Adams Power Plant Transformer House

Infobox nrhp
name = Adams Power Plant
Transformer House
nrhp_type = nhl

---

caption = Adams Power Plant, with transformer house in left foreground
locmapin=New York
location = Niagara Falls, NY
nearest_city =
lat_degrees = 43 | lat_minutes = 4 | lat_seconds = 54.35 | lat_direction = N
long_degrees = 79 | long_minutes = 2 | long_seconds = 34.21 | long_direction = W
area =
built = 1895
architect = McKim, Mead, and White
architecture =
designated = May 4, 1983cite web|url=http://tps.cr.nps.gov/nhl/detail.cfm?ResourceId=1552&ResourceType=Building
title=Adams Power Plant Transformer House|date=2007-09-10|work=National Historic Landmark summary|publisher=National Park Service]
added = June 11, 1975cite web|url=http://www.nr.nps.gov/|title=National Register Information System|date=2007-01-23|work=National Register of Historic Places|publisher=National Park Service]
visitation_num =
visitation_year =
refnum= 75001212
mpsub =
governing_body = Private

Adams Power Plant Transformer House in Niagara Falls, New York is a National Historic Landmarked building constructed in 1895. It is the only remaining structure that was part of the historic Edward Dean Adams Power Plant, the first large-scale, alternating current electric generating plant in the world, which followed an 1886 plan by engineer Thomas Evershed to tap the power of Niagara Falls . The plan involved a "hydraulic canal" and a 7,500 ft. brick-lined tunnel. The transformer house building was designed by the architectural firm of McKim, Mead, and White and built by Cataract Construction Co, a company formed to exploit the opportunity. Locally quarried limestone was used in its construction.

The transformer house was "built on the upper river, above deep excavations housing twenty-one generating units. Tailwater from the generators passed into a 7000-ft tailrace tunnel, which conveyed the water beneath the city to the lower river, near the present-day site of the Rainbow Bridge. The 18-ft by 21-ft tunnel required over 3 years to build, used more than 16 million bricks in a four-course lining. It also cost the lives of twenty-eight workers."cite web|url=http://www.nywea.org/Clearwaters/pre02fall/303020.html
title= Niagara Falls: from honeymoon to Love Canal and back|author=Richard R. Roll|date=Fall, 2000 |accessdate=2007-10-31|work=Clearwaters, Vol. 30, No. 3 |publisher=New York Water Environment Association, Inc.]

The building was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1975 and was designated a National Historic Landmark in 1983.citation|title=PDFlink| [http://pdfhost.focus.nps.gov/docs/NHLS/Text/75001212.pdf National Register of Historic Places Inventory-Nomination: Adams Power Plant Transformer House] |708 KB|date=September 9, 1978 |first=Ralph J. |last=Christian |otherauthors=James Gardner |publisher=National Park Service and PDFlink| [http://pdfhost.focus.nps.gov/docs/NHLS/Photos/75001212.pdf Accompanying photos, exterior and interior, from 1978.] |2.61 MB]

It is located off 15th St., just south of Buffalo Avenue.

References

External links

* "Power The Gift of Niagara", by John Aiken and Richard Aiken, Buffalo and Erie County Historical Society, Adventures in Western New York History, volume X, 1962, (downloadable from http://bechsed.nylearns.org/, click on Adventures in WNY History)
* [http://hdl.loc.gov/loc.pnp/hhh.ny1014 Edward D. Adams Station Power Plant: 15 photos] , at Historic American Building Survey.

ee also

*List of National Historic Landmarks in New York