State National Bank Building
El Paso, Texas
Description: State National Bank Building
Other Names: Home Mortgage Company; El Paso State Bank
Address: 114 East San Antonio Avenue at South Oregon Street, southwest corner, El Paso, El Paso County, Texas
Type: commercial: bank
Original Client: State National Bank
Historic Inventory: National Register number 80004114
Date: begun March, 1921; opened to the public January 30, 1922
Condition: extant
Architect or Firm: Henry C. Trost
Associated Architect or Firm: Trost & Trost; Remington and Company, Los Angeles, interior designers
Contractors: J. E. Morgan, general contractor; Warner and Woodruff, Los Angeles, concealed lighting fixtures; marble supplied by Vermont Marble Company, Dallas; Guheen Brothers, plumbing; Elliott Engineering Company, oil burning heating plant; International Brick Co., brick and hollow tile; W.K. Hill& Co., venetian blinds
Dimensions and Orientation: two stories appearing as one, 72 feet on San Antonio Avenue x 130 feet on Oregon Street
Architectural Style: Second Renaissance
Budget/Cost: $250,000
Foundation:
Wall Materials: granite and glazed terra cotta
Roofing Materials: flat; supported by steel girders
Other Materials Used: walls, customers’ desks, and tellers’ cages of San Saba marble; bronze doors; steel girders support the roof
Remodeling and Additions: a 50 foot addition on San Antonio Avenue of 1942 by Trost & Trost; a 1948 one-story 70 foot addition on Oregon Street probably by Trost & Trost
Present Owner: El Paso State Bank
Location of Drawings: ink on linen drawings owned by El Paso State Bank; a photograph of a watercolor rendering of an alternate eight story design is in the collection of Trost family.
Location of Documentary Photographs: El Paso Public Library: Ponsford 124, general view from San Antonio Avenue before additions
Bibliography: (1) The American Architect and Building News, volume 118, number 2349, December 29, 1920 (announcement that construction will begin, and budget)
(2) “New Home of State National to Be Publicly Opened Monday; on One Corner for Four Decades,” El Paso Herald, January 28, 1922, page 12 (description and budget); see also page 9 (exterior photograph and advertisements by architects and contractors)
(3) C. L. Sonnichsen and M. G. McKinney, the State National since 1881;The Pioneer Bank of El Paso (El Paso: Texas Western Press, 1971), pages [81] and 82 (details of construction of 1921-1922 building); page 91 (an account of the purchase by the Bank of the land on San Antonio Avenue used for the 1942 addition)
(4) Lloyd C. and June Marie F. Engelbrecht, Henry C. Trost: Architect of the Southwest, (El Paso: El Paso Public Library Association, 1981), page 53 (mentioned); page 78 (illustrations of doorway and general view); page 79 (discussed); page 99 (mentioned); page 132 (bibliographic note)
Remarks: “…an outstanding example of the Second Renaissance Revival formal classicism.” (National Register of Historic Places nomination form, 1979) The original entry was relocated to the San Antonio Street addition. The faces in the lintel are portraits of Henry C. Trost. The interior of the bank was finished in a cream gray color and decorated in an empress design of blue and gold.
In February, 1881 Bassett and Morehead organized the State National Bank with Morehead as president and Bassett a major stockholder. The bank was operated out of a brick building located on the site of the present one. It was not until the so-called “old gang” was replaces with men as Charles Bassett, George Flory and others that the bank began to expand.
Prepared for the El Paso Public Library by Lloyd C. and June F. Engelbrecht under a grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities, 1990