Property Record
235 N JEFFERSON ST
Architecture and History Inventory
| Historic Name: | Green Bay YMCA |
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| Other Name: | YMCA |
| Contributing: | Yes |
| Reference Number: | 2172 |
| Location (Address): | 235 N JEFFERSON ST |
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| County: | Brown |
| City: | Green Bay |
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| Year Built: | 1924 |
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| Additions: | 1968 |
| Survey Date: | 19852017 |
| Historic Use: | apartment/condominium |
| Architectural Style: | English Revival Styles |
| Structural System: | Reinforced Concrete |
| Wall Material: | Stone - Unspecified |
| Architect: | Foeller, Schober, and Stephenson; Berners Schober Associates |
| Other Buildings On Site: | |
| Demolished?: | No |
| Demolished Date: |
| National/State Register Listing Name: | Green Bay YMCA |
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| National Register Listing Date: | 2/16/2016 |
| State Register Listing Date: | 11/20/2015 |
| National Register Multiple Property Name: | |
| National/State Register Listing Name: | Green Bay Downtown Historic District |
| National Register Listing Date: | 5/13/2019 |
| State Register Listing Date: | 2/16/2018 |
| National Register Multiple Property Name: |
| Additional Information: | A 'site file' exists for this property. It contains additional information such as correspondence, newspaper clippings, or historical information. It is a public record and may be viewed in person at the Wisconsin Historical Society, Division of Historic Preservation-Public History. Photo code #2: 75BR-13/26 Large residential hotel/recreational building designed in Tudor Revival style. Main facades face north and east and are sided in cut stone. The building is rectangular in plan and has 2 large give and a half story tall rectilinear blocks that intersect to form an L-plan. They surround the two story tall indoor swimming pool that makes up the rest of the rectilinear plan and that is hidden from street view. The rear of the taller blocks is sided in common brick. The building rests on a raised cut stone sided foundation with a dressed cut stone water table surmounting it. Both the north and east facing facades are largely the same and feature symmetrical facades with the main entrances placed in the center of the building. These entrances are both distinguished by wide cut stone surrounds with engaged single step buttresses forming the sides and with crenellated cut stone coping above with a cut stone name panel placed directly above the segmental arched entrance door opening. The lst floor of the building is taller than the rest and is lit by large triple window groups with transoms above each, each group of which is under a single segmental arched opening having a cut stone voussoir. The 2nd through 4th floors above are cut stone sided, while the 5th floor is sided in stucco and is divided by three larger gable roofed one and a half story dormers. The two end dormers each have three story tall shallow rectilinear oriels below sided in fake half timber work. There is a modern two and a half story tall wing across the south side of the older building. 2017-NRHP District Nomination This building was added to the National Register of Historic Places on February 16, 2016. Designed by Foeller, Schober, and Stephenson in 1924, the building opened in 1925. It is the only institutional example of the Tudor Revival (or, more specifically, Elizabethan) style of this scale—six stories tall above a high basement—and quality in Green Bay. Tudor Revival details such as split-faced stone façades, arched openings, half-timbering wood details, and a steeply pitched roof are all present on the Green Bay YMCA building. The 1925-era building has an L-shape configuration. Most first floor windows are in groups of three below segmental arches, while most other windows are single mounts with flat lintels above. The symmetric façade overlooking N. Jefferson street is side-gabled with a steep roof pitch. Three parapet-gabled, attic wall dormers are regularly spaced along the roof, each with a single window in the sixth-floor attic. These dormers cap three of the seven vertical bays of the façade. The central dormered bay houses an entrance at the first floor. The other dormered bays feature a very shallow, rectangular oriel with stucco and stickwork around groups of three windows at the second, third, and fourth floors. Stucco also adorns the walls of the fifth floor where there are no dormers above. The remainder of the wall surface is clad in split-faced stone. The left side of the façade overlooking Pine Street is dominated by the tall, end gable wall of the N. Jefferson street façade. This wall has a polygonal bay window at the basement and first floor. To the right of this wide bay are seven additional vertical bays, three of which are capped with wall dormers like those facing N. Jefferson Street. An entrance is centrally located, between two dormered bays. The dormered bays to either side of the entrance have stucco and stickwork at the second, third, and fourth floors. The remaining dormered bay to the right has a three story, stone, polygonal oriel at these floors. Stucco is again present at the fifth floor where there are no dormers above. A Contemporary style addition was constructed adjacent to the south façade in 1968. The façade of the addition referenced the Tudor Revival style of the larger 1924 building while expressing character-defining characteristics of the Contemporary, mid-century modern style. The 1924 portion of the building is currently undergoing extensive exterior maintenance and interior rehabilitation, but the work maintains the building’s [historic material]. The 1968 addition has had its primary façade removed. The plan is to replace the old façade with a glass curtain wall. Berners-Schobers and Associates, Inc., is the architect for this project. |
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| Bibliographic References: | A. Sanborn-Perris Map Co., Inc. Fire Insurance Map of Green Bay, Wisconsin. New York, 1957. B. "The New YMCA Building", pamphlet, Brown County Library local History Collection; note date. C. Green Bay Press-Gazette, "Indorse Plan for Y.M.C.A. for Green Bay," 9/21/1922. D. Green Bay Press-Gazette, "Property Owners! Have Your a Y.M.C.A. Site?" 9/25/1922. E. Green Bay Press-Gazette, "History of Y.M.C.A. Proves Inspiring Story of Man's Hunger for Moral Uplift," 9/28/1922. |
| Wisconsin Architecture and History Inventory, State Historic Preservation Office, Wisconsin Historical Society, Madison, Wisconsin |