All posts tagged: Historic Preservation

Northern Ireland Photos

Published by

Late last month, Claire and Andrew took a trip to Northern Ireland with their youth group.  While there they walked the wonderful coastline of County Antrim and the Giant’s Causeway; visited sites of the National Trust of England, Wales, and Northern Ireland; met with groups focused on peace and reconciliation; and took lots and lots of photographs. In looking at those photos, my mind went back a decade to my own trip to Northern Ireland for the National Trust for Historic Preservation.  Like the children’s trip, mine was an eye and mind-opening experience.  I recently looked at my diary from that trip and enjoyed reliving my experiences. So I’ll share Andrew’s (color) and Claire’s (black-and-white) photos from June/July 2009, and I’ll share a few diary entries from December 1998. 12/8/98 – I found Crom Castle most interesting.  As we arrived, Irish deer – with huge racks – stared at us from the deer park…had my first Irish whiskey of the trip.  Great for warming chilled bones! 12/8/98 – We have a late afternoon stop at …

Tiger Stadium Going, Going…

Published by

Yet another baseball icon may soon be history.  The City of Detroit began demolition yesterday on the last remaining – and most historic – parts of Tiger Stadium.  This in spite of the fact that the city had agreed to maintain the stadium until an appropriate adaptive reuse of the stadium or a viable new use of the site was in place.   Neither has happened.  With the city’s commencement of demolition, Detroit is moving towards having yet another vacant piece of land with no plans for redevelopment in place. A court injunction is in place this weekend, stopping the demolition for a short time.  To read the story – and find out how you can contact the City Council and Mayor’s Office in Detroit to oppose the demolition plans – visit PreservationNation’s blog. Tiger Stadium was built in the same year as Fenway Park.  While Boston figured out how to save its iconic ballpark and make it one of the most beloved places in America (except to Yankee fans), Detroit went with the allure of …

A Different New Orleans

Published by

I am in New Orleans with supporters of the National Trust for Historic Preservation on a visit to see how the city is recovering in the three and one-half years since Hurricane Katrina made landfall.  I’ve been in the city many times – and several since Katrina hit – but on this trip I found a couple of gems that tell me that I really haven’t seen all this great city has to offer. First, an update on our work.  The National Trust had staff on the ground just weeks after Katrina hit, and we still maintain an office where we help homeowners – primarily in the historic Holy Cross neighborhood of the Lower Ninth Ward – rebuild their homes and their lives.  Meeting the homeowners we’ve helped, seeing the way ravaged buildings have been turned back into beautiful homes, and listening to the volunteers and partners who’ve helped us in this recovery is always inspiring and gratifying.   In Holy Cross you can’t walk down the streets without seeing our Home Again signs, or those …

Partners in Preservation

Published by

I was in Boston earlier this week for the launch of Partners in Preservation – a terrific $1 million grant program of the National Trust for Historic Preservation and American Express.  For the next five weeks, you can join thousands of others who will go online at the PiP website and vote for your favorite Greater Boston landmark.  The winning site in the popular vote is guaranteed to get a grant of up to $100,000, and the remaining funds will be allocated among some of the other 25 sites who are part of the competition. Tuesday was a beautiful day in Boston and we were in historic Faneuil Hall for the launch event.  Governor Deval Patrick and Boston Mayor Thomas Menino were on hand to help us kick off the program (see photo below).  Representatives of the 25 sites were also there – many dressed out in period clothes to depict the historical era of their site.  One of the more innovative schemes came from the Lowell Boat Shop volunteers (see photo above) who brought oars with “Lowell’s” …

Chicago: Great Main Streets, Great Architecture, and Great Food

Published by

I’ve been in Chicago since Sunday for the National Main Streets Conference, and it has been a great couple of days.  I love Chicago and I love Main Street.  The conference is sponsored by the National Trust Main Street Center and brings together 1,600 people from around the country who are rehabilitating their downtown commercial districts.  Having lived in three great Main Street communities – Murfreesboro, Tennessee; Americus, Georgia; and Staunton, Virginia – I have a real affinity for these towns. Getting to Chicago was interesting.  The first of two snowstorms blew into Washington on Sunday morning.  I got a call from the airlines at 4:40 a.m. telling me my morning flight was delayed by an hour.  When I arrived at the airport it turns out that every other passenger on the flight had been moved to a different flight in order to make connections and I had a regional jet all to myself!  I joked that I flew up on the corporate jet…but it was a surreal experience. The opening session at Main Street is …

Restoring the Readyville Mill

Published by

The Readyville Mill sits on the Rutherford/Cannon County line near the town of Murfreesboro, Tennessee, where I spent my childhood years.  At that time it was one of two mills remaining in the vicinity and was still in operation as a working mill for area farmers.  Some time in the early 1970s I played some bluegrass at the mill as part of a heritage days festival.  It was always a community center in this still-rural area of Middle Tennessee. However, in the 1980s the mill was abandoned, a four lane highway opened up Cannon County to rapid development, and the mill seemed destined to either fall into the river from neglect or to be torn down for someone’s vision of a better community.  Luckily Tom Brady (not the Patriots quarterback) stepped into the breech. A local website describes the mill’s background: The Readyville Mill is the sole vestige of what was once a flourishing industry on the Stones River in Middle Tennessee.  Dating from the 1870s, the current Readyville Mill is a three-story building with an open …

Exploring LA

Published by

Having been in Los Angeles the last four days for work-related meetings, I haven’t had an opportunity to post More to Come…updates.  But I have had time to explore parts of the city with colleagues involved in historic preservation.  As is always true when I’m in Los Angeles, I learned more and more about this city’s many wonderful historic places.  Our meetings were in Santa Monica, and I took some time to visit the historic pier and to sample a nice Spanish restaurant in their funky Main Street – which is more like a neighborhood commercial center these days.  Don’t think I spent hours on a sunny beach – it was cool, rainy at times, and in the 50s. But on Saturday, when we spent 8 hours touring around town, the weather gods cooperated.  While the temperature stayed in the 50s, the rain gave way to partly cloudy skies.  We began our tour on bus and went through a number of neighborhoods off Wilshire Boulevard, before we ended up downtown.  It was my first chance to see …

Inauguration Planning – Sites to See Off the Mall

Published by

Well, our little place on earth is getting pretty excited about the next ten days.  Washington is making plans to keep Virginians from coming into the city.  (I would have thought they’d be treated better since they actually voted for Obama, going blue for the first time since Jamestown was founded, or so it seems.)   While Candice and I will be passing each other in the airport on the way to and from town, the children are busy making their plans.  Claire has a good friend on Capitol Hill, so she’s already set for a sleepover and a morning hike to the mall.   Andrew is vacillating between hiking to the mall with friends and watching it all in the comfort of the restored AFI Theatre on the big screen.   I just hope I can see the actual ceremony before I have to head out of town. But for those looking for something to do in Washington during the inaugural week, my organization, the National Trust for Historic Preservation, has put together a great list of …

Save Mid-City New Orleans

Published by

The National Trust for Historic Preservation is working with the Foundation for Historical Louisiana and other partners to try and stop the demolition of significant portions of the historic Mid-City neighborhood in New Orleans.  The U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs and Louisiana State University recently announced the selection of the Mid-City neighborhood for the site of their new hospitals. As the National Trust website PreservationNation.org states: The new hospitals would needlessly destroy the historic neighborhood around Charity Hospital where residents have been rebuilding and restoring their community since Hurricane Katrina. We believe this decision was a serious error and urge LSU and the VA to explore the alternative sites that would restore needed health care facilities faster and at less cost, while preserving much more of the historic Mid-City neighborhood. The video below is just one of several prepared by the Foundation for Historical Louisiana where the affected residents talk about the decision to demolish their neighborhood.  Click on the link above to see more videos and learn what you can do to try and reverse this …

Wrap-Up from Vienna

Published by

As promised, I’m posting a few additional photos from my travels to Vienna, Austria last week.  The top two photos are a detail from Hofburg Palace and a view of St. Peter’s Church in the rain.                   The next is a detail from St. Peter’s.   Finally, the last two are shots from St. Stephansdom:  the organ on the left and a detail of the pulpit and nave on the right. More to come… DJB