Marine Midland Building
Encyclopedia
Broadway (New York City)
Broadway is a prominent avenue in New York City, United States, which runs through the full length of the borough of Manhattan and continues northward through the Bronx borough before terminating in Westchester County, New York. It is the oldest north–south main thoroughfare in the city, dating to...
in Manhattan
Manhattan
Manhattan is the oldest and the most densely populated of the five boroughs of New York City. Located primarily on the island of Manhattan at the mouth of the Hudson River, the boundaries of the borough are identical to those of New York County, an original county of the state of New York...
's financial district. The building, completed in 1967, is 688 ft (209.7 m) tall and is known for the distinctive sculpture at its entrance, Isamu Noguchi
Isamu Noguchi
was a prominent Japanese American artist and landscape architect whose artistic career spanned six decades, from the 1920s onward. Known for his sculpture and public works, Noguchi also designed stage sets for various Martha Graham productions, and several mass-produced lamps and furniture pieces,...
's Cube. Gordon Bunshaft
Gordon Bunshaft
Gordon Bunshaft was an architect educated at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. In 1988, Gordon Bunshaft nominated himself for the Pritzker Prize and eventually won it.-Career:...
of Skidmore, Owings & Merrill, the man who designed the building, had originally proposed a monolith
Monolith
A monolith is a geological feature such as a mountain, consisting of a single massive stone or rock, or a single piece of rock placed as, or within, a monument...
type sculpture, but it was deemed to be too expensive. It is currently owned by Union Investment
Union Investment
Union Investment is the investment company of the DZ BANK Group and part of the cooperative financial services network....
.
The building is approximately 677 feet (206.3 m) high, measuring approximately 1,170,000 rentable square feet (111,000 square meters).
The building was built by a consortium
Consortium
A consortium is an association of two or more individuals, companies, organizations or governments with the objective of participating in a common activity or pooling their resources for achieving a common goal....
headed by Harry Helmsley
Harry Helmsley
Harry B. Helmsley was an Americanentrepreneur who built a company that became one of the biggest property holders in the United States...
and Marine Midland Bank
Marine Midland Bank
Marine Midland Bank was a bank formerly headquartered in Buffalo with several hundred branches throughout the state of New York. Marine Midland began in 1850 in Buffalo as the Marine Trust Company with the objective of financing the new shipping trade on the Great Lakes...
received naming rights as part of its lease agreement which initially covered the two basement and first 20 floors. Controlling interest in Marine Midland was purchased by HSBC
HSBC
HSBC Holdings plc is a global banking and financial services company headquartered in Canary Wharf, London, United Kingdom. it is the world's second-largest banking and financial services group and second-largest public company according to a composite measure by Forbes magazine...
in 1980 and they secured 100% ownership in the 1987; the name of the bank was changed to HSBC Bank USA
HSBC Bank USA
HSBC Bank USA, National Association, the American subsidiary of UK-based HSBC Holdings plc, is a bank with its operational head office in New York City and its nominal head office in McLean, Virginia . HSBC Bank USA, N.A...
in 1998. Today the building is known by both names, but is more often referred to by its older name to distinguish it from the other HSBC Building
HSBC Building
Several buildings carry the HSBC name, and some are often referred to as HSBC Building, HSBC Tower or both:-Building:* HSBC Main Building, Hong Kong - 1 Queen's Road Central, Hong Kong...
s.
A bomb
Bomb
A bomb is any of a range of explosive weapons that only rely on the exothermic reaction of an explosive material to provide an extremely sudden and violent release of energy...
ing occurred on the 8th floor on August 20, 1969, injuring 20 people. The bomb, which police estimated to be the equivalent of 25 sticks of dynamite, was placed in a hallway just off the elevators some time during the evening and it exploded at around 10:30PM. The injured were on the night shift in the bank's stock bookkeeping department and were working on the other side of the corridor wall. Fortunately, the inside of this wall was lined with floor-to-ceiling automated file units that weighed 3 tons each and which absorbed most of the blast. Without them, the 20 injuries would all have been fatalities. The blast moved the file units about a foot, blew out all the windows on that side of the building and opened a 5 feet (1.5 m) hole in the reinforced concrete floor. The bomber, Sam Melville
Sam Melville
Samuel Joseph Melville , was the principal conspirator and bomb setter in the 1969 bombings of eight government and commercial office buildings in New York City. Melville cited his opposition to the Vietnam War and U.S. imperialism as the motivation for the bombings...
, was convicted of this and seven other 1969 Manhattan bombings and sentenced to 18 years in prison. He was killed by a state sharpshooter during the Attica Prison riots
Attica Prison riots
The Attica Prison riot occurred at the Attica Correctional Facility in Attica, New York, United States in 1971. The riot was based in part upon prisoners' demands for better living conditions...
in September 1971.
The primary tenant of the building as of 2010 is Brown Brothers Harriman, leasing some 430,000 ft² (40,000 m²) in 2003. BBH moved to the site from their trademark location at 59 Wall Street, filling a vacancy left after HSBC
HSBC
HSBC Holdings plc is a global banking and financial services company headquartered in Canary Wharf, London, United Kingdom. it is the world's second-largest banking and financial services group and second-largest public company according to a composite measure by Forbes magazine...
moved their primary New York offices out of the building, to the HSBC building at 452 5th Ave.