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Historic place

Mercantile Building (Levy Building)

30 N Hudson Ave, Oklahoma City, OK

An eight-story office building that survived three dynamite blasts before it finally fell on February 29, 1976.

📅 1910–1976🏛️ Office BuildingDemolished
Open on the mapSlide back to 1910

The story

Brothers Sam and Leon Levy built the first five stories of the Levy Building in 1910 and added three more in 1926. It stood on the southeast corner of Main and Hudson, was designed by Layton, and was later renamed the Mercantile Building. Its offices drew attorneys, geologists, and real estate developers.

It came down in urban renewal on February 29, 1976. Crews placed 250 pounds of dynamite inside the eight-story building, expecting it to fall easily. It withstood three detonations before it finally gave way. Each failed attempt drew a crowd held back by police, with sirens and a countdown on a loudspeaker, so the crowd got to watch the same demolition three times.

What's There Now

The pages I opened do not say what occupies the site today.

Everything that was here

Did you know?

The first dynamite attempt did not bring it down, and neither did the second.
Police held back crowds for each attempt, with sirens and a loudspeaker countdown.
It was called the Levy Building before it was the Mercantile Building.

Nearby history

Hotel Black

5 N Hudson Ave · 35 m away
An 11-story Native American Art Deco hotel built after the 1928 oil boom, now an office building called One North Hudson

Globe Life Insurance offices

311 W Grand Ave · 174 m away
Globe Life Insurance Company bought the building in 1953 and kept offices there for 21 years.

Midwest Theatre

16 N Harvey Ave · 205 m away
A 1,700-seat atmospheric movie palace that hosted world premieres of Black Gold and Cimarron, and is now a parking garag

Warner Theatre (Overholser Opera House / Orpheum)

217 W Grand Ave · 234 m away
It opened as an opera house in 1903, became the Orpheum and then the Warner, and in the 1950s was Oklahoma City's first

Civic Center Music Hall (Municipal Auditorium)

201 N Walker Ave · 261 m away
A New Deal auditorium that opened in 1937, was remodeled in 1966, and is still one of the city's main stages.

Cooper Cinerama Theatre (Liberty Theatre)

19 N Robinson Ave · 261 m away
Opened as the Liberty in 1915, it became the Harber and then the Cooper, where Cinema Treasures says Cinerama and Cinemi

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Sourceshttps://www.okhistory.org/research/hmresults?no=3c