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McMorran Place

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1959–1960, Alden B. Dow; 1964 junior arena; 1965 arena tower. 701 McMorran Blvd.
  • McMorran Place (Balthazar Korab)
  • (Photo by Karen Kingsley)

In 1955 Clara E. McKenzie, Emma McMorran Murphy, and Andrew J. Murphy announced plans to build, equip, and donate a combined auditorium and sports arena in memory of their father, Henry McMorran (1844–1929). The huge complex is made up of a broad 1,169-seat auditorium and meeting rooms and two arenas—the pavilion and the main arena. Fronting the Huron Avenue facade of the large, rectilinear, light orangish red brick complex is a limestone memorial wall, on which is centered a giant sunburst clock cast in anodized aluminum finished in gold. Before this backdrop, two large sculptures, a male and a female personifying Night and Day, rise above a pool. The wall and pool sculptures are the work of noted Michigan sculptor Marshall M. Fredericks. A slender 150-foot-tall octagonal tower marks the entrance to the pavilion and the arena.

Writing Credits

Author: 
Kathryn Bishop Eckert
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Data

What's Nearby

Federal Building (U.S. Post Office and Customhouse)
Port Huron Municipal Office Center
Hill Devendorf, PC (Modern Maccabees Temple/Ladies of the Modern Maccabees Temple)
Harrington Inn (Harrington Hotel)
Port Huron Museum Carnegie Center (Port Huron Public Library)

Citation

Kathryn Bishop Eckert, "McMorran Place", [Port Huron, Michigan], SAH Archipedia, eds. Gabrielle Esperdy and Karen Kingsley, Charlottesville: UVaP, 2012—, http://sah-archipedia.org/buildings/MI-01-SC3.

Print Source

Cover: Buildings of Michigan

Buildings of Michigan, Kathryn Bishop Eckert. Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press, 2012, 346-347.

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