Category: SavingPlaces

Stories relating to and of my work for the National Trust for Historic Preservation.

Forces of Nature, Misconceptions and Changing the Rules

I think it might be best to start discussing Thursday at the National Preservation Conference by talking about the “Next American City” general session. During this presentation we heard from Kennedy Smith (of CLUE group, and an expert in community revitalization and main street development) and Charles Buki whose foci includes neighborhood revitalization.

For those of you who read my blog and aren’t plugged into the preservation movement are probably asking what this has to do with preservation and history. Think about it as a means of preserving where we live, and stopping neighborhoods and cities from becoming in-distinctive, and a one-size fit all look. It is a part of preserving Americana in a different way.

The two panelists posed three questions:

  1. What are the major forces driving development?
  2. If we could rewrite the rules what rules would you rewrite
  3. If you could change one misconception about Historic Preservation what would it be.

While Kennedy looked at the continued need to save each community’s distinctive character (she had a great presentation that included images along roadways in 5 different American communities, that all looked the same, cluttered with McDonalds, gas stations, Pizza Huts etc. Her point: you cannot tell where you are just by looking at the street). Buki came from the perspective that “he is not a preservationist” (though many in the room, including me disagreed, but we’ll get to that later). His main assertion was an encouragement of diversity in development and the recognition that sometimes we revitalize/rehabilitate/re-develop and end up creating neighborhoods and places where the old inhabitants no longer feel welcome.

He says for any neighborhood development one should ask the following question: What is the extant to which the project you are working on will be useful to your customers when they are at 60% of their income. Considering the economic recession it isn’t a question to be taken lightly.

So let’s talk about identity, since I found, through my following three sessions, that preservationists are looking—not necessarily to re-define our mission and our goals—but to let the outside world know that we are more than a steward of historic sites.

I think my favorite conversation about asserting our identity more loudly and proudly was in the panel on “Solar Panels, Wind Turbines, and More: Is Preservation Ready.” Val Talmage, from Preserve Rhode Island put up two lists of adjectives. The left side included words like entrepreneurial, visionary, inventive, flexible; while the other list included adjectives like rigid, inflexible, obstructionist. Val asked the audience: “What list do you think we ourselves as being, and what list do you think others perceive us as.”  Then she asked what list represents the public perception of environmentalists or those supporting green building. The answers are fairly obvious.

It came up again in the Habitat for Humanity session, albeit in a different way. Instead of outwardly talking about changing how we act this session showed how we as preservationists can pro-actively work with new partners and show that we are not what everyone expects us to be. Make sure to check out the amazing case studies that show how Habitat for Humanity is working with preservation organizations on new ideas that stray away from their typical model.

The first session of the morning was a breakout directly related to the general session entitled “Everyone Wants to Live Within Walking Distance: What Does this Mean for Preservation?” The panelists included rockstars like David Dixon, Mary Means, and Roberta Gratz and looked at the principles of Jane Jacobs. Gratz at one point posited the following quote of Jacobs:

“You cannot build the ovens and expect the loaves to jump in.”

Development equals the ovens, and Preservation includes the Loaves. You can construct the building, but without a preservation ethic you cannot build, or bake a community. That is we have a responsibility to put the loaves (er preservation) into the developmental process instead of just expecting them to think of us. We have to stop sitting on the sidelines and yelling stop and start taking initiative. Again, in another session (the one on Solar energy), Val Talmage said that what she would love to see is preservationists aggressively going after a plan to cut the carbon footprint of America’s heritage and then going after projects to build a bank of case studies and best practices. So then we have something to point to and say—look, yes we can.

Before I go one more word on identity. I think it is interesting that we as preservationists are trying to tell those in the conservation, environmental, and green movement that we are one of them. It is a conversation that I heard in the halls of the National Council on Public History conference earlier that year—that preservationists are public historians, but that a lot of preservationists don’t identify as public historians. (Though I did appreciate that as preservation moves a little bit further away from the preserving “history” in the purest sense, that in the Solar Panels session we got a great quick history of energy development in America). Buki asked if it was possible for us to “be in two places at one time.” I think we can—we all do wear many hats, and we have to stop waiting to be asked to the table and jump in.

Click here to check out my pictures from last night (including a few from the Candlelight House Tour. Make sure to look at the image below which is from the Max Bickler House. Apparently the architect chronicled his life in pencil on the underpart of the stairs. Here is the notation from the surrender of Japan in 1945.

Etching from the stairway beneath the Max Bickler House

Up Next: Next American Landscape Day! National Preservation Awards! Mad about Mod Party!

“Even if You Do Everything Right….Without Time It Won’t Ring True”

….and we have lift off. Yesterday was the first day of the National Preservation Conference here in Austin, Texas. Last minute preparations, the dispatching of the first round of field sessions were just lead ins to the big event in the evening. The Opening Plenary.

There were many expected to speak—the Mayor of Austin, former first lady Laura W. Bush (who is the honorary co-chair of the conference) and, of course, Stephanie Meeks the new president of the National Trust for Historic Preservation.

The City from the Long Center

Since I was conference staff I missed the first twenty minutes of the convening (which meant I missed the Mayor’s welcome, the musical interlude, and the voting in of new Trustees). However I was lucky enough to hear the band play in rehearsal—and it is something quite special Check them out on the video here.

Laura Bush spoke eloquently about growing up in Texas, and how important courthouses in the state are to daily community life. She made the case for preservation while also providing those in attendance with one Texan’s perspective.

Then came Stephanie Meeks—who did a great job introducing herself to the NTHP community with personal stories, hints at her experiences before and since coming on board, and issued a challenge for the next 5 years leading up to the 2016 anniversary of the National Historic Preservation Act. She asked that we look for ways to make preservation more accessible, visible, and fully funded. The challenge was in a word, ambitious—but with ideas that I think, with a lot of work, might be feasible. One of my favorite parts of the speech was when she introduced a group of middle schoolers who had won a commendation from a national design competition for the school of the future—their design was the only one not asking for new construction, instead they worked on a rehab for their historic school building in Tucson, Arizona.

Now for the main event: Paul Goldberger. I have to say that I wasn’t sure what to expect from him. I know he’s a pretty big name in the preservation community but my knowledge of his ideas and work was largely limited to what I read up on him in preparation for the conference. His talk had three main parts—the first to talk about Austin as the ideal place to have the conversation about the Next American City and Next American Landscape. He emphasized that the work we do is essential and that preservationists need to be the obvious choice i.e. that the other side has to make the argument to destroy and rebuild instead of us always having to make the argument of how historic landscapes and streetscapes provide more value to a community than anything else.

He also spent some time forcing us to think about the phrase: “In a city, time becomes visible”. He described how even if an area is built up to be walkable, sustainable, and beautiful—it rings false if not “covered in the patina of time”. That without the shared history, or experiences it feels false and disconcerting.

Austin in Reflection

Goldberger then talked about public space and the idea of how the Next American city is creating a new public realm in spaces like the High Line in New York City or Millenium Park in Chicago. That these are places where the Next American City and the Next American Landscape are meeting. If we take care of the cities, we are also preserving landscape through the prevention of sprawl etc.

In the end though, the most profound message Goldberger gave us that preservationists need to be honest. We approach preservation as a method of making our lives better right here right now, and that those who believe historic preservation is an excuse to ignore “progress” or the “present” don’t know what preservation is.

Tonight or tomorrow I”ll fill you in on “Next American City” day. Also you can follow me on Twitter at PC_PresNation. Check out pictures here. If you want to watch the opening plenary you can here.

ATX Revealed

Mustangs

The last time I came to Austin it was a whirlwind—a quick cab ride to the city with an hour for the state capitol (majestic dome etched in color, open, expansive), and forty minutes for the Lyndon Johnson library (exterior—an image in white, interior thoughtful, humorous, inspiring). Both sites I would recommend to anyone coming to this city.

In short—the Texas state capitol is easily summed up in one word. Awesome. The architecture is phenomenal, and it apparently is one of the few capitol buildings that stands taller than the National Capitol in Washington, DC. Nearby on the campus of the University of Texas, Austin is the LBJ Library—a building that includes an animatronic LBJ cracking his trademark jokes, while one floor beneath is a testament to his work on civil rights in this country. This library, if anything, emphasizes just how complex one man could be—and how he has the power to effect so much.

This trip has been a bit leisurely in that I still have plenty of time to see the city, and instead spent time setting up for the swarms of preservationists descending on this city. I have, however, eaten well

  1. Moonshine Grill (Apparently the Trout is fantastic, I loved my chicken Almondine).
  2. Polvos—a Mexican food place in the South Congress area. Chicken Enchilada with Mole, be still my heart.

Sixth street feels a little bit like Nashville’s main drag—music piping out of every building (though I heard it is the place to hang out for the students of UT). And the bat’s are only a few blocks away.

The Driskill Hotel

I also stopped by the Driskill Hotel (a member of the National Trust’s Historic Hotels Program). The building as a whole is pretty cool, but I loved the wood paneling on the ceiling, the mustangs and the glass domes on the interior. I also think it is pretty cool that it is the site of LBJ and Lady Bird Johnson’s first date and, like many old hotels, might be haunted.

More to come: Tonight is the opening plenary and reception so I’ll be tweeting up a storm—and will report back if I can by early tomorrow. In case you haven’t heard yet you can also watch the opening plenary live. It will be streaming on the National Trust for Historic Preservation’s webpage (www.preservationnation.org).

More pictures from the conference will be uploaded here (and on the NPC Flickr page soon). Want to be a virtual attendee? Check out the Virtual Attendee page here.

We Are One: The National Asian Pacific Islander American Historic Preservation Forum

Also posted on the PreservationNation.org Blog. I’m working on a post of some exhibits I recently attended but wanted to post this here as well.

We are one.

At the end of the first day of the Asian Pacific Islander American Historic Preservation Forum (APIAHPF) I found myself at a banquet hosted by Guam Preservation willingly participating in a group sing-a-long complete with traditional hand motions and live music. For those who attended the two and a half day conference this moment represented everything that the meeting had offered to attendees: camaraderie, energy, synergy and determination – all in a forum to encourage, educate and mobilize Asian Pacific Islander American (APIA) communities that are working to preserve their American story.

About two years in the making, this conference served two distinct purposes. The first was to provide educational sessions that would give attendees basic preservation tools to save their historic communities. Context matters, so the fact that we were at the Kabuki Hotel in the heart of San Francisco’s Japantown definitely added to the atmosphere. I moderated a session that gave an introduction to historic preservation, and quickly learned that all of the attendees who had gathered brought with them a particular story and vision for APIA preservation. One of the major components of this session was recognizing that preservation, especially in the case of Asian Americans, is more than just buildings and structures, but also includes the intangible heritage—the folklore, the language, the dance.

The second part of the Forum involved thinking organically as a group about what APIA historic preservation means and consequently what it needs in order to become a broader and successful movement. I mentioned synergy earlier and this is where all of our minds worked together to brainstorm. Every meal was a working meal and breakfast (both days) and lunch were reserved for the task of identifying what tools the APIA community needs to preserve their unique American past. Using the World Café format we looked at three central questions that served as jumping off point for what we as a group wanted for APIA preservation:

  • What inspires and motivates you personally to preserve APIA culture?
  • What does historic preservation mean in an APIA context? What changes?
  • What next steps would you like to see for API cultural preservation?

This allowed us, on the final morning, to develop a series of product-based next steps that ranged from developing a “basics” toolkit from existing materials, developing a social media strategy for the group that includes advocacy alerts and networking, and determining that the conversation needs to continue with others—especially with stake holders who were unable to attend the Forum.

Perhaps the most important piece of this Forum was the recognition that the APIA and historic preservation community needs to work together in order to be successful. That…

We are One
With the Earth
With the Sun
With the Sky
With the Sea
We are One

California Bound: San Francisco, Fog, and the History of Asian Pacific Americans

There are words in the remnants of the registration building at Angel Island, a footprint of history, lost to time.

Courage                                                                                    Seperation
Segregation                                                                            Confinement
Bravery Lonliness                                                               Frustration   Anger
Exclusion                                                                                Inclusion
Appeals   Hearings  Examinations                                Denial       Perseverance     Entry
Human Spirit   Opportunities                                         Acceptance     Rejection
Dreams   Hope  Fear  Faith                                              Civil Rights  Realities  Social Justice

I recently wrote the post below for the PreservationNation.org blog, but I wanted to add a few thoughts regarding the importance of tangible and intangible heritage in telling the stories of immigrant America.  My travels around San Francisco emphasized just how important history is in the broader community. Documenting the past has never been more important–not only in terms of producing an archive for posterity, but also for the next generation as a means of forming a broader American identity.

A brief tangent: while at the College of William and Mary I had a chance to read the text from Colonial Williamsburg known as “Becoming Americans“. This publication, a thematic interpretation plan for CW,  pulls out the following main ideas in examining and interpreting the colonial period for the public.

  • Diverse Peoples
  • Clashing Interests
  • Shared Values
  • Formative Institutions
  • Partial Freedoms
  • Revolutionary Promise

While it isn’t a perfect interpretive plan, the main themes do lend themselves as a basic framework for stories of other immigrants to the United States. The interactions between cultures, their individual identities and the process of adapting in a new world may  not be a direct parallel to the stories of the colonial era “immigrants” but they do perhaps offer a glimpse into how American democracy and history constantly evolves and follows the similar arcs throughout time.

In early American the hypocrisy of the revolutionary fervor and the culture of slavery that had taken root in Virgina and other colonies was not lost on individuals like Thomas Jefferson and George Washington. Despite that recognition it took hundreds of years before we, as Americans, began seriously to work to end the legacies of slavery in this country (which includes post-reconstruction Jim Crow laws and segregation).

If you look at later groups that came to this country–the Irish and Scots, the Chinese and Japanese, the Eastern Europeans or African immigrants–all have experienced a level of discrimination and hardships before being accepted into mainstream America. Some would claim that it is a process still in progress for many of the more recent immigrant groups. At various points in time APA immigrants experienced, for a variety of reasons, discrimination and censure whether it is due to the Chinese Exclusion Act or the reactions to the 1942 bombings of Pearl Harbor and the subsequent internments.

For Asian Pacific American communities the preservation of their communities, buildings, stories, music, language and artifacts are essential to documenting the APIA narrative of “Becoming Americans.” So those words that I saw on the stairway to the Angel Island Immigration Station barracks are more than just thought provoking phrases, or poetry to evoke emotion at the site, they are representative of what it means to be American, and that to understand the stories from Angel Island is to understand the story of every single citizen of the United States.

Below is the text from my blog on PreservationNation.org. Click here to view the slide show of my trip to San Francisco.

San Francisco Tours Offer a Glimpse at the Asian Pacific American Experience

A letter speaking about the events of April 18, 1906 in San Francisco, California

For me to describe the scenes and events of the past few days would be an impossibility at present, and no doubt you would have had more news regarding the awful fate of this city than I myself know. All that I can say at this writing is, that about 5:15 a.m., Wednesday morning, I was thrown out of bed and in a twinkling of an eye the side of our house [at 151—24th Ave.] was dashed to the ground. How we go into the street I will never be able to tell, as I fell and crawled down the stairs amid flying glass and timber and plaster. When the dust cleared away I saw nothing but a ruin of a house and home that it had taken twenty years to build…

The Peace Pagoda in Japantown.
The Peace Pagoda in Japantown.

The Peace Pagoda in Japantown.

On my first day in San Francisco I attended a reception for the National Asian Pacific Islander American Historic Preservation Forum (more on this in a blog post next week) at the Chinese Historical Society of America. Amidst the exhibitions, I found myself standing before a pair of slippers belonging to a Mrs. Lee Yoke Suey, a woman who came to America and found herself detained at Angel Island for over 15 months. These slippers were unfathomably tiny, a witness to the Chinese custom of foot binding, but also a part of Mrs. Suey’s American story, for as I talked about the practice with another conference attendee I learned that during the great earthquake of 1906 many of the fatalities included Chinese women whose bound feet rendered them unable to walk, and consequently unable to escape from the resulting fire.

Now, before coming to California I knew that my visit would include three typical tourist experiences. A view of Alcatraz Island? Check. A visit to Fisherman’s Wharf? Check, Check. Taking a lot of pictures of fog as it rolled over the Golden Gate Bridge? Triple check.

But during the last weekend in June I found myself experiencing a different view of San Francisco, one that looked at the history of the city through the lens of APA America.

While in San Francisco I stayed in an area known as Japantown, a small community that includes community-run stores, the headquarters for the National Japanese American Historical Society(NJAHS) and places for the Japanese-American community to gather and live. My first introduction to the history of San Francisco came from my tour of Japantown by youth tour guides from NJAHS. As with most things in the city the history of Japantown begins with the 1906 earthquake.

Even though APA communities lived in San Francisco before the earthquake, this area—known as the Western Addition—is where the Japanese community re-established themselves following the destruction of their former homes. By 1940 the neighborhood had grown into a vibrant community center with Japanese-American run businesses and places for the community to gather; something that changed following the 1942 bombing of Pearl Harbor and the subsequent internment of Japanese-Americans.

This is where most of my tour of the current Japantown began. At NJAHS headquarters I saw Sa sa E, or Camp Objects of Memories—material objects made by residents of internment camps. These artifacts are made of whatever materials the artists could find reflecting the scarcity and solitude of those years. The guides walked us to the place where citizens stood in line to register for the camps, and on a faded staircase we can see remnants of graffiti that proclaims “Japs Keep Out.” It is an interesting glimpse for me, a life-long East Coaster, to actually stand and view facets of American history that I had only seen in textbooks.

Eventually, we walked across the street to the Peace Pagoda, which opened in 1968 as a gift from the people of Osaka, Japan. The structure is centered on a plaza that exhibits four basic elements: fire, earth, water and stone, but also represents the late-20th century story of Japantown, a place stuck in a cycle of redevelopment threats that began with urban renewal and continue on to the present day. This serves as an excellent backdrop to the conversations going on in the Forum, where community members across the Pacific Rim have gathered to identify how best to preserve what’s left of their American-legacy before it is too late.

Orig. Chinese (Cantonese) of the "Wooden House" poem by a detainee.
Orig. Chinese (Cantonese) of the "Wooden House" poem by a detainee.

Orig. Chinese (Cantonese) of the “Wooden House” poem by a detainee.

The second major site I visited while I was in San Francisco was the Angel Island Immigration Station, which is where immigrants from Australia, New Zealand, Canada, Mexico, Central and South America, Russians and Asians were detained. While many call this site the “Ellis Island of the West,” my guide emphasized that this was more like the “Guardian of the West.” Not all immigrants coming to San Francisco went through Angel Island, but rather this is where those (during the years of 1910-1940) who needed “further scrutiny” were held. This is particularly true for the Chinese immigrants who were escaping economic woes (amongst other reasons) in China who found them being held due to the Chinese Exclusion Act. There is a lengthy history of the act and its role in American immigration policy but I want to emphasize that for many the stay at Angel Island was brief, while for others it lasted as long as two years.

Many of the structures at the station are closed to visitors due to decay, but what I found most amazing about the building that we were allowed to tour (where the male detainees were kept) was that many of the detainees took their emotion and reactions to being held and transcribed them onto the walls in the forms of poetry. These poems represent heartache, loneliness, and uncertainty, and what I love about Angel Island is that despite the poems and writings being covered over after the military took over the station to house POWs they can still be seen—revealing the human emotion and a fragment of one life in the APA immigrant story.

Over the course of the weekend I did see some other sites—the Presidio, Golden Gate Park, and Haight-Ashbury—but I think that I left with a broader understanding regarding the many different stories that we, as Americans, have to offer. Stories of sadness, but also of courage and determination—and how we can preserve those stories as time goes by.

THATCamp: Digital Storytelling, Local History, Social Media

What is an un-conference? It is a participant-driven gathering based on a particular theme or purpose. On the weekend of May 22nd I attended THATCamp, an un-conference at the Center for History and New Media in Fairfax, VA.

THATCamp (The Humanities and Technology Camp) is a gathering of individuals who work in the humanities to talk about the issues, concerns, challenges, and products in the realm of digital humanities.  While much of our conversations happened in person, they continued with the group writ large on Twitter all weekend long (#thatcamp). I thought I would take this opportunity to post about three of the sessions I attended.

Digital Storytelling

History is in essence a story. A narrative of the past compiled from documents, objects, and visualizations. It is text, it is verbal, and it is a very integral part of human identity whether it be your personal history or history on the multi-national level. During this session a group of us talked about the nature of digital storytelling and its role in education (though of course I was thinking about how it can be used in the public arena as well).

In a nutshell digital storytelling is the practice of telling a narrative using using technology and web tools. Sometimes this involves film (moving or, pictures put to sound), other times it is just a story told sans words with just digital photography. In our discussions we talked about how DS is narrative (that is a story told in a constructive format), non-narrative (something that is more formal), it can be linear or non-linear, interactive or a mash-up of many different mediums.

In the realm of education digital storytelling can be a means to teach the technology, but also a way to re-examine the past.  At the same time its a way to emphasize the value of textual, material, and visual sources in recognizing a complete picture of the past.

Some Digital Storytelling Links (Resources, Examples and Tools):

Local  History

The great thing about THATCamp was the opportunity to meet with preservationists/historians/humanities practitioners on the local level. At work, we (at the National Trust for Historic Preservation) are often looking at the big picture, and trying to provide resources to the local preservation organizations on the ground. So this session was about digital media on the local level–and what their needs were, and how to make the case to their boards and communities that digital technology and preservation are beneficial to where they live.

During this discussion we ended up talking broadly about the challenges and opportunities for local historical organizations, and aside from the ever present problem of funding we talked about the importance of collaboration and working with free, open-source products to branch out how we tell history on the ground level.  How can we, as digital historians, help our local historic societies reach a broader community not only through the framework of history that they tell, but also through the far reaching capabilities of the internet?

At the end of the session we talked about producing one of three “products” for use at the local level.

At the conclusion of the session we discussed a few possible next steps including,

  • A group blog written by local digital historians in the Mid-Atlantic region
  • A collection of how-to guides for implementing digital projects
  • White-papers or reports with detailed case studies on existing projects, e.g. PhillyHistory.org

Social  Media and the History Non-Profit

This was the session I proposed, which was to get an idea of what was going on at other organizations regarding the use of various social media tools. We started out by looking at some of the ways the National Trust for Historic Preservation has been using social media in its advocacy:

  • The 2009 National Preservation Conference, “Virtual Attendee” page. Using live chat (Cover it Live), Facebook, Flickr, YouTube and Twitter to get information about the conference out to the preservation community.  In particular the web team looked at ways in which Twitter could be used by multiple people to tell the multiple stories from the conference–and as a result a team was deployed that consisted of each individual Twitter account having its own “beat”. For example, my handle @pc_presnation was tasked with giving a general history point of view for the conference, and I ended up actually tweeting the National Preservation Award ceremony as if it were the Oscars. To prep our members we released this video.
  • The Save America’s Treasures campaign. In brief, in the 2011 budget the monies for the Save America’s Treasures, Preserve America and Heritage Area’s programs were either completely zeroed out or drastically reduced.  In order to mobilize our members and remind Congress of the importance of preservation  it was decided that social media would a) put materials out there that people could use, and b)serve as direct marketing for the cause.  The text messages, the Facebook status messages, and the materials posted on YouTube and Flickr were divided between the emotional and the factual. For examples check out our   Tweet for  Our Treasures page.

The conversation ended up with a discussion about how to integrate social media into existing workloads–and we came up with the following strategy list:

  • Adding Social Media to your work plans
  • Creating a policy to deal with criticisms
  • Developing metrics for assessing how our social media projects are reaching potential audiences
  • In order to get the word out it is useful to have canned messaging for your members to use to get the word out themselves

All that being said, we were left with a few questions. How do you reach people digitally outside of Facebook, Twitter etc., and how do you deal with the issues that come from non-profits that work on an international level? Also–aside from another portal to distribute information from Twitter and Facebook how are non-profits taking advantage of the tools on LinkedIn?

THATCamp

The nice thing about The Humanities and Technology Camp is that it appeals to individuals of all levels of tech ability–and unlike most conferences the discussions are informal, and collaborative, ensuring a continuation of the discussion beyond the four walls of the actual lecture room.  With each of these sessions we developed actual goals and ideas that could be implemented in our day-to-day work days.

Please Vote for History and Preservation!

Top five reasons to vote for the National Trust for Historic Preservation in the American Express’ Take Part Member’s Project.

1. Protection of Historic Places. Yesterday the National Trust announced the 2010 11 Most Endangered  Historic Places list.

2.  Preservation= sustainability

3.  Preservation=Jobs

4. What other organization works to preserve buildings, landscapes, main street America, and tries to save itself from a Peep invasion on a regular basis?

5.  Because the past matters, and if we don’t take care to preserve it, who will?

What is the American Express Take Part Member Challenge?

The National Trust for Historic Preservation is one of nine non-profit organizations vying to win $200,000 in the first round of American Express’ latest Members Project endeavors, TakePart. We are now on the last week of the first round of voting and are tied for first.

Click here to vote!

Songs of the Preservationist

Latest post from PreservationNation.org, based on a discussion from the email list I help run.

They paved paradise
And put up a parking lot
With a pink hotel, a boutique
And a swinging hot spot
Don’t it always seem to go
That you don’t know what you’ve got
Till it’s gone
They paved paradise
And put up a parking lot

— Big Yellow Taxi, Joni Mitchell

Music — a bunch of lyrics, poetry put together to a rhythm and a collection of notes that riot our emotions, pull at our heart strings, or soothe the soul. For a preservationist a song can remind us of a place, or a building; an architect or a time long past. They are sounds and words that remind us of home, a nostalgic look back that often isn’t completely rose-colored.

A few weeks ago the preservationists on Forum-L compiled a list of songs that seem to “speak” to the field. In the end, I had a list of more than 200 songs, some with obvious preservation connections, others that are more like “save our building” anthems.

Click here to read more and listen to some of the songs.

Taking a Walk Through Washington DC: Monumentalism and Mass Transit the Nation’s Capital

This post can also be read on the PreservationNation.org blog.

A few weeks ago I took a long walk through our Nation’s Capital. I started off at McPherson Square Metro Station and walked across to Chinatown for lunch. My friends and I then walked down 7th Street to the National Mall, and crossed over to the base of the Washington Monument to watch the National Cherry Blossom Festival performances. After a brief respite we meandered over to the Jefferson Memorial where I left them to travel diagonally past the World War II memorial to the Lincoln Memorial and 23rd Street. From there I walked up through Washington Circle and Foggy Bottom to make my way into Georgetown. I took a brief break, but after grabbing some time to read and some chai, I wandered along the pathway next to the C& O Canal until I could cross the Key Bridge into Rosslyn to catch a train home. Every single step was punctuated by amazing views and beautiful clear skies.

When I’m away from home I say am from DC, which is not wholly accurate and therefore is infuriating to some DC residents, but it suffices for outsiders. I am, in fact, from Northern Virginia – or more specifically from Springfield, the land of the mixing bowl (where Interstates 395, 95 and 495 meet). I am, however, an ardent defender of DC to those from who find it boring, staid, and devoid of diversity, and I recognize that there is more to this city than what tourists see. Washington is a place with running trails and hiking in the woods of Rock Creek Park, museums that aren’t all affiliated with the Smithsonian, individually unique neighborhoods, concert venues and theatres (I’m partial to the Shakespeare Theatre/Harmon Center for the Arts), and ice rinks in the winter.

Of course, there’s also my favorite thing to do when I come downtown: Walking directly into the middle of the National Mall (between the Natural History Museum and the Smithsonian Arts and Industries Building) and to look first left at the Washington Monument and then right at the iconic dome of the Capitol Building. For some reason I can’t explain exactly, it’s a vista that is exhilarating and energizing.

Which is why, when I started reading the various articles floating around about the DC streetcar system that I paid attention—especially since one of the arguments against the planned version involved the wires cluttering up the grand vistas of what is often referred to as the “monumental core” of the city. Some preservationists are opposed to this, while others – as discussed in this Washington Post op-ed – disagree. In this piece Adam Irish states that, “the monumentalist vision of Washington has choked nearly all urban life from the Mall and its environs. It has fashioned large sections of our city into pleasing vistas for tourists but has given the rest of us lifeless wastelands …”

Now I suppose I should be clear. I don’t see the wires as an impediment to the current landscaping of the National Mall; in fact I think that you won’t really notice them. I also agree that the streetcar system will be a benefit for the city, especially in the parts that Metro can’t really reach. While I do take a measure of notice to the argument that the National Mall and the monumental core are only for tourists, I also agree with David Alpert’s assertion in his post on Greater Greater Washington. He argues that there are better ways to make use of the public space, that being a 21st Century city that is an example for sustainability and planning, and a city that thinks strategically about preservation (of those very sightlines that bring visitors from all around the world) are not mutually exclusive. I don’t think we have to choose one or the other. Streetcars and sustainable design can live hand in hand with the Lincoln Memorial and the White House.

I know that Alpert’s assertion that the National Mall is “unpleasantly sun-baked, too spread out, and largely devoid of convenient transportation or food, “ is not a feeling shared by him alone, but if there was one thing that I learned from my walk that gorgeous spring day was that a modern city does not need to be one of towering buildings punctuated by greenery like much of New York City, where the insanity of choices begs for an oasis like Central Park. Rather, I think that the very expansiveness and openness of that monumental core can inspire planners, residents and preservationists alike to find a compromise that everyone can enjoy.

Click here to view my pics

The Story of US Through Save America’s Treasures and Other National Trust Reads

I have a new blog post on PreservationNation.org. Sort of an homage to the variety of sites supported by Save America’s Treasures.

Before we were Americans we lived off the land, within the cliffs and earth. We were Cherokee, Iroquois, Cheyenne; we were the Sinagua, ancestors of the Hopi, who lived here at Honanki (AD1100-1300).
I also wanted to point out this well written blog posting on Cape Wind by Roberta Lane. Its an issue that I actually have only paid a little bit of attention to as the issues have progressed. I found this to be a very well reasoned, well thought out discussion about dealing with cultural resources while we are also trying to save our planet.

Lastly, if you like Chicago Architecture here’s a great interview with Chicago’s First Lady of Modernism by Arnold Berke.