Prudential Building (Houston)

The Houston Main Building (HMB) formerly the Prudential Building, was a skyscraper in the Texas Medical Center, Houston, Texas. It originally housed offices of the Prudential Insurance Company, before becoming a part of the MD Anderson Cancer Center. The building was demolished on January 8, 2012. It was designed by Kenneth Franzheim.

The building was built in 1952. Originally it housed the offices of the Prudential Insurance Company. The building was the first corporate high rise building established outside of Downtown Houston. 18 story, 500,000-square-foot (46,000 m²) building was designed by Kenneth Franzheim. It was among a group of regional headquarters buildings built for Prudential in the late 1940s and early 1950s. During its history the building had landscaped grounds, a swimming pool, and tennis courts. The building was made of limestone and steel. The offices in the building served the states of Arkansas, Kansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri, Oklahoma, and Texas.

The MD Anderson Cancer Center bought the building in 1974. MD Anderson paid $18.5 million for the Prudential Building, which is located on a 22.5-acre (9.1 ha) site.

In 2002 MD Anderson announced that it planned to demolish the building and replace it with a four story medical campus. Area preservationists opposed the plan. William Daigneau, the vice president of operations and facilities, said that renovating the buildings would be too costly. In 2008 Daigneau said that the building was slowly disintegrating. MD Anderson planned to have the building demolished around 2010. Local and state preservationists protested the proposed demolition. David Bush of the Greater Houston Preservation Alliance said that the building would be eligible for listing on the National Register of Historic Places. Bush also said that the organization had been told unofficially that demolishing the structure would damage equipment in adjoining structures, so he said the organization believed that the building would not be demolished. A 2007 BusinessWeek article said that demolishing the Houston Main Building would cost $6 million. Daigneau said that a pair of clinic buildings would replace the Houston Main Building.

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