The steel-framed structure is on the northwest corner of Dearborn and Illinois Streets on Chicago's Near North Side.

Eckstrom adopted some of Burnham's plan, but eliminated his mansard roof, making a more cohesive though less intricate building.

He briefly moved to Winnipeg, Manitoba, where he co-founded The Commercial, then found a job as a reporter in Fargo, North Dakota.

During the 1884 World Cotton Centennial, Boyce worked at the Bureau of Correspondence, which provided news from the fair to 1200 member newspapers across the nation.

These "ready print" stories catered to the interest of small-town readers, but were of higher quality than most towns could otherwise afford.

He convinced Donnelley and two other partners to found a national weekly newspaper to cater to these audiences, the Saturday Blade.

However, the diminishing isolation felt in small town America by the 1920s due to improved technology and infrastructure caused a reduction in Lone Scout enrollment.

Now more financially strapped, Boyce commissioned the construction of the rest of his namesake building in 1921, completed two years later.

Both of Boyce's houses have been destroyed; only his hunting lodge at South Dakota's Fort Sisseton Historic State Park, which was not associated with his scouting or publishing interests, remains.

The main period of significance for the building is 1912, when the first four-story portion was completed, to 1929, when Boyce died.