The story
Lumber baron Simon J. Murphy came to Detroit and built a 13-story office building here in 1905, naming it for the Penobscot River in Maine. He died shortly before it opened. Two more buildings followed: an annex in 1916 and, in 1928, the Greater Penobscot, an Art Deco tower designed by Wirt C. Rowland.
The new tower opened informally on October 22, 1928, at about 565 feet, and Historic Detroit says it was the eighth-tallest building in the world at the time. It stayed the tallest building in Detroit and in Michigan until 1977. The red orb on top, the "blazing ball of fire," was really an aviation beacon.
Everything that was here
- 1928–present · still open
Penobscot BuildingOffice Building
For nearly 50 years this was the tallest building in Michigan, topped by a 12-foot red orb that one newspaper called a "blazing ball of fire."
See the map in 1929 →
Did you know?
Connected places
Guardian Building
Vanity Ballroom
Baker's Keyboard Lounge
AC Hotel by Marriott (planned)
Eastman Kodak Store
Kiel Auditorium (Arena)
Explore the full web of connections on the map.
Nearby history
Caucus Club
Guardian Building
Grand Trunk Pub
Fort Pontchartrain Hotel
Great Lakes Crossing
Crowley-Milner & Company
Know something about Penobscot Building? An old photo, a date, a memory of what stood here before?
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