National Register Listing

Santa Fe Terminal Buildings No.1 and No. 2

a.k.a. Santa Fe Office Building and Warehouse No. 2

1114 Commerce St. and 1118 Jackson St., Dallas, TX

The Santa Fe Terminal Buildings #1 and #2 were constructed in 1924-25 as one of the more ambitious Texas building projects of the 1920s. The massive complex, connected by a network of underground railroad tunnels, served to centralize the Gulf, Colorado and Santa Fe Railway's transferring and warehousing operations in the heart of Dallas while removing the network of surface railroad tracks that had hindered downtown traffic for many years. The 20-story Building #1 (sometimes called the Santa Fe Office Building) housed railroad offices and office space for lease; Building #2 (also called Warehouse No. 2) contained sample rooms, merchandise storage and wholesaling facilities for the city of Dallas which had become the major merchandising center of the Southwest. The complex served the railway company until 1942 when the U.S. Government acquired the office building for use during World War II. The brick buildings, visually tied together by their common use of materials, retain some Beaux Arts stylistic influence but also reflect the simple influences of modern architecture on large building construction. Designed by Dallas architect Lloyd R. Whitson and his associate F. Cowderie Dale, the buildings have been a notable visual feature on two adjacent city blocks in the western central business district for seventy years. The buildings remain a dramatic reminder of one of the major 1920s building projects in the Southwest. While a third building in the complex was razed and the fourth and smallest is now isolated, the two nominated buildings retain their essential historic character. For its role as one of the major railroad facilities of its kind in North Texas from 1924 to 1942, the complex meets National Register Criteria in the areas of Architecture and Transportation at the local level of significance.

Local significance of the building:
Transportation; Architecture

Listed in National Register of Historic Places in 1997.

The National Register of Historic Places is the official list of the Nation’s historic places worthy of preservation. Authorized by the National Historic Preservation Act of 1966, the National Park Service’s National Register of Historic Places is part of a national program to coordinate and support public and private efforts to identify, evaluate, and protect America’s historic and archeological resources.