White Tower Restaurant

Looks great Tom. Details are incredible! Can't wait to see the finished product! Keep the pictures coming! Terry

I am not familiar with White "Tower", but with White Castle from my youth in the midwest.  I remember W.C. as the first "fast food" chain I encountered.  Were they

related to each other?  Building styling was similar but not a clone.

I don't think they were related, however, the details of both certainly were familiar to each other! My version is the redone exterior with new porcelain panels over the brick. The scalloped top of each wall is still visible at the rear, which was not recovered. This has turned out to be a very interesting project and I have learned a lot about the subject for sure.

Don't think they were cut from the same set of legal papers.  However, they had enough similarities of purpose, name, and architecture to cause the confusion for present and future generations.....for sure.

Here's how I remember them....

 White Castle....

White Tower....

The White Castle architecture pretty much had the notched castle-like parapet at the top of the walls....

The White Tower...at least in the neighborhood I grew up in in D.C...had the tower-like features topping the front corner walls. 

I'm sure there were variants of both over time, though.

Nice structure coming along there, Tom.

KD

DKDKRD has done his own version, and if I may be so bold , here is his effort...

Be fun to see your completed project.

Technically...they are not related...but in a strange way...they are. From Wikipedia:

John E. Saxe and Thomas E. Saxe started White Tower Hamburgers after investigating various White Castle locations, observing operations and hiring a White Castle operator. The first location opened near Marquette University in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. By the end of 1927, there were six locations in Milwaukee and Racine, Wisconsin. In 1929, White Tower put 30 locations in Detroit alone. Despite the Depression, White Tower expanded to 130 locations. White Tower placed many of its restaurants near train and trolley stops.

In 1929, White Castle sued White Tower in Minnesota for unfair competition and White Tower counter-sued in Michigan as White Tower had arrived in Michigan first. The Minnesota case ended in 1930 in favor of White Castle, forcing White Tower to end its use of similar building designs, slogans and name. The Michigan case dragged on until 1934, revealing the hiring away of a White Castle location operator and photographing of the latest White Castle to keep up on design. The United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit later affirmed the lower court's rulings that they had copied White Castle deliberately. White Castle refrained from forcing a name change for White Tower but did require new locations to pay a royalty fee, and to send photos of the locations. Having to change its look, White Tower first used an art deco, then modernistic designs. Territorially, White Tower and White Castle stayed away from each other from then on.

So...from this...

...to this.

Outstanding buildings, Tom and KD.

Though, a devote "Craver," I think White Tower had more interesting and fun buildings. Here's one I stumbled upon that I hadn't seen before.

Aha!  I thought White Tower was a blatant copy of White Castle, and my read of the

the Wikipedia articles on both just now verifies that.  If I read the White Tower one

correctly, there is/was? only ONE left in Toledo, Ohio, period.  I was trying to find

out if any of either were in Colorado, and no such luck.  There were a lot of other

imitators that have come and gone, though, and maybe there were some of those

there.   Both had a much earlier start than I would have guessed, in the 1920's which explains me first "buying 'em by the sack" at a Louisville, Ky. White Castle in the 1940's.

The sad local version at Oakland/Berkeley line.

Now closed, Twin Castle.

A list of knock-offs, again, From Wikipedia:

The success of White Castle led to numerous imitators. Restaurants copied the distinctive architecture of White Castle buildings, as well as created confusion for consumers by using a similar name. The first of these imitators in Wichita was Little Kastle. Many competitors created their names with a play on the White Castle name. Some restaurant chains just replaced the word "Castle" with their own word (Cabin, Cap, Clock, Crescent, Diamond, Dome, Fortress, Grille, House, Hut, Kitchen, Knight, Log, Manna, Mill, Palace, Plaza, Shop, Spot, Tavern, Tower, Turret, Wonder), while others chose to replace "White" with another (Blue, King's, Little, Magic, Modern, Prince's, Red, Royal, Silver). Some of the other imitators included Castle Blanca, Blue Beacon, Blue Bell, Blue Tower, Red Barn, Red Lantern and Klover Kastle. Despite all the competition, none of the competitors were able to match the success of White Castle.

I recall passing a White Tower on a corner on the north side of the 16th Street Bridge near the Heinz Plant in Pittsburgh every day on my way home from college in the mid '70s.  I rode a bus from the Greyhound Terminal across the street from the Penn Station in Pittsburgh out to near Butler.  The bus would stop at a red light right at the White Tower.  I was never in one, but looked in from the bus countless times.  I would say it was torn down for the expressway construction in the late '80s.  The model and photos sure look like what I remember.

Tom,

The work looks real nice so far. Have fun with the build.

Alan Graziano