Ohio copied its State Capitol at Columbus: a solid two-story building with a broad Doric portico, 131 feet long and 80 deep, set in spacious grounds with terraces. The architect was Albert Pretzinger of Dayton (Todd spells it Fretzinger). Its rotunda held busts of the Ohio-born Presidents McKinley, Grant, Harrison, Hayes, Garfield and Taft. Ohio's was the first State dedication of the fair, on February 25, 1915.
Its later life was the most unusual of any State building. In 1916 ferry passengers were amazed to see "the classic Ohio Building gliding down the Bay on a raft," bound for the San Mateo County marshes to become a club. Modern accounts say it was bought at auction for about $1,000 and landed on the San Carlos shoreline in August 1916. It went on to serve as a speakeasy, a workshop and a wartime radar plant, and it burned in 1956.
