MissPres News Roundup 7-30-2010

Posted on July 30, 2010 by ELMalvaney

Can you believe July is almost over? Since August is my least favorite month, I’ll be taking my summer vacation next week. You may say, “Good grief, Malvaney just took a long vacation in April!” To which I would respond, “April was over three months ago.”

Since I know I’m off next week, this week’s roundup is kind of long, so you may want to get some popcorn, or a bowl of ice cream to enjoy while you read.

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The Sun-Herald had a great article last week about the Modernist home of local architect Milton B.E. Hill, in Gulfport’s Broadmoor neighborhood, “Design for living Modern house was Gulfport architect’s own home“:

The house was designed by Gulfport architect Milton Hill, who had it built as his own family home in 1949. Its lines have a Prairie influence, with mixed exterior media of brick, stone and wood, which harmonize with the lush greens and browns of the lawn and trees.

. . . .

The L-shaped living room is just off the kitchen. Here, Karen gets to indulge in her passion for modern Danish and Italian style, including a Hans Wegner cabinet and a Wegner chair she found at a shop in Slidell. A pair of wooden Eames chairs were a special find a few years ago at a local Salvation Army store.

The living room’s real conversation piece isn’t a piece of furniture, however. It’s a part of the room — an indoor garden area, original to the house. It sits beneath a bank of casement windows which let plenty of filtered light into the room.

I don’t know much about Milton Hill, other than what I find in the 1956 American Architects Directory, by R.R. Bowker:

HILL, MILTON B(AXTER) E(LLIS). (AIA.)
Office: 1232 Pass Rd, Gulfport, Miss. Home: 911 S. Wanda Pl, Gulfport.

b. Helena, Ark, June 10, 17. M. 37, Children 4. Educ: Ala. Polytech. Inst, B. Arch, 40; B. Civil Eng, 44. Arch, Bldg. & Grounds, Ala. Polytech. Inst, 40-43; Arch. Eng, Raymond Sizemore, Montgomery Ala 44-45, (9 mo.) Present Firm: Milton B. E. Hill, Archt. & Engr, org. 45. Reg: Ala, Miss; Lic. Engr. Mem. Meth. Ch, Bd. of Stewards, since 45; Kiwanis Int; C of C; Theater of Arts, Chmn Bd, since 54. Educ. Activities: Instr, Ala. Polytech. Inst, 42-43; Univ. of Miss, Extension, 53. Subj. Taught: Elem. Drawing, Bldg. Construct, Steel Design, Cone, Design, Advanced Struct. Gov. Serv: U.S. Navy, 45. AIA Mem: Miss. Chapter.

Putting together a list of his most important works from the three architects directories (1956, 1962 and 1970) we get the following:

  • Elem. Sch, Gulfport, 53
  • B. F. Brown Mem. Gym, 54
  • Dr. E. D. Gay Res, Gulfport, 54
  • First Bapt. Church, Gulfport, 55
  • Gulf Nat. Bank, Gulfport, 55
  • Grace Mem. Bapt. Ch, Gulfport, 55
  • Fairchild Office Bldg, Hattesburg, 57
  • Shutt Motel, Gulfport, 57
  • Fairchild Motel, Gulfport, 58
  • Elem. Sch, Gulfport, 59
  • High Sch. Addition, Gulfport, 60
  • Ed. Bldg, First. Meth. Ch, Gulfport, 61
  • State Port Terminal Facilities, Gulfport, 69
  • Miss. Power Co. Gen. Off. Bldg, Gulfport, 69, assoc. archit. w/Curtis & Davis, New Orleans
  • Reichhold Chem. Inc. Industrial Plant, Moncure, N.C, 69
  • Soc. Security Off. Bldg, Gulfport, 69
  • Downtowner Motor Inn, Gulfport, 69, consult, archit. to George A. Thomason, Memphis.

Of those buildings listed above, the Gymnasium, Gulf National Bank, First Baptist Church and of course the Port Terminal are gone–I don’t know about many of the others. One other building not on this list that I know he designed is the Soria City School, a 1940s African-American school just a few blocks from Broadmoor and a designated Mississippi Landmark. As you see, he was the associate architect for the Mississippi Power Company Building on Beach Blvd in downtown Gulfport. The principal architects on that building were the internationally famous Modernists Curtis & Davis of New Orleans, architects of the Superdome, among other major International-style landmarks. This article is very helpful in filling in personal details but I hope that we can convince our newest MissPres contributor, Thomas Rosell, to do a little detective work on these and other buildings by Hill.

Speaking of Gulfport’s Soria City, the African-American neighborhood just east of downtown and north of the railroad tracks, the Sun-Herald also ran a little article about some Community Development Block Grants being used for sidewalks and other infrastructure upgrades and repair in the area: “Soria City included in federal funding plans.”

Still on the Coast, over in Pascagoula, a community group met last week to discuss the renovation of the old Pascagoula High School, specifically the auditorium section, which is going to be a community auditorium, rather than a private space like the rest of the campus. As you recall, a few weeks ago Thomas Rosell gave us a report on the recent walk-through of the building and the ongoing renovation work.

And last but not least on the Coast, an article I missed several months ago because I was headed to France, but it’s worth posting even at this late date. The Sea Coast Echo (which is one of my favorite newspaper names) ran an article “This Property Is Revived” about the Scafidi House in Bay St. Louis, a two-story concrete block building up on Blaize Avenue a block or so from the amazing depot. If you have been down to BSL since Katrina, I’m sure you’ve noticed this once-impressive building, clearly vacant and abandoned for several years and badly damaged by Katrina’s winds and water. Its future was uncertain to say the least after Katrina, but it is now undergoing a transformation into a little theater:

The building on Blaize was purchased from private owners by the Little Theatre in January 2008, after standing vacant and having sporadic occupancy for years. The interior was gutted with help from numerous volunteers after the purchase, and construction crews are now at work on the exterior.

. . . .

The fund-raising, Grace said with understatement, “has been difficult.”

The group received grants worth $250,000 from the state Department of Archives and History and the Mississippi Arts Commission, and was required to raise a 40 percent match. Fund-raising is still underway.

. . . .

Much of the building’s history now is shrouded by the mysteries of time, but it is said to have been built by Andreas Scafidi, an Italian immigrant, farmer, and merchant. He and his workers hand-crafted the stout exterior blocks for the building. He and his family lived upstairs and Scafidi operated a retail business on the first floor.

Interestingly, the building featured prominently in the 1966 movie “This Property is Condemned” starring Robert Redford, Natalie Wood, and Charles Bronson. Is it just me, or do you also have to stop yourself from saying “Charles Manson” when you really mean “Charles Bronson”?

A small but potentially important note in the Bolivar Commercial about the H.M. Nailor School in Cleveland, the historically black high school for the city when it was built in the early 1940s. In an article about getting ready for the new school year, the superintendent noted:

Thigpen announced to the board that she would be traveling to Jackson to attend a meeting with the “Heritage and Archives Department in Jackson.” She said representatives would be discussing information on Nailor.

I’m not sure what this means, but I did happen to stop by the school on my little trip through the Delta a couple weeks ago and from its condition I would think the superintendent either intended to talk about possible grants for repair and renovation or (hopefully not) demolition. The building has clearly not been cared for as it should be, but you can see that it is a substantial, concrete structure with an Art Moderne style–a rare investment in African American education for the Depression/WWII era. Plus, the Amzie Moore house is right around the corner, practically facing the school–this little area of Cleveland has a lot of Civil Rights history to it, but it’s a shame to see how neglected and abused it all is. What’s to be done about preserving African American history when we just keep tearing down or demolishing by neglect the sites of importance? This problem isn’t confined to Cleveland of course, it’s all over, including Jackson’s own Farish Street neighborhood and many other sites and districts around the country.

An article about historic Hawkins Field in the Clarion-Ledger caught my eye, “Hawkins Field maps future,” although it only glancingly mentions the 1936 terminal building, listed as one of the Mississippi Heritage Trust’s 10 Most Endangered Places in 2001, and a favorite of Flickr photographers.

And a rare article out of Meridian–am I wrong but do we hardly ever hear anything from that part of the state except about the Threefoot Building?–about the downtown site chosen for a new museum, the Mississippi Arts and Entertainment Center. According to the article in the Meridian Star:

Museum board members say an architect will decide whether to renovate the current buildings on the property or demolish them and construct a new building.

The buildings in question–one of which is the old Meridian Hotel–are right in the heart of the downtown historic district and are very prominent as you cross the bridge into downtown, so let’s hope they will be renovated instead of demolished. I wish the board members would be more cognizant of the property they have acquired and not be throwing around demolition options from the start. When I first moved to Mississippi, many moons ago, Meridian had one of the most intact turn-of-the-20th-century urban environments in the state, older than Jackson’s downtown. Now, after years of losing one building here, one building there, two buildings over here, it is diminished considerably–still impressive, but disheartening to those of us who knew it before.

We can end on a happy note, thanks to a reader from up Aberdeen way who pointed me to an article in the Columbus Dispatch about more preservation work in Aberdeen and the long-standing contributions of Billy Brasfield in saving historic houses around town. “TV cameras roll as celebrity makeup artist reclaims another Aberdeen home“:

Aberdeen native Billy Brasfield may be makeup artist to the stars, but when it comes to hometown preservation, his passion is putting the best face on some of the city’s hidden gems.

When he’s not transforming faces including Scarlett Johansson, Beyonce, Lady Gaga, Jennifer Lopez and the Dixie Chicks — or glamorous subjects for magazines like Vanity Fair or Harper’s Bazaar — he’s making over as many of Aberdeen’s faded architectural beauties as he can.

One of the latest is a circa 1904 structure at 208 High Street. The house sat empty and deteriorating for years before Billy rescued it. Its renovation generated a buzz around the small North Mississippi town, in large part because of the Los Angeles-based World of Wonder film crew documenting several of his projects for a series to air on the home and garden network, HGTV, in January 2011.

I have to admit I’ve kind of abandoned HGTV because for so many years they’ve featured house renovations that involved complete gutting, including ripping out quality materials and throwing them into the landfill. But it will be exciting to see our own Aberdeen featured in January and hopefully see what “This Old House” used to be and should have remained.

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That’s it for this week and next–enjoy my vacation, y’all! As is tradition round these parts, I’ll send back postcards for you to enjoy while I’m gone.

Posted in Aberdeen, African American History, Architectural Research, Bay St. Louis, Cleveland, Demolition/Abandonment, Grants, Gulf Coast, Gulfport, Jackson, Meridian, Mississippi Landmarks, News Roundups, Pascagoula, Schools | 4 Comments

To Leakesville and Back

Posted on July 29, 2010 by ELMalvaney

Leakesville? Leakesville, you say? What’s in Leakesville and why would you go there? Well, for one thing, Leakesville boasts a fine courthouse and a nice school complex. Plus, there’s interesting stuff on the way there from Jackson, and it’s on my way to see family and friend in the Florida Panhandle, so why not?

On the way, I check in on one of my favorite Art Deco gymnasiums in the state at the rural crossroads of Runnelstown, which you almost pass on the highway before screeching to a halt and turning off the road. The campus has at least two older buildings, including a 1929 classroom building with a plaque giving credit to T.D. Mixon as architect–I have never heard of T.D. Mixon before–and L.E. and W.E. Breland as contractors. The Brelands also built the Lamar County Courthouse in Purvis–poor abused building that it is. As for the gymnasium, which is designated as a Mississippi Landmark, there’s no plaque, at least on the outside to tell us about its architect. Probably it was designed by one of the Hattiesburg architects in the late 1930s.

Continuing east on Highway 42 through the lovely Piney Woods region, you come to Richton, a little former railroad town, now perhaps having seen better days. But the little downtown strip has a few interesting buildings, including a former 50-car garage built in the 1920s (why? who knows?) and a sweet red Modern storefront that shows you can be sophisticated in a low key way in small town Mississippi.

Moving along into Greene County, one of my favorite counties for really old country schools (see the Indian Hill School, Bexley School, etc.), we come to Leakesville, which boasts a nice 1920s and 30s school campus of its own, along with an Art Moderne courthouse designed by the Hattiesburg/Biloxi firm of Landry & Matthes in 1939 and built under the Federal Emergency Administration of Public Works. As I was taking a picture of the plaques at the front entrance, a man came out the door and said “Taking pictures?” and I said, “Oh, yes, what a great building!” and he looked at me funny as he walked away. I get that alot, don’t you?

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Posted in "To . . . and Back", Architectural Research, Cool Old Places, Courthouses, Leakesville, Richton, Schools | 4 Comments

Laurel’s Contribution to Architectural History

Posted on July 28, 2010 by ELMalvaney

I saw this postcard of the Masonite Plant on ebay recently (and no, I’m not addicted. Yet) and snatched it right up because it reminded me that we have our own Laurel, Mississippi to thank for all that pressed wood masquerading as clapboard on houses around the country. But then when I did a little digging at the archives, I realized how much else Masonite was and is used for. The material was a necessity during World War II, used in the construction of the once-ubiquitous Quonset huts, airplanes, tanks, land mines, and ships.

I came across a great article from the December 1945 Manufacturers Record recounting the history of the Masonite company and giving us some insight into why a material made of wood particles pressed together became so important in the nation’s economy.

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Another $1,000,000 for Mississippi

Masonite Demand Heavy, Company Expands at $1,000,000 Cost–Mississippi Site of Extended Facilities

When the board of directors of the Masonite Corporation authorized expenditure of over a million dollars for expanding the Laurel, Miss., plant by more than 30 per cent, the action focused attention on a southern industry that has grown from an idea to a great manufacturing operation within the short span of 21 years.

The story of the Masonite Corporation began at Laurel, Miss., in 1924. It was then that the late William H. Mason, after whom the company is named, developed the basic process by which pressed wood products are made.

From the humble beginning of a handful of men with a new idea, the company has grown to be one of the largest industries in Mississippi, employing an average of 2,000 men and women in the state and producing 90 per cent of all pressed wood hardboards manufactured in America.

Beginning with the small shack at the edge of Laurel where Mr. Mason developed the process for producing pressed wood, the plant has grown to occupy approximately 40 acres of an owned tract of 350 acres. Wages and salaries paid by the company in Mississippi during the fiscal year ending August 31, 1945, amounted to $4,173,000, and taxes paid into the State Treasury amounted to approximately $200,000.

The proposed extension is evidence of the company’s faith in the future of its operations in Mississippi. This appropriation, Masonite management has pointed out, is in line with the company’s policy of anticipating expansion and development. A three-year program of expansion completed in 1941 enabled Masonite to meet the greatly increased demands for wartime use of its production in the manufacture of Quonset and Pacific huts for housing workers and service personnel, airplanes, tanks, radar equipment, parachute flares, land mines and ships as well as in the preparation of the atomic bomb.

Mr. Mason, for 17 years an associate of the late Thomas A. Edison, first went to Laurel in 1920 to develop a process for extracting naval stores from southern pine lumber during curing. While engaged in this work he conceived the idea of turning to good use the thousands of tons of wood chips and lumber ends then considered waste and consigned to the huge trash furnace of a nearby lumber mill.

When, in 1924, Mr. Mason had developed the process for exploding wood chips under high steam pressure and then by means of heat and pressure converting reassembled fiber into the pressed wood hardboards, practical uses for the new product were soon found. In the formation of the company in 1925, to manufacture the new products, it was decised to locate the manufacturing operation in Mississippi because of the plentiful supply of raw materials, power, water, labor and good transportation facilities.

In time, the waste from the lumber mill ceased to be a sufficient raw material supply. Today the Laurel plant uses approximately 800 cords of wood a day, bought through contractors from Mississippi farmers and other owners of woodlots and timberlands. Masonite itself wons timberland reserves of 162,095 acres in the state.

To avoid depletion of Mississippi forest resources, the company in 1936 began a program of tree planting and education in the growth, protection and harvesting of trees, a valuable annual crop to many farmers. Carrying on its program in cooperation with the State Agriculture Extension Service, Division of Vocational Agriculture of the State Department of Education, the State Forestry Commission and other interested agencies, the company annually distributes free of charge more than 1,500,000 seedlings to farmers, 4-H and FFA Club Boys, and provides instruction for proper planting and care. Those who plant the seedling are free to dispose of any trees harvested as they wish. Masonite was one of the first wood products companies in the country to inaugurate such a forest development program.

With the coming of peace again the Masonite plant at Laurel has no reconversion problem in manufacturing operations as do so many industries which were also engaged almost entirely in war production. The products which the company manufactured for war uses are, with few exceptions, identical with those made for peacetime consumption, and the management has reported that it appears that the demand from all major channels of consumption of Masonite products will be large.

Masonite pressed wood products have a wide variety of uses. They are employed by industry in the manufacture of automobile, trailer and railroad car parts and fixtures, refrigerators, furniture, store fixtures, desk tops, telephone booths, signs, display booths, toys, and many other industrial products, as well as by the building and decorating trades in the construction and remodeling of homes, commercial structures, prefabricated homes and farm buildings. Masonite die stock, first employed in aircraft production, is used in assembly jigs, router dies, templates, chucks and form blocks, and in the electrical industry.

Sanborn map, Laurel, 1961

*****For those who have been following the discussion about the sad state of the Mississippi Industrial College and are up near Holly Springs today, Ben Ledbetter will be visiting the campus to report back on its condition and welcomes any MissPres reader who wants to join him. See his latest comment about how to get in touch with him at http://misspreservation.com/2010/06/14/not-just-another-post-about-mississippi-industrial-college/#comment-2256.

Posted in Architectural Research, Laurel | Leave a comment

Abandoned Mississippi: Central Delta Academy, Inverness

Posted on July 27, 2010 by ELMalvaney

I was up in the Delta recently and swung through Inverness on my way back to Jackson from Indianola. I had heard that one of my favorite Delta schools, the old Inverness School and more lately the Central Delta Academy, might be closing or already closed and I wanted to check it out.

It was getting on toward evening, but as I walked around the building, a very helpful lady came walking past with her dog and offered me the chance to go inside, something no one ever needs to ask me twice. She confirmed that this last school year had been the final class at Central Delta Academy, which has closed due to declining enrollments and population in general.

The Academy occupied three historic buildings, including a two-story administration building designed by Jackson architect N.W. Overstreet in 1924. A stucco or concrete gymnasium–didn’t really get close enough to it because it was getting late by the time I finished inside the main building–that looks probably late 1930s or possibly immediately post-WWII and a tan-brick vocational building probably from the early 1950s complete the campus.

All the buildings appeared to have been well-maintained over the years and are in good condition. The lady who let me in said that just in the past couple of weeks, all the contents had been auctioned off and the school would officially cease to exist in August. She said the trustees were talking about just tearing it all down, but that other people in town were trying to come up with a way to save it. I hope they can, and maybe these pictures will inspire someone out there to bring new life to this great Delta school campus.

One thing I would suggest looking into is whether the deed to the property has a reverter clause. This was the school for white students until desegregation in 1969, and as I understand it (and as happened elsewhere), the white campus was practically turned over to the new private academy. If the deed was written like lots of school property deeds in the past though, there might be a clause that stipulates that the property will revert to the original owner, presumably the city or county, whenever it ceases to be used for educational purposes.

Let’s hope for the best for this campus and for Inverness–it’s worth saving if only there is a will (and money) to do it.

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Posted in Abandoned Mississippi, Schools | 14 Comments