Pretzinger

Last updated
Commercial Building (1908) in Dayton, Ohio designed by Peters, Burns & Pretzinger CommercialBuilding.jpg
Commercial Building (1908) in Dayton, Ohio designed by Peters, Burns & Pretzinger
Dayton Fire Station No. 14 by Peters, Burns & Pretzinger DaytonFireStation14.jpg
Dayton Fire Station No. 14 by Peters, Burns & Pretzinger
First Lutheran Church in Dayton, Ohio designed by Peters, Burns, & Pretzinger FirstLutheranDayton.jpg
First Lutheran Church in Dayton, Ohio designed by Peters, Burns, & Pretzinger
The Beaux Arts style Dayton Daily News Building designed by Albert Pretzinger DaytonDailyNews.jpg
The Beaux Arts style Dayton Daily News Building designed by Albert Pretzinger

The Pretzinger name belongs to a family of architects and engineers in Dayton, Ohio. Albert Pretzinger (born February 28, 1863) started the family's architectural legacy.

Contents

In 1892 he was with Peters, Burns & Pretzinger. He established his own firm Albert Pretzinger Architect by 1906. He was part of Pretzinger & Musselman in 1913 and Pretzinger & Pretzinger in 1928. The firm became Freeman A. Pretzinger Architect in 1941 before switching to Pretzinger and Pretzinger by 1962, and Pretzinger and Pretzinger Architects and Engineers in 1968. In 1980 the firm became Robert B. Pretzinger, Consulting Engineer, changing in 1982 to Pretzinger and Klenke, Inc. Consulting Engineers. [1] After Thomas Klenke retired in the mid-1990s, the firm's name reverted to Robert B. Pretzinger, Consulting Engineer. The firm closed in 2010 with the death of Robert Pretzinger.

Colonial Theater, Dayton

Albert Pretzinger's work included the Colonial Theater (later the RKO Colonial Theatre) on Ludlow Street. It featured premium reserve balcony seating, twenty individual dressing rooms, and two chorus rooms. Showings changed from vaudeville to movies, and then western movies and burlesque shows as management sought to capture a profitable audience. The 1,800-seat theater hosted Dayton's first "talkies" on September 22, 1928, with showings of Lights of New York bringing in the throngs. The theater had its own chorus, the Colonialettes, and a band during its prime, and acts who took the stage included the Three Stooges, Jimmy Durante, and Ozzie & Harriet. [2]

In 1930, the Colonial became part of RKO and started showing second-run and B movies. By 1964 the theater was sold to St. John's Lutheran Church and was demolished to build a new church. [2]

Records from the Pretzinger firms were donated to Wright State University by Robert Pretzinger in 1994. [1] [3]

Projects

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Rapp and Rapp</span> American architect

C. W. & George L. Rapp, commonly known as Rapp & Rapp, was an American architectural firm famed for the design of movie palaces and other theatres. Active from 1906 to 1965 and based in Chicago, the office designed over 400 theatres, including the Chicago Theatre (1921), Bismarck Hotel and Theatre (1926) and Oriental Theater (1926) in Chicago, the Five Flags Center (1910) in Dubuque, Iowa and the Paramount Theatres in New York City (1926) and Aurora, Illinois (1931).

Samuel Hannaford was an American architect based in Cincinnati, Ohio. Some of the best known landmarks in the city, such as Music Hall and City Hall, were of his design. The bulk of Hannaford's work was done locally, over 300 buildings, but his residential designs appear through New England to the Midwest and the South.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Samuel Sloan (architect)</span> American architect

Samuel Sloan was a Philadelphia-based architect and best-selling author of architecture books in the mid-19th century. He specialized in Italianate villas and country houses, churches, and institutional buildings. His most famous building—the octagonal mansion "Longwood" in Natchez, Mississippi—is unfinished; construction was abandoned during the American Civil War.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Connor Palace</span> Entertainment venue in Cleveland, Ohio, US

The Connor Palace, also known as the Palace Theatre and historically as the RKO Palace, is a theater located at 1615 Euclid Avenue in Downtown Cleveland, Ohio, part of Playhouse Square. The theater opened in 1922, as Keith's Palace Theatre after B. F. Keith, founder of the Keith-Albee chain of vaudeville and movie theaters. It was designed by the Chicago architectural firm of Rapp and Rapp in the French Renaissance style, and originally housed live two-a-day vaudeville shows. The $2 million theater opened in the Keith Building on November 6, 1922, seating 3,100. The interior featured Carrara marble and 154 crystal chandeliers, and the main lobby, dubbed the "Great Hall," was decorated with over 30 paintings.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">John Rudolph Niernsee</span> Prominent Architect and Confederate Officer (1814-1885)

John Rudolph Niernsee was an American architect. He served as the head architect for the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad. Rudolph also largely contributed to the design and construction of the South Carolina State House located in Columbia, South Carolina. Along with his partner, James Crawford Neilson, Rudolph established the standard for professional design and construction of public works projects within Baltimore and across different states in the United States.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Commercial Building (Dayton, Ohio)</span> United States historic place

The Commercial Building is a historic skyscraper in central Dayton, Ohio, United States. Constructed in the early twentieth century, it played an important part in the development of the western portion of downtown Dayton, and it is one of the most prominent surviving examples of the work of one of the most significant architects in the city's history. Located at the edge of what was once one of the city's leading commercial complexes, it has been named a historic site.

Albert Carey Martin was an American architect and engineer. He founded the architectural firm of Albert C. Martin & Associates, now known as A.C. Martin Partners, and designed some of Southern California's landmark buildings. Martin is also credited with developing a system of reinforced concrete construction, along with reinforced brick masonry.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">The Dayton Biltmore Hotel</span> Historic hotel in Dayton, Ohio, US

The Dayton Biltmore Hotel is a historic former hotel built in 1929 and located at the junction of First and Main Streets in downtown Dayton, Ohio, United States. It was converted to senior citizen housing in 1981 and named a federal historic site in 1982.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Dayton Daily News Building</span> United States historic place

The Dayton Daily News Building is a historic structure located at the corner of 4th and Ludlow Streets in Dayton, Ohio. It was designed by architect Albert Pretzinger for Dayton Daily News founder James M. Cox. According to Cox's autobiography, he was turned down for a loan by a local banker who told him “Newspapers have never been known to earn money. Of course we can’t accommodate you.” After being turned down for a bank loan to start the paper, Cox asked Pretzinger to "build him a damn bank" so it was modeled after the Knickerbocker Trust building in New York City. Among the most significant components of the three-story building are those surrounding the entrance: three bays wide, the facade features a set of Corinthian columns, a set of fluted columns in the Doric order that form a grand frontispiece around the entrance, and a partial pediment with a cornice supported by cornucopiae. Its walls are built of a mixture of wood and granite.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">First Lutheran Church (Dayton, Ohio)</span> Historic church in Ohio, United States

First Lutheran Church is a historic Lutheran church in downtown Dayton, Ohio, United States. Constructed in the 1900s for a large congregation, its architecture includes numerous elements seen in older grand churches, and it has been named a historic site.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Benjamin F. Kuhns Building</span> United States historic place

The Benjamin F. Kuhns Building is a historic commercial building on Main Street in downtown Dayton, Ohio, United States. Distinguished by its little-modified late nineteenth-century architecture, it has been named a historic site.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Rudolph Pretzinger House</span> United States historic place

The Rudolph Pretzinger House is a historic residence in southern Dayton, Ohio, United States. Constructed in the late nineteenth century for a prominent local pharmacist, it now abuts a city hospital, but it has been named a historic site.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Dayton Fire Station No. 14</span> United States historic place

Dayton Fire Station No. 14 is an historic structure at 1422 N. Main St. in Dayton, Ohio. It was added to the National Register of Historic Places on September 27, 1980. It was designed by the Peters, Burns & Pretzinger firm.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Charles Insco Williams</span> American architect

Charles Insco Williams was an artist and architect in Dayton, Ohio.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Schenck & Williams</span> Architectural firm in Dayton, Ohio, US

Schenck and Williams was an architectural firm in Dayton, Ohio. The firm's projects included the Hawthorn Hill home for Orville Wright and his sister and father, the Dayton Young Men's Christian Association Building, and the Engineers Club of Dayton building. The firm's partners were Harry J. Williams and Harry I. Schenck, both 1903 Cornell University graduates and members of the American Institute of Architects Several other Cornell graduates including Nelson J. Bell (1904), Robert E. Schenck (1912), Albert R. Reilly (1914), Wolfe Marcovitch (1915), Leslie L. Lambert (1916), Ernst W. Kurz (1917) and Ellason R. Smith (1917) came to work for the firm.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Graphic Arts Building (Dayton, Ohio)</span> United States historic place

The Graphic Arts Building is a historic commercial building on the edge of downtown Dayton, Ohio, United States. Built in the 1920s, it long housed the publishing house of a Protestant denomination, and it has been named a historic site.

Coburn & Barnum was a Cleveland, Ohio architectural firm from 1878 to 1897. It was established by Forrest A. Coburn and Frank Seymour Barnum. The firm also included W. Dominick Benes and Benjamin S. Hubbell for one year and was known as Coburn, Barnum, Benes & Hubbell until 1897, when Benes and Hubell departed to establish their own firm Hubbell & Benes. After their departure and Coburn's death, Barnum formed F. S. Barnum & Co. with Albert Skeel, Harry S. Nelson, Herbert Briggs, and Wilbur M. Hall. Barnum also served as consulting architect to the Cleveland Board of Education. He retired in 1915 having designed more than 75 school buildings, the Caxton Building (1903) and the Park Building (1904), an early example of reinforced concrete floor slabs. The firm continued after his 1915 retirement under the name of Briggs & Nelson.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Metro South Historic District</span> Historic district in Connecticut, United States

The Metro South Historic District encompasses a portion of the downtown area of Middletown, Connecticut. Extending south from Main and College Streets for two blocks, this area was developed in the 19th century, and contains a diversity of well-preserved architecture from that period, some with association to locally important individuals. It was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1980.

Walter Danforth Bliss (1874-1956) was an American architect from California. Many of his buildings are listed on the National Register of Historic Places.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Dayton Women's Club</span> United States historic place

The Dayton Women's Club refers to a women's club founded in 1916 and a landmark building on 225 North Ludlow Street in Dayton, Ohio, United States.

References

  1. 1 2 Pretzinger Architectural Collection MS-153 Wright State University
  2. 1 2 Jon Flynn Cinema Treasures
  3. archival photo of the Colonial Theatre [ permanent dead link ] Lutz collection Dayton Library
  4. Rudolph Pretzinger House (added 1979 - Building - #79001901) 908 S. Main St, Dayton Montgomery, Ohio National Register of Historic Places listings
  5. Duncarrick Mansion Archived 2010-06-11 at the Wayback Machine Preservation Dayton Inc.
  6. Educational architecture in Ohio
  7. Preservation Priorities Archived 2009-05-24 at the Wayback Machine Springfield Preservation Alliance
  8. "National Register of Historic Places". National Park Service. Retrieved 2009-01-07.