White Memorial Building
E. Washington & S. Salina Sts
Download 1876 high-resolution image (17 meg.)
Joseph Silsbee designed this building one year after his Syracuse Savings Bank was completed on Clinton Square. It, too, is in High Victorian Gothic style, here with a detailed polychrome facade.
The 1876 inscription above the front door reads:
As a memorial of Horace and Hamilton White
this building,
replacing one in which they were engaged in business for many years,
is erected by their children.
Syracuse National Bank, founded by the Whites, originally occupied the second floor of the building. The first floor contained shops, the third and fourth floors were office space, the fifth floor under the mansard roof was intended to be used as a Masonic hall.
The 1962 photo captures a much dingier White Memorial building with the polychrome patterns obscured by years of railroad soot (for decades, coal burning trains passed right in front of the building). The University Building now towers over it on the east. Four new windows have been added in the mansard roof at the front of the building.
Howe Jewelers was a long-term tenant of the White building, occupying the first floor from 1895 until the 1970's (click 'other pictures' below to see the Howe storefront). In the 1960's Chappell's Department Store occupied half of the first floor; installing a "modern" facade over the northeast corner. The Chappell's store emerged again in the building next door, just south on Salina, where it also installed a modern facade and painted over the brick wall above.
The 2001 photo shows the results of an extensive 1984 restoration. The original contrasting patterns of the facade are once again visible, the awnings are back and the Chappell's facade has been removed to reveal the original design.