race streets, as follows: Verbal Boundary Justification: 35 West Fourth Street. It excludes modern structures that do not contribute to the district. At the northwest corner of the same intersection, a 1960s parking garage has also been left out. Please refer to map with boundary line drawn. The boundary includes buildings on the block between Vine and Race that are visually and historically consistent with the existing West Fourth Street Historic District.

Like the (8-86) 083-0001-0042-00 Fourth and Race streets, a 1990 enclosed shopping mall has been excluded from the This boundary contains all the property presently and historically associated with 1 to 29- accompanying map.The district comprises the following addresses:1,2,4-8,10-12,14- 10. Geographical Data significance under which the district is being nominated.At the northeast corner of NPS Form 10-900-a Page 1 NPS Form 10-900-a OMB No. 1024-0018 United States Department of the Interior National Park Service NATIONAL REGISTER OF HISTORIC PLACES CONTINUATION SHEET Section Page 2 West Fourth Street Historic District, Boundary Increase Cincinnati, Hamilton County, Ohio architecturally consistent with those in the existing boundary.

They represent some of the dominant styles of the existing district: Renaissance Revival, Italianate, Commercial Queen Anne, Beaux-Arts Classical, and Commercial. They also represent the characteristic building types of the existing district: the vault, the two-part commercial block, and the tall office building. While the Union Central Life Insurance Building towers over its smaller, older neighbors, it relates visually to the Insight Tower at 105 West Fourth Street, a limestone-clad Second Renaissance Revival-style office building of 14 stories, built in 1927. The buildings of the expanded area are similar in form, scale, materials and methods of construction to those of the existing district, using masonry bearing wall or steel-frame construction, limestone or concrete foundations, stone, brick or terra-cotta wall treatment, and masonry or terra-cotta ornamentation.

They are well preserved, with minimal exterior alteration. All but one of the buildings in the expanded boundary contribute to the property's significance. (8-86) small office buildings, and banks.The buildings in the expanded boundary are blocks to the west, part of the city's premier shopping district, dominated by retail stores, United States Department of the Interior NATIONAL REGISTER OF HISTORIC PLACES CONTINUATION SHEET Section number_n/a 1 West Fourth Street Central Trust Tower Associates Cincinnati, Ohio 45202 Hilch Partners, LLC 6934 Miami Avenue 4: The Frank Herschede Company 6: Bankhardt, Inc. 8: Fifth Third Bank, TR 38 Fountain Square 3036 Burning Tree Lane Page Property Owners continued OMB No. 1024-0018 National Park Service WWW Properties, L.L.C. PS Form 10-90 Rev.

10-90 NPS Form 10-900 United States Department of the Interior National Park Service NATIONAL REGISTER OF HISTORIC PLACES CONTINUATION SHEET Section number _n/a Page 2 13-17, 19-25, 27 West Fourth Street: 4 J Development, L.L.C., c/o Madison Realty 1850 M Street, N.W. 14-18 West Fourth Street: GJ Building Associates, Ltd. 119 East Court Street Cincinnati, Ohio 45202 29-35 West Fourth Street: Law Department Real Estate Services Division 801 Plum Street Cincinnati, OH 45202 513-719-6014 513-352-3610 City of Cincinnati Attn: Joseph Straka Attn: Pat King Washington, D.C. 20036 MB No. 1024-001 (Rev.

10-90) W 5TH ST E 5TH ST RACE ST ELM ST E 4TH ST E OGDEN PL E 3RD ST W 3RD ST West Fourth Street Historic Dashed line: boundary District, Boundary Increase Cincinnati, Hamilton Co., OH 400 Feet Inventory Map 100 200 "X": parking/vacant lot Cross-hatching: noncontributing - W 4TH ST 300 abc W 5TH ST E 5TH ST E 4TH ST E OGDEN PL E 3RD ST W 3RD ST West Fourth Street Historic District, Boundary Increase Cincinnati, Hamilton Co., OH Photo key map City of Cincinnati, Hamilton County, Ohio VINE ST~ RACE Si ELM ST MOFARLAND ST 400 Feet E COURT ST National Register Resource National Register District GARFIELD PL Locally Designated McAlpin Block Rivers & Streams West Fourth Street Historic District, Boundary Increase Cincinnati, Hamilton Co., OH Location Map W 3RD ST Building Central Business Distric LEGEND: E3RD ST NEW ST CENTRAL PKWY Proposed boundary increase RACE ST 250 500 Feet Existing District West Fourth Street Historic District, Boundary Increase.

Cincinnati, Hamilton County, Ohio. Titus' county atlas (1869). WORTH PEARL RACE 34.435 OND 2 276 252 VINE PLUM 352 410 1.36 102. 461 .r: 40 2 W. 4 TH Size 640 x 480 Set the zoom and size then click an area on the image Cincinnati, Ohio (1904-June 1950 vol. 1,1934-Apr. 1950) West Fourth Street Historic District, Boundary Increase. Cincinnati, Fire Insurance Map (1904) (pixels) Hamilton County, Ohio. Sanborn W. 4TH Set the zoom and size then click an area on the image Cincinnati, Ohio (1904-June 1950 vol. 1,1934-Apr. 1950) West Fourth Street Historic District, Hamilton County, Ohio. Sanborn Fire Insurance Map (1904). Boundary Increase. Cincinnati, THE UNION CENTRAL LIE BLOG ANNEX RACE OGLEN This picture is a water color design fora lithograph, advertising the Wholesale and Retail < Drug Store of Suire Eckstein a Co, located at fourth &Vine Sts.

West Fourth Street Historic DRUGS The lithograph was never issued. McElvey's Building, 1859. Cincinnati, Hamilton County, Ohio. District, Boundary Increase. *FOVRTH*STREET*CINCINNATI+LOOKING+WEST+FROM+VINE+STREET*1859* West Fourth Street Historic Shillito/McAlpin Building, from Kenney's Illustrated Cincinnati (1875). District, Boundary Increase. Cincinnati, Hamilton County, Ohio. JOHN SHILLLITO & CO. West Fourth Street Historic Undated archival view of District, Boundary Increase. Shillito/McAlpin and Mitchell & 1890). Rammelsburg Buildings (c. 1872- MIRRORS Cincinnati, Hamilton County, Ohio. FURNITURE CO. BEDDING. LACE CURTAINS &C Undated archival view of McElvey West Fourth Street Historic District, Boundary Increase. 1900). and Woodruff/Gidding buildings (c. Cincinnati, Hamilton County, Ohio. Archival view of German National West Fourth Street Historic District, Boundary Increase.

(1930s). Cincinnati, Hamilton County, Ohio.

NATIONAL LINCOLN BANKHARDT BANK Bank and McElvey buildings LINCOLN NATIONAL BANK DRUCKER NATIONAL PARK SERVICE EVALUATION/RETURN SHEET West Fourth Street Historic District (Boundary Increase) NAME : DATE OF 45TH DAY: DATE OF WEEKLY LIST: APPEAL: N PROGRAM UNAPPROVED: COMMENT WAIVER: N ABSTRACT/ SUMMARY COMMENTS : DOCUMENTATION see attached comments Y/N see attached SLR Y/N If a nomination is returned to the nominating authority, the DATE TELEPHONE RETURN 12/28/06 2/10/07 MULTIPLE PROPERTY DISCIPLINE REVIEWER 1/31/07 RECOM./CRITERIA PDIL: OTHER: SAMPLE: PERIOD: VACCEPT NATIONAL REGISTER OF HISTORIC PLACES DATE RECEIVED: REQUEST: N REASONS FOR REVIEW: LESS THAN 5O YEARS: DATE OF 16TH DAY: UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR DATA PROBLEM: N LANDSCAPE: N REJECT IRON MCAIN (Boundary Increase) Comey & Shepherd cay Orice 241-3400 MALPIN Now Selli Now Selling Luxury Lofts!

(Boundary Increase) (Boundary Intreare) STARBUCKS COFFEE UNITED STATES COVINGTON QUADRANGLE 7.5 MINUTE SERIES (TOPOGRAPHIC) GEOLOGICAL SURVEY UNIVERSITY OF KENTUCKY DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR STATE OF KENTUCKY COVINGTON, KY.-OHIO REC'D BY OHPO APR 17 2006 Fourth & Vine Tower April 4, 2006 VIA OVERNIGHT DELIVERY Ms. Rachel M. Tooker State Historic Preservation Officer c/o National Register Staff Ohio Historic Preservation Office 567 East Hudson Street Columbus, OH 43211-1030 Re: Proposed Boundary Increase to West Fourth Street Historic District, 1 W. Fourth Street, Cincinnati, Hamilton County Dear Ms. Tooker: The undersigned, Central Trust Tower Associates, L.P., is the owner of the real estate located at 1 West Fourth Street, Cincinnati, Hamilton County, Ohio (the "Property").

We received the Ohio Historic Preservation Office's letter dated February 6, 2006 advising us that nomination to the National Register of historic Places. We hereby certify as follows: The undersigned, Central Trust Tower Associates, L.P. is the sole owner of the Central Trust Tower Associates, L.P. objects to the listing of the Property on the National Register of Historic Places. Thank you for your attention to this certification of objection. CENTRAL TRUST TOWER ASSOCIATES, L.P. By: Central Trust Tower, L.L.C., its General Partner Stanford(N. Phelps, Member One West Fourth Street Cincinnati, Ohio 45202 Fax 513.621.1311 513.621.4090 Property. proposed boundaries of a historic district would include the Property to be considered for STATE OF OHIO COUNTY OF HAMILTON ) CINLibrary 0068476.0367938 1621535v.1 JURA C. ZIBAS, ESQ Notary Public, State of Ohio My Comm.

Expires_14 Notary Seal Franklin County partner of Central Trust Tower Associates, L.P., on behalf of such limited partnership. The foregoing instrument was acknowledged before me this 7day of April, 2006, by Notary Public RECEIVED : 2280 December 22, 2006 Ms. Jan Matthews, Associate Director and Keeper of the National Park Service 2280 National Register of Historic Places 12011 (Eye) Street, NW Washington DC 20005 Dear Ms. Matthews: Enclosed please find four (4) new National Register nominations. All appropriate notification procedures have been followed for these new submissions.

NEW SUBMISSION Muskingum River Navigation Historic District Canal Winchester School West Fourth Street Historic District (Boundary Increase) Marion Township Sub-District #8 School If you have questions or comments about these documents, please contact the National Register staff in the Ohio Historic Preservation Office at (614) 298-2000. State Historic Preservation Officer Ohio Historic Preservation Office 567 East Hudson Street, Columbus, Ohio 43211-1030 ph: 614.298.2000 fx: 614.298.2037 Washington Hamilton COUNTY Marion Sincerely, Franklin www.ohiohistory.org Coshocton, Muskingum, Morgan, National Register Enclosures OHIO HISTORICAL SOCIETY HISTORY OHIO Rachel Tooker