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Property Location
Property Features
In 1909, Cusick and his partners built the Beaux-Arts Classical Bay View Beach Pavilion, crowned by a domed cupola. Clapboard walls enclosed dining rooms in the middle section, a roller-skating rink (long gone) in the west wing, and a dance hall in the east wing. Famous orchestras such as Tommy Dorsey's, Glenn Miller's, and Lawrence Welk's played at the dance hall over the years. In 1934, 100,000 people gathered before the pavilion to hear President Franklin Roosevelt commemorate the tercentennial of French explorer Jean Nicolet's landing in the Green Bay area. (FDR had also come to rally Wisconsin's Progressives and Democrats behind his ambitious New Deal agenda, sparking the beginning of a liberal coalition in the state.)
Roosevelt spoke from a bunting-draped stage, set up under the colossal two-story portico facing the bay. The portico's smooth Tuscan columns, simple capitals, inset balcony (now gone), and broad triangular pediment made for a grand backdrop. On the opposite side of the building, a more modest one-story semicircular portico with coupled Doric columns shelters the double-door entry. Unfortunately, aluminum siding now clads the walls.
National And State Register Of Historic Places Listings
Architecture & History Inventory
The Wisconsin Architecture and History Inventory (AHI) is a digital source of information on historic buildings, structures, and objects that have been surveyed by the State Historic Preservation Office in Wisconsin. Each property has a digital record providing basic information about the property and images.
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