Griesheim Building
Built: 1900
Architect: Arthur L. Pillsbury
Arthur L. Pillsbury
Arthur L. Pillsbury was born in Bloomington on November 29, 1869. He grew up in Bloomington and attended schools in Normal while his father served as principal of the Model School at Illinois State Normal University (today Illinois State University). In 1880, the family moved to Springfield where his father became principal at Springfield High School. Pillsbury completed high school there and began his higher education at Harvard University, graduating in 1892 with a degree in Engineering. Subsequently, he then moved back to Illinois to attend the University of Illinois in Champaign-Urbana for its architecture program, which was the first university in the United States to offer a four-year architectural degree in 1890. He graduated with a degree in architecture in 1895.. After graduation, Pillsbury traveled to Chicago, Toledo, Buffalo, and New York where he worked for a short time and explored the architectural works of these cities. When he moved back to Bloomington in 1898, he was the city’s first university-trained architect. He also became one of Illinois' first licensed architects in 1897, a process established through the University of Illinois architecture program.
In 1898, Pillsbury married Daisy Deane Hill, and they had one daughter, Frances. Throughout his career, Pillsbury designed and renovated approximately 435 homes, 104 schools, 73 businesses, 32 churches, 17 banks, and 16 garages, alongside other architectural projects. Over a dozen new buildings in downtown Bloomington were designed by Pillsbury in the first few years after the Downtown Bloomington Fire of 1900.
In addition to designing notable buildings in Bloomington, he was active in community organizations including the Freemasons, American Institute of Architects, Bloomington Country Club, a member of Second Presbyterian Church, and the University of Illinois Alumni Association. He also donated his time as the McLean County Chairman for the State Council of Defense. With this position, he was responsible for insuring that non-essential construction projects would not draw supplies that would otherwise be used for the war effort during World War I. Tragically, Pillsbury died in a car accident at the age of 55 while returning from a University of Illinois football game. He is buried in Evergreen Memorial Cemetery in Bloomington, IL.
Style: Chicago Tall Building (1800-1920)
Chicago Tall Building (1800-1920)
The result of advances in construction technology which used steel frames to allow buildings to get taller, the Chicago Tall Building style is characterized by the projecting bays, or oriels, that run the length of the building. The commercial style is often marked by a flat roof and a terminating cornice. The façade is organized in horizontal bands and sometimes borrows elements from the Richardsonian Romanesque style with rough stone and recessed openings and from Neo-Classic style using pilasters to create vertical emphasis in the composition
Address: 217-221 North Main Street
The building was designed for Wolf Griesheim, a German-Jewish immigrant who came to the United States in 1864. Griesheim didn’t speak any English and only had $5 in his pocked when he arrived in Bloomington. He quickly found work with a local German merchant and eventually worked his way up to owning his own store in 1886. By 1896 he had erected one of the tallest buildings in downtown Bloomington for his store, which was lost to the 1900 Fire just four years after it was built.
The new building was constructed on the site of the one that was destroyed. Designed by Arthur Pillsbury, it was architecturally similar to the previous one. Constructed in the Chicago Tall style of architecture, the six-story steel-framed structure utilized light press brick from St. Louis on the exterior.
On the north side of the structure, 3-half hexagonal oriel windows ran from the 2nd to the 6th floors, which were separated by three window bays. Brick cornice and brick bay windows. In-rock faced coursed ashlar foundation of Bedford limestone. All the windows had Bedford limestone sills. Double windows on the sixth floor with rounded arches. Terra cotta cornices capped the oriel windows.
The west side had modern brick and glass on the first floor. The rhythm of the windows (from right to left): single window, oriel, bowed oriel, oriel, single window. The most distinctive feature was the rounded tower on the corner which rose to the top of the building. At the frieze level was a terra cotta wolf head and below that was the name “Griesheim” in terra cotta, a suitable signature for the building’s owner.
The building opened on December 11, 1900, just 165 days after the fire, and was completed for a cost of $105,000, or about $35 million today. It was billed as the largest office building in Central Illinois, with 138 offices. The main store room was occupied by Wolf Griesheim & Sons until the business closed in the 1920s. Another notable tenant was Biasi’s Drug Store, which occupied pare of the first floor for 62 years. The 1949 Bloomington City Directory listed 24 physicians and 9 dentists in the building. The Griesheim Building was considered a prime location for retail and processional businesses until the 1960s.
Sadly, this building was also lost to fire—this time arson—on August 26, 1984. The wolf's head was carefully removed and donated to the McLean County Historical Society (Museum of History). The current structure, the Snyder Building, was constructed and occupied in November 1990.