A couple hiccups and a rebuild later, historic G sign returns to downtown Fresno

The State Center Community College District on Friday fulfilled its promise to restore an iconic piece of Fresno skyline.

In a ceremony just before sundown, the district officially turned the lights on an 18-foot, LED sign atop its headquarters, ending a two-year removal and restoration project for the so-called Guarantee Savings, or “G” sign.

For nearly six decades, the G-lettered sign sat a top the Mattei Building on Fulton and Fresno streets.

It served as an advertisement (for Guarantee Savings and Loan, which bought and remodeled the building in the 1960s) and a weather forecast for those shopping on the Fulton Mall. The rotating sign was color-coded with green, red and white lights that could flash to signal danger that a storm was on the way.

By the time the community college district took over the building in 2018, the sign was in full disrepair. The electrical system was broken, the panels were rusted, and the whole thing was held in place by just some thick wires. While the district had hoped for a quick repair and repaint, “we found the sign was in fairly bad shape,” SCCCD Vice Chancellor or Operations, Christine D. Miktarian, told The Bee in 2024.

Instead of losing the sign completely (it was unsafe to keep in place as it was) the district set a plan to remove and reconstruct the sign as a copy of the original, but made with current structural design codes and LED lighting.

Of course that was easier said than done.

The removal process itself took months of planning and a day of street closures to accommodate the large crane needed to hoist the sign down the building’s 12 stories. And then it was postponed by technical difficulties; the sign was too heavy and somehow stuck in its own infrastructure. When the sign did eventually come down, the district took dimensions and other needed details, and then donated it the Fresno County Historical Museum, where it would be added to its permanent collection of vintage signs (on display at the Fresno Fairgrounds around the Paul Paul Theatre).

The replica sign was finished and reinstalled on top the district offices earlier this month. It took another few weeks for the electronics to be connected, tested and fully operational. The sign will now be lit from dusk to dawn, according the district, with lighting schemes following those of the exterior of the building, which change color in recognition of commemorative events.