The Tower That Never Was
Exhibition on View
New York State Capitol
Governor's Reception Room
Monday - Friday
7:00 a.m. - 7:00 p.m.
The New York State Capitol is one of the few capitol buildings in the United States without an eye-catching tower or dome, but that was not the original intention. Throughout the building’s 32 years of construction (1867-1899), three different architects worked on the design — Thomas Fuller, Leopold Eidlitz, and Isaac Perry — with each one proposing a different design of a dome and/or tower.
Original Capitol architect Thomas Fuller proposed a tower that would reach 320 feet in height and have a spiral staircase leading to an observatory platform. After Fuller failed to complete his construction timeline, Leopold Eidlitz took over the design and proposed a shorter structure—a dome in a Romanesque style but heeding the engineers' warning about a potential lack of structural integrity in the northeast quadrant, the Capitol Commissioners determined it was too risky to move forward with a granite tower or dome.
Architect Isaac Perry proposed a lighter tower made from a steel framework enveloped in copper sheeting and adorned with cast bronze ornaments. Ultimately, even though the foundation for a tower had been built in the mid-1890s, the Capitol Commission scrapped all tower proposals indefinitely in 1896 due to budgetary and engineering concerns.
Decades went by without discussion of a dome or tower until rising, patriotic sentiments at the end of World War I. During New York State Governor Alfred E. Smith’s term, a plan was conceived to create a Flag Room on the first floor of the Capitol. Forty feet above the two-storied rotunda, paintings depicting New York State’s military past would be displayed. In 1920, William de Leftwich Dodge, a well-known illustrator, and muralist from New York City, was commissioned to paint the murals.
Although the second floor was never removed, the murals were installed on the slightly flattened, domed second-floor ceiling in 1929. The military history portrayed in the murals led to the room’s unofficial nickname, “The War Room.” In the mid-1990s, the room was rehabilitated and dedicated as the Governor’s Reception Room, which it is officially called to this day.
Browse these Objects from the Exhibit
Plan of the New Capitol at Albany by Architects Thomas Fuller and Arthur D. Gilman, 1867
Scene in the Capitol Photogravure from Albany Illustrated, H.R. Page and Company, 1897
Aaron Veeder Stereoview Photograph, Circa 1875
Invitation to the Opening of the Legislative Halls in the New Capitol, January 7, 1879
Invitation to a State Ball commemorating the Centennial Anniversary of the establishment of the Capitol at Albany, January 6, 1897
Souvenir Glass Paperweight , Circa 1895 to 1900
The Albertype Company, Brooklyn N.Y. Souvenir Viewbook of Albany N.Y., Circa 1905.
Postcard View of the “War Room”, Circa 1907
Postcard View of the New Flag Room, Circa 1935
Hennessey and Nolan, Albany NY Empire State Mineral Water Bottle, Circa 1888
Traverse the Timeline of the New York State Capitol's Proposed Tower in Photos
Thomas Fuller and Chilion Laver design, Harper’s Weekly, October 9, 1869
1870s
Proposed changes to Capitol by Leopold Eidlitz, Henry Hobson Richardson, and Frederick Law Olmsted, American Architect and Building News, March 11, 1876
Section through the proposed dome showing spiral stairway to a lookout platform, American Architect and Building News, March 11, 1876
1880s
Architectural Drawing of the final tower design by Capitol Architect Isaac Perry, March 13, 1889. Image courtesy of OGS Design and Construction
Isaac Perry’s design revisions for the NYS Capitol with tower, from The Capitol, Albany, NY Viewbook, circa 1889
1920s
Architectural Rendering of a two-story rotunda within the tower space, circa 1920