Vernacular Architecture Forum VAN November 2021

Letter from the Editor

Mon, 06 Dec 2021 18:00:00 GMT

Welcome to the 2021 Fall Features edition of VAN. Use this link to access the full issue. In it, you'll find an exciting update from VAF President Jim Buckley on a new VAF initiative funded by the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, as well as upcoming calls for awards nominations! As you'll see, our membership has kept busy - attending workshops and publishing new research. Please also enjoy an extended entry by David Rotenstein on post-prohibition beer distribution networks in Pennsylvania - a fascinating read!

Marisa Gomez Nordyke

President's Column

Mon, 06 Dec 2021 17:50:00 GMT

By Jim Buckley, VAF President

One of the most exciting chapters in VAF history is opening now as we prepare to launch our VAF/UVa African American fieldwork program funded by the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation. VAF members have always been at the forefront of investigating Black landscapes, particularly in the interpretation of how enslaved Africans and their descendants lived in the American South. It is fitting that we are taking the next step with this new program to further investigate the history of African American life in direct partnership with Black communities.

A committee of VAF members has been working over the past year to develop the program guidelines and select one or more proposed field schools to take part in this initiative. The project is shepherded by Principal Investigator Louis Nelson, Professor of Architectural History at the University of Virginia, who fielded all the initial expressions of interest in the program and helped applicants shape their proposals to fit VAF’s goals. I had a chance to talk to Louis about how the program is coming together recently and asked him about the origins of this effort. He recalled conversations at VAF’s 2019 Annual Conference in Philadelphia about how to keep attracting emerging scholars and professionals: “Many of us were concerned with the need to keep bringing new members into the organization, and to do so we felt we needed to support the exciting changes in the way new scholars and practitioners are approaching fieldwork, but also to respond to the pressing politics of our moment.” Louis says many long-term VAF members were concerned with including scholars from communities who had been underrepresented in vernacular studies.

Past President Kim Hoagland and recent President Claire Dempsey joined Louis to begin conversations with the Andrew A. Mellon Foundation about how philanthropic funding could help organizations like the VAF address the challenges of making our work more inclusive. The Foundation was receptive to the idea of helping VAF’s community of academics and professionals form responsible partnerships with Black communities to ensure that historical narratives reflected the lived experience of those who have experienced racism. Representatives from Mellon and the VAF saw this type of program as an excellent method of fostering more participation in architectural history by Black scholars and preservation professionals.

Once Mellon made the grant, Claire formed a committee to develop guidelines for the program and select the participants. After many months of conversation and strategizing, the team came up with a final plan to invite proposals from teams that combined scholarly and community-oriented skills. Selection criteria included teams’ strength in identification and documentation of sites, in African American history, and in community engagement; the importance of the sites being investigated and whether they were endangered; and the quality of the student experience.

The initiative will support summer field schools at three different locations, with each school starting in 2022, 2023, or 2024. Each site will offer the opportunity to explore aspects of African American history and culture that lend themselves to a vernacular architecture approach but have not yet been fully studied from this perspective. Each school will recruit a diverse group of students both locally and nationwide to be trained in advanced field recording and assessment techniques in sessions of three or four weeks over two years, and each program will involve local communities related to the historical site as partners in the investigation.

Louis says he discussed a wide range of proposals with prospective field schools, from the deep South to the Midwest and urban North, and on subjects that varied from Freedom Communities negotiating new political realities after the Civil War to early twentieth century sites in which African Americans were establishing a Black middle class. “Teams looked at a wide range of regional locations, landscape types, and working methods,” he says. “It’s an amazing array of approaches to African American history.” Each field school will determine the best methods for documenting its historic sites, with techniques that include traditional hand measurement of individual buildings to digital capture strategies for entire landscapes and documents that are likely to include everything from family photo albums to oral histories.

In the end, a dozen teams put together proposals for the field school program, and the committee has been meeting regularly to determine the final selections. I asked Louis what he hopes this fieldwork program might mean for the VAF as an organization, and his answer reflects the immense potential he sees in the proposals submitted. “I would like to see the VAF lead the country in re-seeing and re-“scribing” African American histories at the local level around the country. Given the current moment,” he continued, “nothing could be more important.” Observing that much of the work of architectural history and preservation has traditionally privileged the story of white individuals and communities, Louis hopes that this fieldwork program will “open the door to telling the richness and complexity of African American communities through buildings and landscapes.”

Our program committee should be announcing the selected teams within the next few weeks. I am very excited about this new opportunity to explore African American landscapes – many thanks to the members of the program committee and to the many teams who worked to develop proposals for our Mellon African American Fieldwork Initiative!

The VAF/UVa African American Fieldwork Program is operated by a program committee that includes Louis Nelson, Claire Dempsey, Kim Hoagland, Kwesi Daniels, Carl Lounsbury, Niya Bates, and Jim Buckley.

Call for Nominations: Advocacy Award

Mon, 06 Dec 2021 17:45:00 GMT

The Vernacular Architecture Forum seeks nominations for the 2022 VAF Advocacy Award. The application deadline is January 21, 2022.

The VAF Advocacy Award recognizes exemplary efforts and achievements on behalf of our vernacular built heritage. The award honors individuals and groups for exceptional contributions toward the interpretation, appreciation, and protection of vernacular buildings and cultural landscapes, and recognizes outstanding initiative, commitment, and action to promote and protect vernacular resources. The award may be made in recognition of a specific effort or the nominee's long-term record. The awardee will be given two full registrations to the VAF conference and a certificate of excellence.

Eligibility

Any public or private entity or individual in North America may be nominated.

Nominations

Nominations should include the following:
A summary paragraph of the nominee’s advocacy effort or highlights of the nominee’s long-term advocacy work.
An up to 1000-word narrative of how the nominee’s work has contributed to the appreciation and protection of vernacular buildings and/or cultural landscapes. The description should include information about the vernacular resources and their history and emphasize the public outreach—such as curricula, websites, and public speaking—that is the basis for the nomination.
Description of people and organization partners that contributed to the advocacy effort.
For advocacy over a career, a timeline or chronology noting the highlights of the nominee’s advocacy.
Images of the vernacular resources that were the focus of the advocacy effort and events that contributed to the effort.
Links to websites or other relevant digital outreach developed for advocacy.

Submissions

Please submit nomination materials electronically in a single zip file OR as a link to a single downloadable file on a cloud drive to advocacy@vafweb.org. Should the file size exceed 50MB, please communicate with us at the same address. Likewise, if you must send a paper or hard copy of your documentation, please email us so that we may make alternate arrangements.

The application deadline for 2022 VAF Advocacy Award is January 21, 2022.

Electronic nomination materials should be submitted to Advocacy Award.

Hard copies should be sent to:

Sam Palfreyman

870 Crimson Lane

Kaysville, UT 84037

Call for Nominations: 2022 Paul E. Buchanan Award

Mon, 06 Dec 2021 17:40:00 GMT

The Paul E. Buchanan Award recognizes contributions to the study and preservation of vernacular architecture and the cultural landscape that do not take the form of books or published work. Reports, documentation projects, restoration plans, National Register or local nominations, exhibits, video/digital media productions and similar reports and projects are eligible for recognition. This award honors the valuable work that many of our members and professional associates perform. For information on submission requirements, see Buchanan Award Page.

The deadline for submissions is Friday, January 28, 2022.

Nominations should include 1) a brief email or cover letter that in a few lines explains the project and why it deserves special recognition, and 2) if applicable, a PDF of the project. For video/digital media productions, please include project links in your email.

Send nominations (and any questions) to Philip Herrington, buchananaward@vafweb.org

Call for Contacts: VAF Guidebooks

Mon, 06 Dec 2021 17:30:00 GMT

The VAF education committee is seeking contact information for the following contributors to guidebooks to request their approval to post material to the website:

Jonathan H. Poston, 1994 guidebook from the Charleston, SC conference
James M. Denny, 1989 guidebook from the St. Louis, MO conference
Erin McCawley Renn, 1989 guidebook from the St. Louis, MO conference. Erin McCawley Renn was the administrator of the Deutschheim State Historic Site, a property of the Missouri Department of Natural Resources, Division of Parks, Recreation, and Historic Preservation.
R. Patrick Christopher, 1985 guidebook from the San Francisco, CA conference
Karana Hattersely-Drayton, 1985 guidebook from the San Francisco, CA conference
R. Partick Christopher and Karana Hattersely-Drayton worked for the Golden Gate National Recreation Area.
Stephen Del Sordo, 1984 guidebook from the Newark, DE conference. Stephen Del Sordo retired from the FCC. His last known professional association was with iresponse an organization that conducts NEPA reviews for tribes.
Donna Ware, 1998 guidebook from the Anapolis, MD conference. Formerly the Historic Site Planner for Anne Arundel County, MD
Mark Edwards, 1980 guidebook from the Washington, DC conference

If you can help, please contact PJ Carlino: pj.carlino@csus.edu

Photography Workshop funded by Orlando Ridout V Fieldwork Fellowship

Mon, 06 Dec 2021 17:20:00 GMT

By Allison Luther, Maryland Historical Trust

With support from the Orlando Ridout V Fieldwork Fellowship, Maryland Historical Trust staff members attended a photography workshop led by Willie Graham at the Chase-Lloyd House in Annapolis. It was truly an exceptional day—Willie is a skilled photographer and the Chase-Lloyd House is one of the most outstanding houses in Annapolis. The workshop content included composition, controlling light, sharpness, depth of field, tonal range, perspective correcting, color, black and white, digital editing, metadata, and camera equipment.

We also learned some of Willie’s practical photography tips, including:
Use a tripod.
Be conscious of windows’ lighting impact in interior shots; digitally edit as needed.
Find good skies or cut skies out.
Shoot your subject as straight on as possible to reduce the manipulation needed when digitally editing.
Use black and white for a dramatic impact.
Use a color corrected monitor when digitally editing.
Make sure your photographs are publishable.
Don’t share bad photos!

Attendees of the workshop practiced shooting the richly detailed interior of the Chase-Lloyd House. Construction of this property was commenced by Samuel Chase in 1769; however, Chase quickly sold the unfinished shell to Edward Lloyd IV. With the assistance of English joiner and builder William Buckland, the house was completed in 1774. Distinguishing the Chase-Lloyd House are its three-story height and dedicated tripartite exterior presentation, in addition to the standard Annapolis fare of stone foundation with galletting, molded water table, projecting belt courses, and enriched cornice. Notable interior features include the columned center hall with cantilevered stair, detailed Buckland carvings in the dining room, and Georgian-inspired decorative plaster ceilings.

The valuable skills gained from this workshop will assist the Maryland Historical Trust in both conducting and promoting proper record photography across the state of Maryland. We are very grateful for the financial support from the Orlando Ridout V Fieldwork Fellowship for this training opportunity.

VAF Chesapeake Tour

Mon, 06 Dec 2021 17:10:00 GMT

By Catherine Lavoie, National Park Service

On September 25, 2021, VAF members from the Chesapeake region exploring the possibility of forming a new chapter held their first event, toured two rare houses in Frederick, Maryland, the Dutch H-bent Beatty-Cramer House (1748) and the German Georgian Schifferstadt (1758). Both sites are owned by Frederick County Landmarks Foundation, although only the latter is open to the public. They represent the early settlement of the region and the assimilation of various immigrant building traditions. The twenty-three members in attendance were given overviews by some of the local preservationists instrumental in saving these sites, Joe Lubozynski, Peter Pearre, and Doug Claytor at Beatty-Cramer and Joan Deacon, Jennie Russell, and Claytor at Schifferstadt. Attendees were then allowed to explore the buildings and exchange ideas. Joe Lubozynski expressed his gratitude, stating: “The visit from the Vernacular Architecture Forum rewarded our efforts to save the Beatty-Cramer House and validated our mission. It was a wonderful day, and the camaraderie was superb. We are grateful to the VAF for contributing to our mission.”

Highly unusual for Maryland, the Beatty-Cramer House was built for Thomas Beatty following the building traditions familiar to his Dutch wife Maria Jensen. The original two-room, single-pile section exhibits the heavy timber, transverse “H-bent” construction emblematic of Netherlandic framing, featuring posts connected by an anchor beam to form an H-shape. The framing is infilled with brick nogging (originally left exposed) while the interior partition wall is formed by horizontal planks with earthen infill known as “Dutch biscuit.” Evidence exists of a former Dutch tripartite window and a split-level or “Opkamer” plan. Thomas and Maria Beatty originated from Ulster County, New York, where Dutch buildings were common. The property remained in the Beatty family until 1797. In 1855 it was purchased by farmer Jeremiah Henry Cramer, who added the V-notched log section. A two-story, ca. 1782 banked springhouse features a spring-fed trough and a hood for a traditional jambless Dutch fireplace on the lower level and a finished room above. Although abandoned since 1985, the buildings remain sound, and a rehabilitation by Frederick County Landmarks Foundation is planned.

Schifferstadt is an exceptional surviving example of colonial-era German architecture. The main block was constructed ca. 1758 by owner Elias Bruner, who immigrated from Germany in 1729 and settled on land purchased in 1746 near the newly established town of Frederick. Schifferstadt has a distinctive Durchgangigen or center-hall arrangement of interior spaces, one of the principal German plan types used in the American colonies. Traditionally interpreted as Anglo-influenced, Durchgangigen houses are now understood to be part of the regularization of German domestic design against a broader ethos of gentility in the eighteenth century. The symmetry of Schifferstadt departs from the typical off-center front door entrance, opting for contemporary Georgian convention. The central wishbone chimney, Liegender Stuhl (leaning truss system), vaulted cellar, stone kitchen window sink, decorative hardware, Stroh Lehm (mud and straw) paling insulation, and five-plate jamb stove, however, are all fully characteristic of German architecture. Despite alterations and additions such as the 1866-1867 two-story brick kitchen wing, Schifferstadt offers an unusual level of insight into an important immigrant group in America’s early history. The house is currently operated as a museum but has been closed due to COVID.

Pennsylvania Beer Distributorships: An Overlooked Vernacular Building

Mon, 06 Dec 2021 16:00:00 GMT

by David S. Rotenstein

***Editor's Note: To view captions, hover your cursor over photos.

Introduction

This is a story that begins in the Prohibition era. It is about a long-overlooked vernacular building found in Pennsylvania: the beer distributorship.

Last summer I led a walking tour of sites associated with organized crime history along Fifth Avenue in Pittsburgh’s Uptown neighborhood. One of the tour stops is a Victorian home once owned by a bootlegger and numbers banker named Joe Tito. After Prohibition ended, Joe and two of his brothers bought a flagging brewery east of Pittsburgh and in 1935 they introduced Rolling Rock beer to the world. During the tour, one of the participants — a man who had grown up in the neighborhood — asked me if I knew about the beer distributorship in back of the house. I replied that I had not.

The day after the June 2021 tour, I returned to Uptown and visited the beer distributorship building. It looked like an ordinary garage and, except for a metal sign bracket attached to its façade and heavy metal wheel guards at the entrance, there were no outward signs of its earlier use. I had originally missed the building while designing the walking tour of the Fifth Avenue corridor because the parcel on which it was located had been sold by the Tito family in the 1960s and it had a Colwell Street address, not a Fifth Avenue one.

My organized crime history research isn’t necessarily a historic preservation project. I designed the tours as a tool to engage the public about the city’s significant numbers gambling history and I wanted to use the built environment to help tell the stories. That June walking tour led to me research and write a local landmark nomination for the former Tito house and the beer distributorship. This essay explores some of what I learned about the Tito beer distributorship and its place as a material culture expression of Pennsylvania’s post-Prohibition liquor laws.

Prohibition and its Entrepreneurs

In 1919, the United States Congress passed the eighteenth amendment to the Constitution, which made illegal the manufacture, transportation, and sale of intoxicating liquors. The amendment went to the states for ratification and Congress then passed the “Volstead Act” which implemented the amendment. On January 17, 1920, Prohibition became the law of the land and with it came new economies, cultural patterns, and material culture that have become embedded in American popular culture. Bootleggers, once known as local outlaws became legendary folk heroes who laid the foundation for the national organized crime network that came to be known as La Cosa Nostra or (inaccurately), the Mafia.[1]

In Pennsylvania, Prohibition’s cultural influences extended to vernacular architecture. There and in other parts of the country, bootleggers adapted the newly introduced automobile garage as a space for manufacturing and storing beer and liquor. The garage itself is an adapted architectural form with its origins in stables, carriage houses, and other buildings designed to house draft animals and transportation devices. After Prohibition’s repeal in 1933, Pennsylvania passed new laws to regulate the manufacture, transportation, and sale of beer, wine, and liquor. The state’s new laws also created a distinctive type of business: the beer distributor. The new type of business adapted the automobile garage to the bulk sale of beer.

After much wrangling between Pennsylvania’s staunch Prohibitionist governor, Gifford Pinchot, and legislators eager for the state’s entrepreneurs to begin manufacturing and selling liquors, beer, and wine, Pennsylvania passed a beer act in May of 1933. The new law passed one month after the governor vetoed an earlier bill that critics claimed would have fostered corruption.

Pennsylvania’s beer act went into effect in June of 1933. It prohibited bars and limited retail beer sales to eating establishments. Retail establishments could only sell individual beers in quantities up to the equivalent of two six-packs. Beer distributors were prohibited from allowing consumption on their premises and could only sell originally packaged cases and kegs.[2] Beer could legally be sold and consumed, but the new law’s restrictive requirements for licensing and compliance made it very difficult for consumers, retailers, and wholesalers. Nearly a century later, the licensing and regulatory structure continue to make buying beer and liquor in Pennsylvania difficult.

The Garage: Adaptability and Ubiquity

Places to store and service automobiles appeared soon after cars began appearing in American streets in the years bracketing the turn of the twentieth century. “Many of the earliest garages were either makeshift structures, modified from a barn, shed, or mechanic’s workshop,” wrote Jonathan Sager in a 2002 University of Georgia historic preservation master’s thesis.[3]

Within a couple of decades, the earliest garages had evolved into liminal spaces where domesticity, commerce, creativity, and transportation overlapped. These changes flourished starting in the 1920s as automotive technology improved and dedicated automobile service and filling stations began to spread across the landscape. “By the late 1920s, the garage workbench had often been transformed into father's home repair and hobby bench … homeowners began to think of the garage as a safe place to store garden tools, baby carriages, and other household overflow.”[4]

The twentieth century garage, wrote Olivia Erlanger and Luis Ortega Govela, was “a vehicle to deconstruct the entrepreneur and the radical individual.”[5] Their slim volume, simply titled Garage, is a survey of the structure’s multiple meanings and uses that transcend storing cars. Garages birthed businesses and bands, from Hewlett-Packard and Apple to rock musicians whose family garages doubled as rehearsal studios. Pittsburgh engineer Frank Conrad established commercial radio’s first broadcast studio in his suburban garage.[6]

From Batteries to Bootlegging

The garage almost became a natural space for bootleggers. After Prohibition went into effect, liquor and beer entrepreneurs found additional uses for commercial and private garages: places to manufacture and store illegal alcohol. One history of Prohibition in Nebraska noted, “As portrayed in the movies, garages played an important part in the transporting of whiskey.”[7] Rented became key sites for bootlegging activities.[8]

The Titos’ beer distributorship offers us a window into the garage’s incorporation into bootlegging and later legal beer sales. The Tito boys, as they were known around Pittsburgh, were well-positioned to enter the legal beer business after more than a decade transporting and selling bootleg beer. They were a well-rounded family of entertainment and hospitality entrepreneurs when they went into the legal beer business.

In late 1932, Joe (1890-1949), Anthony (1901-1956), and Robert (1905-1949) Tito bought the Pittsburgh Brewing Company’s assets in Latrobe, a Westmoreland County, Pennsylvania, city about 45 miles east of Pittsburgh. They received a brewery license in 1934 and the Latrobe Brewing Company soon began producing and selling beer. Frank Tito (1892-1942) got a Pennsylvania Liquor Control Board distributor’s license.

Frank set up the family’s beer distributorship in a brick garage the family built in 1922. Located behind the home the family bought that year, the garage became part of the Titos’ legal “hauling” business and their off-the-books bootlegging. Joe stored a fleet of trucks there — vehicles that found themselves in newspaper reports and court proceedings. The building’s construction coincides with the first reported arrests of Titos for bootlegging.[9]

The Tito beer distributorship outlived Frank, who died inside of a heart attack in 1942. His widow Gretchen secured the license and continued running the business. By the late 1940s, beer was being sold out of the building by a firm using the name “Rock Beer Distributing Company.” Rolling Rock beer was its featured brand, according to newspaper advertisements. In the early 1960s, advertisements for the business show that it moved from its longtime address at 1818 Colwell Street to Pittsburgh’s Northside. The move coincided with Gretchen’s sale of the property out of the family.

The Bigger Picture

The Tito beer distributorship appears to have been one of many similar automobile-related buildings that were adapted as beer distributorships after 1933. Others appear to have been purposely built drawing from the architectural vocabulary found in earlier garages: overhead doors and masonry buildings with little fenestration and ornamentation.

Caruso Beer Distributor in Pittsburgh’s Northside is an excellent example of a building that housed an automobile repair business from the 1920s to the 1960s. AngeloT. (A.T.) Lascher went into the automobile repair business in the mid-1920s after working as an engineer and motion picture entrepreneur. Lascher specialized in automobile electronics, selling and installing batteries and spark plugs, according to advertisements published in Pittsburgh newspapers. Lascher died in 1966. Sam Caruso, who had owned a beer distributorship several blocks away, bought the property and converted it into a beer distributor.

Despite nearly a century of beer distributorships in Pennsylvania, only four are documented in Pennsylvania State Historic Preservation Office inventories and none have been determined eligible for listing nor listed in the National Register of Historic Places.[10] The Pennsylvania beer distributorship building is a unique vernacular architectural form that is ripe for deeper study. First-generation beer distributors like the Tito building may be an endangered historic resource because few historic preservation surveys get beyond superficial architectural descriptions and they are easily written off as not historically significant or lacking architectural integrity.

Notes

[1] “House Passes Beer Bill That Faces Pinchot Veto,” Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, April 18, 1933; “New Beer Bill Rushed After Pinchot Veto,” Philadelphia Inquirer, April 21, 1933; “Governor Signs Beer Regulation and Repeal Bills,” Philadelphia Inquirer, May 4, 1933.

[2] Suzanne Laucks, “Brewing up Changes: Pennsylvania Should Modernize Its Tax Laws and Policies to Encourage the Growth of Its Craft Brewing Industry Note,” Pittsburgh Tax Review 14, no. 1 (2017 2016): 119–50; Emma Snyder, “Privatization in Pennsylvania: How Reforming the Pennsylvania Liquor Code Would Benefit the Commonwealth and It Citizens Comment,” Penn State Law Review 119, no. 1 (2015 2014): 27

[3] Jonathan E. Sager, “The Garage: Its History and Preservation” (Thesis, University of Georgia, 2002), 7.

[4] Leslie G. Goat, “Housing the Horseless Carriage: America’s Early Private Garages,” Perspectives in Vernacular Architecture 3 (1989): 68–69, https://doi.org/10.2307/3514294.

[5] Olivia Erlanger and Luis Ortega Govela, Garage (Cambridge, Massachusetts: The MIT Press, 2018), 4.

[6] Erlanger and Ortega Govela, Garage; “A House for the Automobile - Old House Journal Magazine,” Old House Journal Magazine - Renovation DIY and Old-House Restoration, Traditional Styles, Period Kitchens, Historical Decorating, Period Gardens, from Colonial and Victorian through Arts & Crafts and Mid-Century Modern: All from Old-House Journal Magazine and Special-Interest Titles Old-House Interiors, New Old House, and Early Homes. (blog), January 6, 2010, https://www.oldhouseonline.com/gardens-and-exteriors/a-house-for-the-automobile/; Nikil Saval, “How the Garage Became America’s Favorite Room,” The New Yorker, January 14, 2019, http://www.newyorker.com/culture/dept-of-design/how-the-garage-became-americas-favorite-room; “Conrad’s Garage,” All Things Considered (NPR, November 30, 2005), https://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=3059095.

[7] “Historical Details,” Niobrara County Library (blog), accessed September 21, 2021, https://www.niobraracountylibrary.org/historicals/

[8] Allan S. Everest, “Officer Confronts Bootlegger,” in Rum Across the Border, The Prohibition Era in Northern New York (Syracuse University Press, 1978), 109–10, https://doi.org/10.23

[9] “128 Stills and Parts Are Seized in Penn Avenue Raids,” Pittsburgh Daily Post, December 14, 1922.

[10] PA-SHARE database, Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission, https://share.phmc.pa.gov/pashare/landing, accessed August 22, 2021.

Nicole A. Deihlmann publishes history of Charles County, Maryland

Mon, 06 Dec 2021 15:05:00 GMT

VAF Member Nicole A. Deihlmann has published a new book on the architectural history of Charles County, Maryland.

In the Midst of These Plains documents nearly four centuries of settlement in Charles County, describing in detail its shift from a rural agricultural community to an exurb of Washington, DC. The result of many years of historic research and survey funded by the Maryland Historical Trust, the book highlights the history of the county through its historic buildings and landscapes. From the county’s iconic tobacco barns and substantial dwellings to the buildings of everyday life, such as school, churches, and stores, the authors paint a wide-ranging picture of Charles County’s built environment.

Jeremy Ebersole & Milwaukee Preservation Alliance receive Richard H. Driehaus Foundation National Preservation Award

Mon, 06 Dec 2021 15:00:00 GMT

The Milwaukee Preservation Alliance, led by Executive Director and VAF member Jeremy Ebersole, recently received a National Trust for Historic Preservation Richard H. Driehaus Foundation National Preservation Award for their work preserving the Milwaukee Soldiers Home and a Docomomo-US Modernism in America Advocacy Citation of Merit for their work on behalf of the Mitchell Park Domes and other Milwaukee Modernist buildings.

Congrats, Jeremy!

Catherine W. Zipf publishes new research on Virginia Greenbook Sites

Mon, 06 Dec 2021 14:55:00 GMT

VAF member Catherine Zipf and colleagues Anne Bruder and Susan Hellman have been hard at work researching and documenting sites listed in the Green Book.

Their research has been compiled in an interactive website.

In addition, the project is looking for anyone interested in researching Green Book sites in their area. Everyone is welcome!

If you'd like more information on how you can contribute, contact Catherine: cwzipf@gmail.com.

Call for Applications: SAH Annual Conference Student Diversity Fellowship

Mon, 06 Dec 2021 14:35:00 GMT

The Society of Architectural Historians (SAH), alongside its Minority Scholars, Asian American & Diasporic Architectural History, and Race & Architectural History Affiliate Groups, invite applications for a 2022 SAH annual conference undergraduate and graduate student fellowship as a step toward increasing the racial diversity of SAH and the field of architectural history.

The fellowship will provide funding for attendance at the SAH annual conference, a one-year digital membership, and mentorship during the conference.

Three applicants will be selected by a committee consisting of members of the Minority Scholars, Asian American & Diasporic Architectural History, and Race & Architectural History SAH Affiliate Groups.

Please submit your application online (login required) by Wednesday, December 15, 2021.

Call for Sessions: Society for the Study of Architecture's 2022 Conference - Montreal

Mon, 06 Dec 2021 14:30:00 GMT

From Revival to Renewal
47th Annual Conference of the Society for the Study of Architecture in Canada
Université du Québec à Montréal, Montreal, Quebec, May 25-28, 2022

The Society for the Study of Architecture in Canada will organize its 47th annual conference under the theme: “from revival to renewal.” The association wishes to discuss these themes in a transverse and inclusive way, through historical and contemporary approaches, whether at the scale of the building, the city, or the landscape.

The organizers invite interested persons to submit proposals for the organization of sessions on the themes presented above. Proposals will be accepted in different fields, such as:

Architecture;
Heritage studies;
Urban planning;
Landscape architecture;
History of architecture, heritage, urban planning and landscape architecture.

Proposals will also be accepted from different angles, such as:

Historical or empirical studies;
Projects and creation;
Intervention and requalification;
Practical or theoretical issues.

Any proposal related in some way or other to the theme of the conference will be considered.

Please send session proposals no later than Sunday, December 19, 2021 to the following address: SEAC.2022.SSAC@gmail.com.

A Call for Papers will follow at the beginning of January.

Call for Papers: 19th National Conference on Planning History

Mon, 06 Dec 2021 14:20:00 GMT

SACRPH 2022 – Harlem

The Society for American City and Regional Planning History cordially invites scholars and practitioners to present papers and talks on all aspects of urban, regional, and community planning history and their relationship to urban and metropolitan studies. The conference will be held in multiple formats, including: virtual presentations on Thursday, October 20, 2022; in-person tours on Friday, October 21; and in-person presentations on Saturday, October 22. It will also include a virtual keynote on Thursday night. All Saturday events will take place in Harlem, at the Bernard and Anne Spitzer School of Architecture on the historic campus of The City College of New York.

We are delighted to be coming together again in a multimodal format that will expand means of participation and engagement; on a campus committed to the diversity, affordability, and access that today’s cities demand; and in a community long involved with the work of planning for justice and equality. We hope you can join us online and in Harlem. For more information and submission instructions, see http://sacrph.org/conference-2022.

Submission Deadline: February 15, 2022

Call for Applications - HABS/SAH Sally Kress Tompkins Fellowship

Mon, 06 Dec 2021 14:10:00 GMT

Attention Student Architectural Historians!

Spend your summer conducting research on a nationally significant U.S. building or site and preparing a history to become part of the permanent HABS collection. The HABS/SAH Sally Kress Tompkins Fellowship, a joint program of the Historic American Buildings Survey (HABS) and the Society of Architectural Historians (SAH), permits a graduate student in architectural history or a related field to work on a 12-week HABS history project during summer 2022. The Fellow’s research interests and goals will inform the building or site selected for documentation by HABS staff. HABS is a program of the National Park Service and the Fellow is usually stationed at our Washington, DC office, although remote work may be possible. The award consists of a $12,000 stipend, and SAH conference registration and travel expenses up to $1,000.

Applications accepted Sept. 1 – Dec. 31, 2021

For more information visit: http://www.nps.gov/hdp/jobs/tompkins.htm

Call for Applications – Barns and Beaches Field School, Michigan Tech

Mon, 06 Dec 2021 14:00:00 GMT

Interested in conducting fieldwork on the banks of Lake Superior AND earning credits? Apply for the one-week intensive field school Barns and Beaches: People and Landscapes of Southern Houghton County, led by Dr. Sarah Fayen Scarlett (Michigan Tech), Dr. Hilary-Joy Virtanen (Finlandia University), and Dr. John Arnold (Keweenaw National Historic Park).

Click HERE to download the flyer with full details!

Registration Deadline: March 15, 2022

Contact: sfscarle@mtu.edu

Society of Architectural Historians Announces Publication of SAH Data Project Report

Mon, 06 Dec 2021 13:55:00 GMT

The Society of Architectural Historians has announced the publication of the SAH Data Project Report, a 263-page print and PDF book titled Architectural History in the United States: Findings and Trends in Higher Education. Funded by The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, the SAH Data Project is the first in-depth, data-driven study designed to assess the health of the fields of architectural, landscape, and urban history at institutions of higher education in the United States. The key findings of the report are summarized under the headings Architectural History Student Enrollment, Institutional Support, and Student Debt Load; Equity Concerns and Barriers to Access: The Architectural History Pre-College Pipeline; Creating and Sharing Knowledge: Architectural History Expertise; The Architectural History Professoriate and the Tenure-Track Job Market; Resonance and Public Engagement: Social Justice-Themed Architectural History Courses, Research, and Publications.

The full report is available at https://www.sah.org/publications-and-research/sah-data-project.