Posted Oct 10, 2010
By bryanharley

The Mattei Building (Guarantee Savings Building) on Fresno & Fulton. Taken from the alley behind the building in Summer 2009.

Some interesting history from downtownfresno.org: "In 1916, Andrew Mattei, Italian-Swiss winemaker, bought the property for $55,000 and spent $1,200,000 on the current building which included a basement water well, direct-current steam generators, and tunnels to the Andella (Crest Theatre site), Kinema Theatre, Brix Building and Fresno Hotel. The building was designed by architect Eugene Mathewson. Mattei died in 1933. The bank foreclosed on the property and it had many owners until Guarantee Savings bought it in 1961. They remodeled it and unfortunately destroyed some of the classical details. If you look at it from the alley, you will see the original classical columns and capitals on the exterior of the first floor. For years, Fresno residents have looked to the electric sign below giant 'G' at the top of this building to see the time and temperature. For much the the 1990's the building sat vacant, but in the early 2000's it was renovated, complete with a state of the art fuel cell power plant (utlizing Mattei's orginal water well). It is now home to the United States Citizenship and Immigration Center Fresno office. It is listed on the Local Register of Historic Places."