Tuesday, March 1, 2011

The Boston Building

I was really disappointed a few weeks ago when I wasn't able to get a picture from on top of the Boston Building.  However, a couple of days ago I was meeting a friend in Salt Lake and it happened to be right between the Boston and Newhouse Buildings.  With the help of my friend Erik I was able to reproduce the following picture:
 
Used by permission, Utah State Historical Society, all rights reserved.


This is a picture from on top of the building looking north.  The Judge Building is still very noticeable in the right corner.  The Salt Lake Temple and other buildings around Temple Square are also visible in the top picture, although they are no longer visible and are hidden by the skyscrapers.  Besides that, most of the buildings have been destroyed.  Construction on the capitol building had not even begun when the first picture was taken in 1908.

The Boston Building was finished in 1908.  It was built by Samuel Newhouse, who was hoping that the area around the building would become a mini Wall Street.  he named the building after the city of Boston, where he did a lot of business.  he also built a very similar building just to the south of the Boston Building called the Newhouse building.  Although the two buildings share several similarities, they do have some distance differences.  Newhouse wanted to bring some class to downtown buildings and so he hired an architectural firm from New York to design the building.  The two buildings were the first skyscrapers in Salt Lake City.

The Boston and Newhouse Buildings are located in what is called the Exchange Place Historic District.  In 1978 this area was designated a National Historic District and is the city's only purely commercial local historic district.




The Boston Building recently underwent a huge renovation and looks incredible.  Several pieces of the building are originals, such as the railing leading up the staircase.  I definitely recommend going to check out this old building. 

4 comments:

  1. Awesome. This blog is great!

    ReplyDelete
  2. Thanks, I appreciate it. Keep following cause there is more to come. Also, I love the profile picture of you and Alli. It is one of the coolest wedding photos I have ever seen.

    ReplyDelete
  3. I work in the Boston Building, and it never gets old coming to work, I love the place.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Does any one know if the Boston Building has been retrofitted for earthquakes?

    ReplyDelete