Down comes the tower
Pieces of leaning tower to be stored so it can one day be restored
A crew pulled the top section off the Senator Theater's celebrated leaning tower Wednesday afternoon, just a day after the City Council agreed to the demolition permit.
With a crack and a few falling planks of wood, a huge crane lifted the globe-topped tower section a few inches at 5 p.m. so it leaned slightly to the south. Then the crew members on the roof stopped, and waved to those on the ground to stop Main Street traffic.
A few minutes later, the tower was pulled away and lowered to a few feet above Main Street. People took advantage of the chance to get a close look — standing in the closed traffic lane as a flatbed trailer was pushed beneath it.
The jewel-shaped globe had what appeared to be bullet holes in places and live pigeons still inside. Dropping-covered wood supports were visible inside the top tower section.
Crew members slapped each other on the back and shook their fists in the air, celebrating their success.
The job apparently turned out to be “more dangerous” than originally thought, according to City Building Official Dave Purvis. It put several crew members at risk, he added, since there was much more “rot” in the top section of the tower than originally thought.
One crew member said the guy who did the sawing was the bravest man he knew.
For some, the tower's partial destruction was an allday event, understandable since it's been part of the downtown landscape for a long time. Designed by architects Miller and Pflueger in 1927, the tower is its main feature and a part of downtown's quirky style. …
The crowd, dozens of people strong, was largely quietly watching the show at 517 Main St. Others were upset that more hadn't been done to save the tower, yelling “put it back!” as it was borne skyward. …
Bute Councilman Rick Keene said elected officials felt they'd done all they could Tuesday night.
“We couldn't have forced them to rebuild it, according to our legal advice,” he said. …
Purvis said the tower would be taken down to its roofline. The sections are being stored at the city's corporation yard, behind the Humboldt Road police station. United artists proposed to store the sections in an unfenced yard, which the city judged unsafe, Purvis said.
At present, all the city has is a letter from UA agreeing to cut down the tower in sections and store it, then allow the “community” to put it back up after it's rebuilt. They also said they'd paint the facade of the building, and show movies at the El
Rey theater for free for an event to be used as a fundraiser for the group raising money to put the tower back. …
— Enterprise-Record, March 4, 1999