Warner and Swasey Building

A Decades-Long Search for Repurpose

Warner and Swasey Building Situated on the north side of Carnegie Avenue, just east of East 55th Street, the five-story Warner & Swasey building, built in two stages between 1904-1910, towers over the surrounding midtown area. Vacant since 1985, the building is now in the process of being converted into an apartment building. Source: Google Maps

According to one website, it was for years one of Cleveland's most popular places for urban exploring. In a building where world wars were once won, young people crept through dark hallways, clambered up rusted metal stairways, and walked carefully through debris-filled rooms.

Well, perhaps it is a bit of a stretch to say that wars were won in this building. But it is a fact that, in the long-vacant Warner & Swasey building at 5701 Carnegie Avenue, critical armament parts were once manufactured that helped the United States and its allies win two world wars during the twentieth century.

The five-story building made of reddish-brown stone was constructed over a six-year period from 1904 to 1910. It replaced the original Warner & Swasey building that had been erected on the site in the early 1880s. That was just shortly after Worcester Warner and Ambrose Swasey, two young New England machinists, had come to Cleveland to build a machine shop — to Cleveland, because they thought Chicago was just too far west.

Warner & Swasey built telescopes and machine lathes in the new, as well as the old, building on Carnegie Avenue. And in wartime, when the company built those armament parts that helped America win two world wars, thousands of Clevelanders worked there. They built parts for tommy guns in World War I. And in World War II, when 7,000 Clevelanders worked for Warner & Swasey, they built parts for planes, ships, and tanks.

From World War I, through World War II, and into the 1950s and the 1960s, the building on Carnegie Avenue was one of Cleveland's most important workplaces. People talked about Warner & Swasey in the same breath and in the same way that they talked about the city's other big employers, like Republic Steel, TRW, and Ford Motor. But then the building on Carnegie Avenue began its downward slide, much like the city of Cleveland did in the same period. In the end it was a victim of high technology, and when it closed its doors for good in 1985, only a few hundred employees were still left to be sent elsewhere.

Decades passed after Warner & Swasey left Cleveland. Its iconic early twentieth-century industrial building was owned for much of that period of time by the City of Cleveland, which looked to put the building to a new use. In 1988, Cuyahoga County had considered the building as a possible site for its Department of Human Services and Child Support Enforcement Agency. That fell through. In 1992, Cleveland officials talked about making it the Charles V. Carr Municipal Center. That never happened either.

In 2010, yet another proposal was put on the table. Fred and Greg Geis, sons of German immigrants who came to Cleveland in the 1960s, proposed to convert the Warner & Swasey building into a high-tech office, lab and manufacturing facility. However, after several years of planning, the Geis Brothers ultimately decided that the Warner & Swasey Building would not suit their purpose, and they developed their Tech Park instead on a large piece of land located between Euclid and Carnegie Avenues, several blocks east of the Warner & Swasey Building.

And so the historic building stood vacant and deteriorating on Carnegie Avenue for several more years. And then, in 2018, a new redevelopment proposal was put forward by Pennrose, a housing developer from Philadelphia. Its proposal was to convert the Warner & Swasey Building into an apartment building with some affordable housing units, some units for seniors, and some market-rate units. The proposal included a possible roof deck which, according to the developer, would offer tenants amazing views of downtown Cleveland.

In 2025, Pennrose completed its acquisition of the Warner & Swasey Building and, in early 2026, it began its redevelopment and restoration of the historic building. It is likely hoped by all who know the historic nature of the Warner & Swasey Building that soon it will be filled with residents who will not only enjoy the benefits of living in an historic building, but will, as well, enjoy the benefits of living in Cleveland's fast-developing Midtown neighborhood.

Images

Warner and Swasey Building Situated on the north side of Carnegie Avenue, just east of East 55th Street, the five-story Warner & Swasey building, built in two stages between 1904-1910, towers over the surrounding midtown area. Vacant since 1985, the building is now in the process of being converted into an apartment building. Source: Google Maps

The Founders of Warner and Swasey Worcester Reed Warner (1846-1929), on the right, and Ambrose Swasey (1846-1937), on the left, became friends while working as apprentice machinists in a shop in Exeter, New Hampshire in the 1860s. They came to Cleveland in 1881 to start their own machine business which specialized in the manufacture of telescopes and lathes. This photo was taken in the 1920s shortly prior to the death of Worchester Warner. Image courtesy of Cleveland State University, Michael Schwartz Library, Special Collections.

The First Factory The first Warner & Swasey factory, shown above, was built in the early 1880s. This three-story building was demolished in 1908 to make room for construction of the eastern half of the five-story building which replaced it. The company manufactured telescopes and machine lathes in this building. Image courtesy of Cleveland State University, Michael Schwartz Library, Special Collections.

Warner and Swasey Employees - 1883 A group of Warner & Swasey workers pose for an employee group picture in 1883, just two years after the company was founded in Cleveland by Worchester Warner and Ambrose Swasey. Image courtesy of Cleveland State University, Michael Schwartz Library, Special Collections

Death of a Cleveland Industrialist This headline story from the June 13, 1937 edition of the Cleveland Plain Dealer graphically demonstrates the the importance of Ambrose Swasey to the Cleveland business community in the early twentieth century. At the time of his death, Cleveland mayor Harold Burton called him one of the city's "greatest citizens." Image courtesy of Cleveland State University, Michael Schwartz Library, Special Collections

Advertising Turret Lathes A view of the Warner & Swasey building circa 1941 from the west shows the company's rooftop scaffold sign advertising not only the company's name but also its primary manufactured product. A turret lathe is a machine that repetitively produces metal parts in multiple cutting operations that do not need to be interrupted for the purpose of performing intermediary setup tasks. Image courtesy of Cleveland State University, Michael Schwartz Library, Special Collection.

Workers and their Lathes The above photo shot in 1940 shows the size of the machine shop at Warner & Swasey on the eve of the United States' entry into World War II. During the War, machinists like these shown in the photo manufactured parts for the planes, ships, and tanks that helped the Allies win the war. Image courtesy of Cleveland State University, Michael Schwartz Library, Special Collections

Longest Strike in Cleveland History In December 1948, machinists at Warner & Swasey went on a 184 day strike, the longest in Cleveland history. The strike idled 1800 employees at the company's complex of buildings along the E. 55th Street corridor, including the building at 5701 Carnegie. In the photo above taken on June 14, 1949, a mounted Cleveland policeman keeps an eye on a nearby group of striking employees. The strike ended two weeks later. Image courtesy of Cleveland State University, Michael Schwartz Library, Special Collections

Leaving Cleveland After 100 Years In 1985, after operating its industrial business in Cleveland for over 100 years, Warner & Swasey, now part of the Bendix Corporation, shuttered the doors on its building at 5701 Carnegie Avenue and moved its remaining operations to its facility in the Cleveland suburb of Solon, Ohio. In the above Plain Dealer article, several Democrat Councilmen assign blame to Republican Mayor George Voinovich, while others blame Republican President Ronald Reagan. Image courtesy of Cleveland State University, Michael Schwartz Library, Special Collections

Pennrose Site Plan The above site plan for the Warner & Swasey property on Carnegie Avenue was submitted to the City of Cleveland by Pennrose Properties, LLC. Source: NEOtrans Blog

Location

5701 Carnegie Ave, Cleveland, OH

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Metadata

Citation Info

Jim Dubelko, “Warner and Swasey Building: A Decades-Long Search for Repurpose,” Cleveland Historical, accessed May 10, 2026, https://mail.clevelandhistorical.org/items/show/623.

Added November 1, 2013. Modified April 29, 2026.

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