512 Main Street (formerly 106 W. Fifth Street), Sinclair Building, 1930; 1942; 1990. Oil money flowed into Fort Worth during the 1920s, and the downtown skyline reflects this infusion of capital in a number of elegant buildings. Among them is the recently restored Sinclair Building. Oilman R.O. Dulaney, president of the Fort Ring Oil and Gas Co., had already constructed the Petroleum Building (CBD 152) in 1927 when, in 1929 he announced plans for a new office tower to be designed by Wiley G. Clarkson and built by contractor Harry B. Friedman. Completed in 1930, the building’s Zigzag Moderne styling is evident in ziggurat motifs over doorways and display windows that recalls Mayan Indian design and in the vigorous play of the finials at the crest of the building. The building contains setbacks at its upper levels after the model established by Eliel Saarinen’s second prize entry for the Chicago Tribune Tower competition. The upper levels of the Sinclair Building are as richly ornamented as the street-level facade. Eagle finials cap the green recessed window panels at the fourteenth floor, and as the structure steps back to form the fifteenth and sixteenth floor penthouse, the vertical mullions become distinctive pinnacles. Altogether, it is one of Fort Worth’s finest Moderne or Art Deco structures.
Dulaney planned to call the building the Dulaney Building but, before it was completed, the Sinclair Oil Company leased seven of the sixteen floors, and the decision was made to rename the structure for its principal tenant. Other tenants included a number of insurance and oil companies and the Northern Texas Traction Co. (see CBD 116) which ran the Fort Worth-Dallas Interurban and street railway system.
Over the years the building underwent incremental alterations including the remodeling of its street level corner storefront in 1942. Many of the Moderne elements in the Sinclair Building’s elegant lobby, including bronze and silver plaster borders, shop window displays, and the main entrance itself, were closed off or removed completely.
A 1990 restoration of the building’s facade, under the direction of the architectural firm of Ward Bogard and Associates, reopened the main entrance, and replicated the decorative Monel screen above the entryway. Other exterior details, including the stair-stepped green marble above the windows and entrances, the green recessed window panels, and the dramatic penthouse lighting have been either restored or replaced. Johnny Pittman of Texas Sunshine, Inc. was the project construction manager. The Sinclair Building is listed on the National Register and has been designated as a City of Fort Worth Landmark. It is also a contributor to the proposed Downtown Skyscrapers National Register Thematic Group.