National Register of Historic Places

Tenney Building

Madison, Dane County, Wisconsin
Listed
October 26, 2017
Type
Building
Period
Industrial
Ref No.
100001775

About this property

The Tenney Building is a historic office building at 110 E. Main Street in Madison, Wisconsin. It was built in 1929-30 and is listed on the National Register of Historic Places. The ten-story building is located directly across from the Wisconsin State Capitol. The first floor houses commercial space, while the top nine stories serve as offices. The Art Deco building has a limestone exterior with a 3-foot (0.91 m) granite base. Each of the upper floors features a row of seven windows on the southwest facade; the rows are divided by green terra cotta spandrels between the five inner windows. Fluted pilasters separate the inner windows, and each is capped by a bronze light fixture. The building is topped by a limestone parapet on the southwest and southeast sides. The building's lobby includes marble walls and floors and bronze light fixtures and elevator doors. Lawyer Daniel K. Tenney built the Tenney Building's predecessor, the Italianate style Tenney Block, on the site of the Tenney Building in 1877. His brother Henry W. Tenney and nephew Charles Kent Tenney were also Madison lawyers, and his brother Horace was a local journalist. Charles's sons Charles Homer Tenney and William D. Tenney, a lawyer and businessman respectively, announced that they would replace the Tenney Block with a larger building in 1928. Construction on the new building began in 1929 and was completed in 1930. The architecture firm of Law, Law & Potter, the largest in Madison in the 1920s and 1930s, designed the Art Deco building. While the building was initially successful and well-occupied, the impact of the Great Depression led to the Tenney family losing the building to foreclosure in 1936; despite this, subsequent owners were able to profit from the building, and it remained a popular choice for Madison's professional offices into the 1960s. The building underwent a $6,000,000 renovation in 1985. The Tenney Building was added to the State and the National Register of Historic Places in 2017. Media related to Tenney Building at Wikimedia Commons

Location

110 E. Main St.
Madison, Dane County, Wisconsin
43.07292, -89.38167

Categories

ARCHITECTURE
Sources

Property data from the National Register of Historic Places, National Park Service (public domain).

Description adapted from Wikipedia under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.

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Nearby Historic Sites

United States Post Office and Federal Courthouse
Early Republic
0 mi
King Street Arcade
Industrial
0.1 mi
State Office Building
Industrial
0.1 mi
Bellevue Apartment Building
Industrial
0.1 mi
Dick, Christian, Block
Industrial
0.1 mi

Nearby Battles

Wisconsin — Civil War Mutiny — 14th Wisconsin Infantry
1862Civil War
1 mi

Questions about this property

When was Tenney Building listed on the National Register?

Tenney Building was listed on the National Register of Historic Places on October 26, 2017.

What type of historic resource is Tenney Building?

Tenney Building is classified as a building in the National Register of Historic Places.

What is the period of significance for Tenney Building?

The period of significance for Tenney Building is recorded as the industrial era.

Can I research the history near Tenney Building?

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