The Dixie Terminal is a set of buildings in

Cincinnati Cincinnati ( ) is a city in the U.S. state of Ohio and the county seat of Hamilton County. Settled in 1788, the city is located at the northern side of the confluence of the Licking and Ohio rivers, the latter of which marks the state line wit ...

Ohio Ohio () is a state in the Midwestern region of the United States. Of the fifty U.S. states, it is the 34th-largest by area, and with a population of nearly 11.8 million, is the seventh-most populous and tenth-most densely populated. The sta ...

, that were completed in 1921 and served as a streetcar terminal, stock exchange, and office building in the city's downtown business district. They were designed by Cincinnati architect

Frederick W. Garber Frederick W. Garber (July 21, 1877 – August 7, 1950) was an American architect in Cincinnati, Ohio and the principal architect in the Garber & Woodward firm with Clifford B. Woodward (1880–1932). The firm operated from 1904 until it was dissol ...

's Garber & Woodward firm. The main building includes an Adamesque barrel-vaulted concourse and Rookwood Architectural

Faience Faience or faïence (; ) is the general English language term for fine tin-glazed pottery. The invention of a white pottery glaze suitable for painted decoration, by the addition of an oxide of tin to the slip of a lead glaze, was a major ad ...

entry arch. The Rookwood tiles were manufactured by the local

Rookwood Pottery Company Rookwood Pottery is an American ceramics company that was founded in 1880 and closed in 1967, before being revived in 2004. It was initially located in the Over-the-Rhine neighborhood in Cincinnati, Ohio, and has now returned there. In its heyday ...

. At Fourth and Walnut Streets, the terminal was constructed of

reinforced concrete Reinforced concrete (RC), also called reinforced cement concrete (RCC) and ferroconcrete, is a composite material in which concrete's relatively low tensile strength and ductility are compensated for by the inclusion of reinforcement having hig ...

and finished in gray brick, Bedford limestone, and granite. It includes two structures: the four-story south building extending to Third Street, where streetcars entered and left, and the "handsome" 10-story north building, housing railroad ticket agencies, the Cincinnati Stock Exchange, administrative offices of the Cincinnati Street Railway Company, commercial offices, and shops. A long and elaborate arcade runs through from main entrance through the building, lined by shops. The building included marble floors, Bottincino marble

wainscot Panelling (or paneling in the U.S.) is a millwork wall covering constructed from rigid or semi-rigid components. These are traditionally interlocking wood, but could be plastic or other materials. Panelling was developed in antiquity to make roo ...

, metal trimmings, and "costly brightly decorated ceilings, with fanciful medallions showing little children riding on the backs of various animals". The terminal was used for bus service after streetcar service ceased in the 1950s. Buses arriving from northern Kentucky crossed the

Roebling Suspension Bridge The John A. Roebling Suspension Bridge (formerly the Cincinnati-Covington Bridge) is a suspension bridge that spans the Ohio River between Cincinnati, Ohio, and Covington, Kentucky. When opened on December 1, 1866, it was the longest suspension ...

and took ramps from the bridge into the terminal. In 1998 the ramps were removed, and the bus service ceased using the terminal. The Cincinnati Stock Exchange closed its physical trading floor in 1976 after becoming an all-electronic stock trading exchange but remained in the building until relocating to

Chicago (''City in a Garden''); I Will , image_map = , map_caption = Interactive Map of Chicago , coordinates = , coordinates_footnotes = , subdivision_type = Country , subdivision_name ...

in 1995 as the National Stock Exchange. A scene in the 1988 film ''

Rain Man ''Rain Man'' is a 1988 American road movie, road Drama (film and television), drama film directed by Barry Levinson and written by Barry Morrow and Ronald Bass. It tells the story of abrasive, selfish young wikt:wheeler-dealer, wheeler-dealer C ...

'' was shot at Dixie Terminal.

Ornament and decoration

Joseph Francis Beller is believed responsible for the original gold-leafing and the "frolicking"

cherub A cherub (; plural cherubim; he, כְּרוּב ''kərūḇ'', pl. ''kərūḇīm'', likely borrowed from a derived form of akk, 𒅗𒊏𒁍 ''karabu'' "to bless" such as ''karibu'', "one who blesses", a name for the lamassu) is one of the u ...

s in the building.

References

{{reflist Buildings and structures in Cincinnati Bus stations in Ohio Former railway stations in Ohio Stock exchanges in the United States

Ornament and decoration

See also

References