{"nrhp_refnum":"98001178","name":"Body Block","other_names":["Old Smith Arcade","Robert L. Stolz Apartments"],"category":"building","location":{"address":"4925-4955 Payne Ave.,1692-1696 E. 55th St.","address_restricted":false,"city":"Cleveland","county":"Cuyahoga County","state":"OH","lat":41.512823998000044,"lon":-81.65234634799998,"geom_source":"nps_gis"},"listed_date":"1998-09-18","is_nhl":false,"nhl_designated_date":null,"areas_of_significance":["Architecture"],"significance_levels":["local"],"summary":{"what_it_is":"A three-story Queen Anne style brick commercial and apartment building at the northwest corner of East 55th Street and Payne Avenue in Cleveland, Ohio, built in 1892-93 and now rehabilitated as 39 apartments.","why_significant":"The nomination argues it is a good, early and unusual small-scale Queen Anne commercial and multi-dwelling building that uses an arcade/atrium in a residential setting. The two-story atrium with skylights brought in light and ventilation and created a shared social space for tenants. It was also the earliest apartment building of its type in the Payne-East 55th neighborhood and helped spur later development.","narrative":"Built in 1892-93 at the northwest corner of East 55th Street and Payne Avenue in Cleveland, this three-story brick building combined ground-floor shops with rental housing above. Its Queen Anne character shows in wood-paneled projecting bays, stepped stone-capped parapets and decorative corbeled brickwork. The standout feature is a two-story interior atrium under a segmented glass and steel skylight, with third-floor balconies and two freestanding T-shaped staircases. The atrium brought daylight and cross-ventilation to the surrounding apartments and gave residents a common meeting space. The nomination calls it an unusual use of the arcade idea, which Cleveland applied mostly to large commercial buildings, in a residential setting. The architect is uncertain; the permit names only Smith, and attribution is split between George H. Smith and Edward E. Smith. Once the area declined, the building emptied, and a 1973 demolition permit went unused. Rehabilitation in the 1990s converted the storefront level to housing and produced 39 apartments.","period_of_significance":"1892-1948","architect_builder":"George Smith or Edward Smith - architect; Schultz and Stien - builder","architectural_style":"Late Victorian: Queen Anne","criteria":["C"],"status_note":"Rehabilitated and in use as 39 apartments and one small office; the building was largely vacant from 1977 to 1993 and was saved from demolition.","vacant_flag":false,"machine_generated":true,"model":"claude-sonnet-5-5","prompt_version":"v1.0-2026-10-29","generated_at":"2026-10-29 02:52:07.200701-05","source_pdf":"https://s3.amazonaws.com/NARAprodstorage/lz/electronic-records/rg-079/NPS_OH/98001178.pdf"},"photo":{"url_800":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/media/98001178/e73f300eb5-800.webp","url_1600":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/media/98001178/e73f300eb5-1600.webp","licence":"CC BY-SA 1.0","author":"Christopher Busta-Peck | Talk.","credit_html":"<a href=\"https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Body_Block_Cleveland_Ohio.jpg\" rel=\"noopener\">Christopher Busta-Peck | Talk.</a>, <a href=\"https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/1.0\" rel=\"license noopener\">CC BY-SA 1.0</a>, via Wikimedia Commons","source_page":"https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Body_Block_Cleveland_Ohio.jpg"},"district":null,"sources":{"nps_snapshot_date":"2026-05-22","nara_catalog":"https://catalog.archives.gov/id/71987458","wikipedia":"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Body_Block","wikidata":"https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q30152363"},"indexable":true,"url":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/ohio/cuyahoga-county/body-block-98001178/"}