Category Archive: Historic Properties
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Renovations inch closer at historic Dormont pool
By Daveen Rae Kurutz
TRIBUNE-REVIEW
Monday, August 6, 2007After two seasons of uncertainty, Dormont Pool users can expect changes that will cement the future of the historic summer hot spot.
Dormont council is expected to approve a measure tonight to begin accepting bids to renovate the aging pool’s bathhouse.“It’s a good start to keeping this pool the centerpiece of the community,” said John Maggio, president of Friends of Dormont Pool, a nonprofit group that raised money for repairs. “Everyone’s been great and offered a lot of support.”
The organization, dedicated to keeping the 87-year-old pool from closing, collected about $812,000 from donors and in grants since spring 2006.
The group received $75,000 from Allegheny County and $250,000 from the state Department of Conservation of Natural Resources. Both grants require the borough to match the money.
Initially, officials estimated repairs at $2.6 million, but Maggio said $1 million is more realistic.The landmark art-deco pool, which opened in 1920, is believed to be the largest public pool in the state. Other than the addition of a community recreation room in 1996, the facility has undergone little renovation.
The pool almost closed last summer after officials discovered leaks and an unstable bathhouse. Friends of Dormont Pool formed and raised about $30,000 to pay for plugging leaks and shoring up the pump room.
In the offseason, workers sealed cracks and repaired pipes to ensure the pool would not leak.
“This is about 1 million gallons of water we’re talking about,” said Ann Conlin, a Dormont councilwoman. “That’s not something you want to mess with.”
Repairs are scheduled for the bathhouse and to support the nearby deck.
“Once these repairs are done, it could stay that way for many more years,” Conlin said. “But we want to add some amenities, but keep the footprint of the pool.”
Council will meet at 7:30 tonight at the municipal building on Hillsdale Avenue.
Maggio said the pool is an essential part of the borough’s identity.
The citizens group shouldered the burden of raising money, Conlin said. She and other borough officials say the group saved a community icon.
“”They’ve done a tremendous job … to make Dormont Pool a jewel,” Conlin said. “For generations to come, people will be able to keep driving down Banksville Road thinking, ‘Oh my God, it looks like a beach.’ The integrity of the pool will continue.”
Daveen Rae Kurutz can be reached at dkurutz@tribweb.com or 412-380-5627.
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Overnight in a Wright – Our architecture critic visits the Duncan House and discovers the delights of a mid-century modern Usonian
Sunday, August 05, 2007
By Patricia Lowry, Pittsburgh Post-GazetteGarden is watered, cats are fed, family is squared away. It’s Mom’s overnight out, a solo retreat on which my only companions will be a few good books, including my old, yellowing paperback copy of Frank Lloyd Wright’s “The Natural House,” because I’m going to stay in one: The Duncan House, a plywood prefab built in the 1950s in a Chicago suburb.
But I’m headed east out of Pittsburgh, at 4:09 on a Monday afternoon. As I pull onto a crowded parkway, I’m hoping the gas in my tank will get me to the town of Mt. Pleasant, where they still pump it for you at no extra charge. Just as I pull into a gas station there, my warning light comes on. “Fill it up, please,” I say, getting in a 1950s groove.
So it isn’t until I’m almost to Kecksburg that I feel that I’ve shed the city and things-I-must-do. As I come up over a rise, the countryside spreads out before me, patches of green under a cloudless blue sky, with a farmhouse and barn in the distance and horses grazing in a small pasture to my right.
When selecting a home site, “The best thing to do is go as far out as you can get,” Wright, a notorious anti-urbanist, advises in “The Natural House,” published in 1954 as a guide to building the Usonian house, the acronym he coined for the United States of North America. Usonian houses were affordable, single-story dwellings for the middle class; over his long career he built more than 100 of them, including the Duncan House.
At 5:30, I pull onto the private road leading to the Duncan House. There’s a pickup truck crossing the one-lane bridge up ahead; the driver is Tom Papinchak, the house’s owner. We wave and I follow him through the dense, deciduous forest up to the house, a long, low ranch in a clearing at the end of a winding road.
“I’m ready for my night in the woods, Tom,” I say, gravel crunching underfoot as I follow him through the side door under the carport. This old screen door with its patina of scuffs and scratches must have been the one Don and Elizabeth Duncan used every day, not the big double doors at the main entrance.
The Duncans built this house in Lisle, Ill., in 1957. Fifty years later, I’m walking into their kitchen on a hilltop in Western Pennsylvania’s Laurel Mountains. No time-space warp at work here; just old-fashioned ingenuity — and a vision to link four houses in the Laurel Highlands with Wright associations.
A low-key resort
After Don Duncan’s death at age 95 in 2002, his estate sold the house and its 15 acres to a developer who didn’t want the building but agreed to work with the Frank Lloyd Wright Building Conservancy to find a new location for it. In April 2004, the 2,200-square-foot house was deconstructed and moved to Johnstown, where it was to become an educational center for 20th-century architecture and design on the grounds of a proposed botanical garden at Sandyvale Cemetery, the town’s oldest burial ground. Papinchak, a young Westmoreland County home builder and carpenter, would be the general contractor.
He and his wife, Heather, had an interest in Wright; they had purchased 125 acres near Acme, Westmoreland County, that held two Wrightian weekend houses designed in the 1960s by former Taliesin apprentice Peter Berndtson for Pittsburgh businessmen James Balter and Harry Blum.
When the Johnstown plan fell through for lack of funding, a new one evolved — move the house to the Papinchaks’ land and open it as a guest house that also would accommodate tours and seminars. The state helped with a $200,000 First Industry Fund tourism loan, and many suppliers donated materials.
“Why wouldn’t I want to do this?” says Papinchak, who led a small crew in the yearlong reconstruction. “I already had the land and the company to build the house.”
What he didn’t have were construction plans, although there were detailed photographs and drawings documenting the deconstruction, and each piece had been lettered and numbered.
“Once we caught on to the system, we were all right,” he said. “I was like, ‘Give me a 2AF1!’ ”
Berndtson’s 1962 master plan for the site had called for 24 houses, each set within a 300-foot circular clearing in the woods, but only the Blum and Balter houses were built. Today the property, laced with about five miles of hiking trails, is a low-key resort called Polymath Park, the name given the land by its previous owner and which Papinchak retained. Lodging is available in the Duncan and Balter houses; the Blum House will serve as the visitor center, cafe, spa and gift shop when it opens later this month.
Close to two other Wright houses — it’s about 15 miles to Fallingwater and 30 to Kentuck Knob — the Duncan House is one of only six Wright houses in the country that accommodate overnight guests.
Because of Wright pilgrims, “We’ve been full almost every night,” Papinchak says.
An open plan
The place is decidedly more homey than it was at the ribbon-cutting on June 14. There are towels in the bathrooms and a microwave, small fridge, toaster oven and hot-and-cold water dispenser in the breakfast room off the kitchen. A note left on the kitchen island, surfaced in the original red-linen laminate, advises against using the house’s cooktop range, dishwasher, big pink refrigerator and oven, “to preserve the historical integrity.”
But look, there’s a bowl of fruit on the table in the breakfast room, a nice, welcoming touch. I make a beeline for the grapes.
Plastic! What a letdown. Then I laugh. Very 1957. I heat up my leftover soup in the microwave, then paw through the basket of snacks on top of it, settling for a small bag of “fruit crisps.” Very 2007.
And that’s the way it is throughout the Duncan House: One minute you’re in the 1950s in the kitchen, fantasizing about what Elizabeth Duncan cooked and looked like, and the next President Bush is commuting Scooter Libby’s sentence on MSNBC in the master bedroom. Happily, the living room is TV-free, and the overall ambience, furniture-wise, is mid-century modern.
But before we get too far ahead of ourselves, let’s enter the house like the guests we are, through the double doors. Here Wright is up to his old tricks, compressing space overhead in the entrance hall before opening it up to the great expanse of the sunken living room. Three steps down and we’re in it, marveling that a room that feels this big could be contained in a house that, from the outside, looks so small. Straight ahead, there’s a view of the stone-walled terrace through a span of glass-paneled doors.
To the right is the stone fireplace wall, where the living room flows into the dining room, which flows into the cork-floored kitchen, unusually large for a Wright house.
With a small kitchen, “We have more money to spend on spaciousness for the rest of the house,” he writes in “The Natural House.” But in the Usonian houses, Wright saw the kitchen as an extension of the living room.
“Back in farm days there was but one big living room, a stove in it,” he wrote. “And Ma was there cooking … .”
Well, Ma’s not cooking tonight, so let’s get on with the tour, back through the living room and up the three steps to the long hall Wright called the gallery, which runs along the front of the house and is lined on one side with built-in cupboards designed for storage within and display above. Off the gallery are two small bedrooms and a bath; another bath is on the opposite side of the master bedroom, located at the end of the gallery.
Downstairs, but off limits to overnight guests, is a conference room with its own stone fireplace and terrace.
Concrete to stone
I plug in my laptop at the kitchen table and start to write. The house is wireless, so I curse myself (again) for not having a wireless card. Then I curse the cursing. Relaaaax, I tell myself. There was no Internet in 1957.
At 8:30, the sun is dipping below the tree line and throwing golden rectangles on the stone fireplace wall. There were no stones in the house when the Duncans owned it; they opted for the less expensive concrete block. But the Frank Lloyd Wright Building Conservancy told the Papinchaks that stone would be an appropriate upgrade, if they could afford it. It also would be a better fit with the house’s rugged, rocky new surroundings.
The house was full of natural light in late afternoon.
“Orientation was a key factor,” Papinchak said, adding that the house is south-facing, the same way it was in Lisle. But with the sun going down, it’s time to turn on some lights.
Artificial lighting, Wright writes, should be “as near daylighting as possible.” He used recessed lighting in ceilings to create the effect of natural light. But the Duncan House rooms are too evenly illuminated at night; for me they lack drama and hominess. The Papinchaks have provided some table lamps, but the house could use more, especially in the bedrooms. My reading-in-bed plan thwarted, I veg in front of the tube until I fall asleep.
At 5 a.m. I wake to a brightening sky and bird songs. I should get up, but I roll over. At 7:30 I’m faced with two choices — the master bath with a glass-walled shower facing the woods or the windowless bath next door. I opt for the warmer, cave-like bath.
After breakfast I visit the nearby Blum and Balter houses, separated from each other by a broad meadow with a view of the Laurel Ridge.
And after a lingering look, it’s time for my reluctant return to the city.
First published at PG NOW on August 3, 2007 at 12:11 pm
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Market Square may get historical makeover
By Jeremy Boren
TRIBUNE-REVIEW
Monday, July 30, 2007Two Market Square landmarks could be poised to regain their early-20th century charm when the city’s Historic Review Commission weighs renovation plans Wednesday.
Developers and architects believe the improvements will heighten the appeal of the square — a place many avoid because of the prevalence of homeless people and panhandlers.
Washington County developer Lucas Piatt said exterior renovations to the vacant G.C. Murphy Building will restore a 1920s or ’30s era look, based on photographs of the store in its heyday. On the opposite side of Market Square, Nicholas Coffee Co. plans to turn a closed bar into a coffee shop with an old-style European look.
Most of Piatt’s $32 million renovation project is to begin by year’s end. Retail space will occupy the first floor of the G.C. Murphy Building, and most of the 38,000-square-foot headquarters of the YMCA will be on the second floor. The Y will occupy a portion of another floor as well.
“The benefit of having the activity back in the building is huge,” Piatt said. “The tax repercussions for the city will be phenomenal.”
Piatt’s project will receive about $6 million in state aid and benefit from tax credits for restoring historic buildings.
Downtown architecture firm Strada LLC is handling the design work on the G.C. Murphy Building and nearby structures, such as the adjoining seven-story D&K Building.
“There’s a combination of architectural styles within all these buildings,” said John Martin, a Strada principal. “We’re trying to bring the buildings as close as we can to their own original look.”
Original brick that was painted over will be exposed, decorative stone fixtures at the entrance will be rebuilt, and windows will be replaced.
“The (historic commission) would rather you don’t invent,” Martin said. “They don’t want it to be Disneyized.”
To avoid that, he’s relying on photographs of the buildings from the 1930s to help guide the design. Martin said he thinks the commission will approve the project. The changes still would need approval from the state Museum and Historic Commission.
Nicholas Coffee hopes to expand its imported coffee, tea and spices business to include the former Mick McGuire’s bar next door on Graeme Street. The Irish pub was closed Jan. 12 after police arrested three people accused of dealing drugs from the business.
Architect Doug Sipp of Sipp & Tepe Architects has designed about $50,000 worth of facade renovations for coffee shop owner Nicholas G. Nicholas. The interior would be changed into a cafe offering coffee, espresso, pastries and other treats.
“The facade will be like a step-down European storefront,” said Mike Kratsas, project manager. “There will be large windows like an old-time storefront.”
Arthur Ziegler, president of the Pittsburgh History & Landmarks Foundation, welcomed both of the historically sensitive upgrades to Market Square.
“I think that both coming together give a great deal of substance to the effort to make the square a vital part of the residential Downtown,” Ziegler said. “Restoring historic buildings creates an environment where people want to be.”
Jeremy Boren can be reached at jboren@tribweb.com or 412-765-2312.
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Bedford Springs course put back on map
By Rick Starr
TRIBUNE-REVIEW
Sunday, July 22, 2007Many golf courses would be proud to claim either Donald Ross or A.W. Tillinghast as its designer. Bedford Springs Resort Old Course displays the work of both architects from the “Golden Age” of golf course design.
The classic 18-hole course, which just reopened for public play, offers a rare chance to not just study their hole designs, but play them.
Bedford Springs is back on the golf destination map following a $120 million renovation and restoration of the links and 216-room hotel by Bedford Resort Partners, Ltd.
Green fees range from $110 to $135.
The resort reopened July 12 after being closed for almost two decades. It was virtually abandoned in 1986, just two years after the Department of the Interior designated its hotel and spa as a National Historic Landmark.
Located about 100 miles east of Pittsburgh, Bedford Springs Old Course now welcomes a new generation of golfers.
While the hotel dates to 1804 (Vice President Aaron Burr was one of its original guests), golf didn’t arrive on the scene until 1895.
Spencer Oldham built the original 18-hole layout, complete with geometric designs such as the S-curve and donut bunkers, which have been restored on the third hole.
In 1912, while cutting it back to a nine-hole layout, Tillinghast designed a classic little 130-yard par-3 hole (now the 14th hole) which he named “Tiny Tim.”
Ross kept “Tiny Tim” intact when he redesigned the course in 1923. Even Ross couldn’t improve on Tillinghast’s use of mounding, wetlands, a creek, pond and tight bunkering on the short hole.
“Tiny Tim” stretches from 108 to 138 yards, and Tillinghast later wrote about the 13 little mounds on the left, referring to them as the “Alps.”
Bedford Springs superintendent David Swartzel said Ross’ work is obvious on holes No. 4 through 9, which follow the flood plain of Shober’s Run, one of the states Gold Medal trout streams.
“We created a lot of habitat for trout during our construction,” Swartzel said.
While only 6,785 yards from the back tees, Bedford Springs Old Course features five par-5 holes, and five par-3 holes.
The signature par-4 sixth hole, known as Ross’ Cathedral, is cut out of a deep stand of oak and hickory.
“You could pick that hole up and put it down in Ashville, N.C., and you wouldn’t know the difference,” Bedford Springs golf pro Ron Leporati said. “Beautiful is the only word to describe it.”
Architect Ron Forse, whose Forse Design team specializes in golf course restorations, rebuilt every course feature at Bedford Springs, from the bunkers to the bent grass fairways, greens and tees.
“It’s all new, but it’s not a new style of architecture,” Swartzel said.
Forse also reinstated Ross’ original closing holes, which had been replaced by a driving range.
Bedford Springs is the 37th Ross design and 11th Tillinghast layout which Forse has restored.
“These strategic courses are forever enjoyable for every golfer’s ability,” Forse said.
About Donald Ross
No course designer had a greater impact on the American golf landscape in the first half of the last century than Donald Ross.Born in 1872 in the north Sottish coastal town of Dornoch, he arrived in the United States in 1899 to build the Oakley Golf Club near Boston.
Before his death in 1948, Ross built or designed 413 courses, and his work still can be seen across New England, the midwest, and southeast coast.
Over 100 national championships have been played on his courses.
Courses considered to be among his best include Pinehurst No. 2 in Pinehurst, N.C., Oakland Hills Country Club in Birmingham, Mich., Inverness Club in Toledo, Oak Hill in Rochester, N.Y., and Seminole in North Palm Beach, Fla.
Given the constraints of train and car travel, Ross never saw some of his courses. He did many designs from topographic maps and blueprints which he studied in his cottage behind the third green at Pinehurst.
As Ross often said, “Golf should be a pleasure, not a penance.”
Design features
Following is a list of design features which Ross repeated in many of his golf courses:• Very little walking required from one green to the next tee.
• Short par-4s built on uphill ground.
• False fronts and openings to the front of greens to invite run-up shots.
• Fallaway slopes next to greens.
• Deep trouble over the green to punish bold golfers.
• Greens (pushup construction) sloped with the terrain for drainage.
• Subtle breaks hidden in greens.
Source: Donald Ross Society
Local connections
Following is a list of area courses designed in whole or in part by Donald Ross:• Edgewood Country Club
When Ross designed the 18-hole layout for the private club in 1921, he had to factor in the typical hilly terrain near Pittsburgh.
A total of 13 holes have drop offs behind or alongside the greens.
Edgewood, which was founded in 1898 as one of the first golf clubs in the country, took advantage of its 100th anniversary to go back to many of Ross’ original designs.
Ross’ work clearly can be seen in Edgewood’s par-3 12th hole. A slightly uphill tee shot of about 175 yards must clear the false front of the green and find the right level, or bogey quickly comes into play.
“Once you get to the green, that’s when the strokes happen,” Edgewood pro Pete Micklewright said. “It’s really a classic Donald Ross design.”
Arthur Hills redesigned the areas around Edgewood’s clubhouse in 1990.
• Immergrun Golf Course
The public course in Loretto is owned and operated by St. Francis University and has never been redesigned since Ross built it in 1917. The nine-hole layout was built as part of industrialist Charles M. Schwab’s estate. He attended the college before moving on to become president of Carnegie Steel, U.S. Steel and Bethlehem Steel.
Golfers interested in playing a Ross design can pick up a bargain here – it’s only $8 for a walking round on Mondays and Tuesdays.
Rumors abound at Immergrun, but it’s not true Ross designed it for a left-handed golfer. (It’s true Schwab kept champagne cool in the spring house beside the ninth green, where he would pause with guests before finishing the round.)
• Rolling Rock Club
The private club near Ligonier was originally a nine-hole course designed by Ross in 1917.
Brian Silva designed nine new holes in 1997.
The course is not overly long – Ross’ front nine measures 3,066 yards – but makes up for it with its greens.
In typical Ross fashion, the greens are fast, well contoured and difficult to lag.
“I’d put our greens up against any in the country,” assistant pro Stephen Witcoski said.
Rolling Rock’s par-3 third hole features another Ross signature – hidden bunkers. The three massive bunkers are not visible from the tee.
More info: www.donaldrosssociety.org
Rick Starr can be reached at rstarr@tribweb.com or (724) 226-4691.
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Children’s Museum award launches plaza repairs
Friday, July 20, 2007
By Patricia Lowry,
Pittsburgh Post-GazetteAllegheny Square, the poorly maintained, concrete heart of the North Side’s Allegheny Center, could be in line for a dramatic makeover, sparked by the desire of the Children’s Museum to transform the 1960s plaza into what museum director Jane Werner calls “a green, sustainable park that’s actually used.”
To help get the process started, the museum has scheduled a collaborative design workshop for tomorrow, using a $50,000 cash prize it is receiving today for winning first place in the Rudy Bruner Award for Urban Excellence competition for its 2004 expansion.
Representatives of the Cambridge, Mass.-based Bruner Foundation will present the Gold Medal award this afternoon at the Children’s Museum.
The museum expansion, by Koning Eizenberg Architects of Santa Monica, Calif., and Perkins Eastman Architects of Pittsburgh, was chosen as the best of nearly 100 projects around the country for its blend of historic preservation and innovative, green design, as well as for the museum’s collaborations and partnerships with other organizations.
The Bruner Award is the museum’s second significant national honor; it won a design award from the American Institute of Architects last year.
At tomorrow’s workshop, to be held from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. in front of the museum, six design firms will meet with museum-goers, North Side residents and other community members to learn what features they would like to see in a new park and town square.
The six designers are landscape architect Andrea Cochran, San Francisco; La Dallman Architects, Milwaukee; architect Doug Garofalo, Chicago; landscape architect Walter Hood, Berkeley, Calif.; landscape architect Dina Klavon, Pittsburgh; and landscape architect Paula Meijerink, Boston. They were chosen from a field of 25 designers, based on portfolios of past work, by representatives of the museum, local design community and the North Side neighborhood.
Everyone is invited to tomorrow’s workshop — or charrette — and those who attend can consult base-map drawings of the existing plaza to produce their own schemes on tracing paper.
Four sand boxes will be set up with scaled items such as people, benches, trees, trash cans and lights, and visitors can design their own parks in three dimensions. Digital cameras will document the designs to capture ideas before other visitors have a go at it.
Participants also can write the top three features they would like to see in the park, as well as the top three functions they would like it to serve, on quilt squares that will be hung for display.
“It’s a little bit free-form,” Ms. Werner said.
While museum staffers conduct the hands-on activities, the six competing designers will be talking with participants and perhaps drawing with them, Ms. Werner said. “It’ll be a little like speed-dating.”
In October, designers will submit their schemes, which will be informally reviewed in a series of community meetings. Later that month, a jury of national design professionals and community leaders will pick the winning designer.
The multilevel Allegheny Square is one of the city’s most interesting but least used public spaces, with a large, stepped, sunken fountain — now defunct — designed to double as an amphitheater and three overlooks that provide views into the plaza, as well as shade.
“I worked at Buhl [Science Center] in 1982,” Ms. Werner said. “I remember the fountain working and kids running through it. But it was so hot to sit out there because there was no shade and it was always a little scary to go under the overhangs.”
The designers could retain some elements of the plaza or reference two of its earlier, greener iterations. Diamond Square had perimeter trees, intersecting diagonal paths and a central, circular fountain surrounded by benches.
In 1939, with the construction of Buhl Planetarium, the fountain was removed and the square redesigned and renamed Ober Park (honoring the fountain’s donor), but remained mostly lawn.
“The Children’s Museum wants to create a new oasis in the city for families, college students, the elderly, Children’s Museum visitors and workers, as well as a place for community events — in a way that builds upon the strengths of the plaza’s history,” said Chris Siefert, the museum’s deputy director.
The designers have been asked to create a green, sustainable park, but have been given a free hand in interpreting what that means.
Although the park could be built within five years, there is no fixed timeline or budget.
The museum will use the Bruner Award’s cash prize to help plan the new park and town square, and also to launch the “Charm Bracelet” project linking North Side and North Shore attractions. One idea is to create a temporary art gallery within the Federal Street underpass.
The Bruner Foundation was established in New York in 1963 by Rudy Bruner, a Romanian immigrant who built a small metals company in a Brooklyn basement into a multimillion dollar public corporation. He and his wife Martha established the foundation “to create opportunity for others, and to instigate meaningful social change,” according to its Web site, www.brunerfoundation.org.
The Rudy Bruner Award for Urban Excellence, given every two years, was founded in 1987 by their son, architect Simeon Bruner of Cambridge, who now heads the foundation. The award is dedicated to discovering and celebrating urban places “distinguished by quality design, and by their social, economic and contextual contributions to the urban environment.”
Patricia Lowry can be reached at plowry@post-gazette.com or 412-263-1590
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4 schools in region to share preservation grant
By Mary Pickels
TRIBUNE-REVIEW
Friday, July 20, 2007Four area schools of higher education will share in a $200,000 Getty Foundation grant aimed at preserving the individual campuses’ historic buildings and landscapes.
Each of the four schools — Seton Hill University, Washington & Jefferson College, Indiana University of Pennsylvania and California University of Pennsylvania — also contributed $10,000 to the effort.The Pittsburgh History & Landmarks Foundation announced the Campus Heritage grant. A foundation team will begin studying the schools this month, concluding in March 2009.
“The benefit is they get a very complete analysis of their historic buildings,” said Arthur P. Ziegler Jr., president of the Pittsburgh History & Landmarks Foundation. “Even if they are in perfect condition, they get a plan for future maintenance; recommendations for restoration; disability (improvements); and landscaping — down to how to prune a bush properly that might have been there 50 years.”
The individual reports, Ziegler said, can assist the schools with fund-raising to implement specific plans.
According to the Getty Foundation Web site, each of the schools exhibits a range of design in its academic buildings, distinctive campus planning and landscapes, and individual structures that represent American architectural history both locally and nationally.“They all have historic buildings, and/-or historic landscapes,” Ziegler said. “They are small in size, not likely to apply individually. And they are within easy travel distance for our team. And they were very cooperative. … We went to several and said: ‘In our view, you would qualify.’ These four were very enthusiastic.”
Seton Hill’s winding entrance drive is lined by 80 sycamore trees that are 100 years old, spokeswoman Becca Baker said. She called its historic buildings “a campus treasure.”
“Once we receive the conservation plan for Seton Hill — which will detail the PHLF’s recommendations for the preservation, conservation and continued use of our historic buildings — we plan to incorporate the recommendations into our campus master plan,” Baker said.
McMillan Hall, built in 1793, and Old Main, built in 1836, are Washington & Jefferson College’s flagship buildings, said Kristen Gurdin, director of foundation and legal affairs. McMillan Hall is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.
“One of the unique features of Old Main is that it has two towers,” Gurdin said.
After the Civil War, Washington College and Jefferson College united because of the loss of student soldiers. The towers represent the two schools.
“One of the benefits (of the study) will be the strategic assessment of the campus all at one time,” Gurdin said.
IUP’s Sutton Hall and Breezedale Alumni Center, and California’s Old Main, are all listed on the National Register of Historic Places — a consideration in their candidacies for the Getty grant, Ziegler said.
“During this final year of the Campus Heritage initiative,” said Getty Foundation Director Deborah Marrow in a news release, “we are pleased to fund the preservation planning for four of Pennsylvania’s historically important campuses.”
Two years ago, a similar grant was awarded to Allegheny College, Geneva College, Slippery Rock University and Grove City College. The earlier round of grants included funding from the Allegheny Foundation, said Ziegler.
Mary Pickels can be reached at mpickels@tribweb.com or (724) 836-5401.
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Getty Foundation Grant to Support Historic Campus Heritage Program
Pittsburgh History & Landmarks Foundation announced today it has received a Campus Heritage grant from the Getty Foundation. It will enable Landmarks to undertake conservation planning studies of buildings and landscapes of four major Western Pennsylvania colleges and universities: Seton Hill, Washington and Jefferson, Indiana U. of PA, and California U. of PA. This is the second Campus Heritage grant to Landmarks from the Getty Foundation.
“The Getty’s peer review committee is impressed by Pittsburgh History and Landmarks Foundation emphasis upon collaboration among several educational institutions,” said Getty Foundation Director, Deborah Marrow. During this final year of the Campus Heritage initiative, we are pleased to fund the preservation planning for four of Pennsylvania’s historically important campuses.”
The purpose of the Campus Heritage program is to encourage colleges and universities to develop preservation plans for their historic buildings and landscapes. Getty Foundation awarded a previous grant to Landmarks in 2005 to enable it to study the historic campuses of Allegheny College, Geneva College, Slippery Rock University, and Grove City College. The reports of Landmarks were enthusiastically received by the presidents, staff, faculty and students of all four institutions and has already resulted in successful fund-raising by the schools to begin to implement the plans.
“This grant brings notable and significant outside recognition and assistance to our rich collection of historic colleges and universities scattered throughout Western Pennsylvania, “said Arthur Ziegler, President of Landmarks. We look forward to another year of intensive activity together with developing educational programs with these institutions to involve faculty, students, and staff in a useful learning process with the professional staff and consultants of Landmarks.”
The work will begin in July and be concluded by March 31, 2009. The team will be Eugene Matta, Landmarks Director of Real Estate and Special Development Projects, who will manage the project; Thomas Keffer, Property Restoration Manager; Landmarks Design Associates, architects; and Liberto Landscape Design, all of whom are local and who worked successfully on the first Campus Heritage Grant.
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Nephew seeks city historic status for August Wilson home
By Jodi Weigand
TRIBUNE-REVIEW
Thursday, July 12, 2007The nephew of late Pittsburgh playwright August Wilson wants his uncle’s childhood home to mean as much to the community as did the man who once lived there.
“He wrote plays about the Hill District that took on national significance,” attorney Paul Ellis Jr. said of his uncle’s 10-play chronicle of black American life.
On Wednesday, Ellis asked the city’s Historic Review Commission to name Wilson’s former home — at 1727 Bedford Ave. — a historic structure. Commission members will vote Aug. 1. The request would need approval from the city Planning Commission and City Council.
“I don’t think there’s a question about whether we should designate this,” said commission Chairman Michael Stern.
The state dedicated a historical marker in May.
Ellis, 37, lives a block away from where Wilson grew up with his five brothers and sisters. Ellis bought the house in 2005 — the same year his uncle died at age 60. He began pursuing the historical designation about a year later.
“Many of the identified historical aspects in the Hill are gone,” Steven Paul, executive director of Preservation Pittsburgh, told the commission. “This is an example of an important structure for the community.”
Ellis said he has begun interior renovations and plans to restore the exterior of the structure to what it looked like when Wilson was a child.
“(The task) is physically and emotionally draining,” Ellis said. “What keeps me going is the spirit of my uncle and the desire to make a significant contribution to my community.