If you are just joining us, you have picked a great time. We are at the very start of the twelfth edition of our Name This Place contest, wherein MissPres readers battle for the much-coveted title of Mississippi Preservationist Extraordinaire. At the end of the week, maybe it will be you standing on that podium while the National Anthem plays and the whole world watches in awe.
Check out The Rules and start playing. This first photo is a softball lobbed right down the middle of the plate.
Categories: Contest
Preservation in Mississippi 
finally! tullis-toledano house, biloxi, 1856-2005. this is a very sad loss—it survived many hurricanes but not that in 2005. while it would be considered ‘only slightly better than vernacular’ in louisiana, it was ‘rather better than that’ stylistically in its location on highway 90 in biloxi, a wonderful mix of late federal, greek revival, louisiana planter and i-house. it wasn’t very large, really, but had great presence. the front doorways, up and down, relate to some houses in natchez–the designs are derived from pattern books, and, while the building has the look of the 1840s in some respects, the ‘fancy dormers’ have the fussier look of the 1850s–they relate to the dormers at dunleith, natchez, if i recall correctly. i was in the house on several occasions, but, in the case with many lost buildings everywhere, ‘not enough to remember every detail’; when my father lived in biloxi, he was a docent here at one time. i think a service building survives. this is a james butters photo from habs, i think. can’t recall at the moment if there is an architect and/or builder/contractor associated with this structure. perhaps someone from new orleans or mobile.
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Two points, you jump out to an early lead.
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Tullis-Toledano House – Biloxi, MS – destroyed by a big floating casino box during Hurricane Katrina.
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Ed Polk Douglas just beat you on identifying the house, but you still get a point for telling us how it was destroyed.
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oh, always loved the exterior staircase–as i recall, the interior was so small–two larger rooms in front flanking a center hall and cabinet rooms in back–that there wasn’t room for a staircase ‘tall enough’ reach the second floor in the main hall.
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our webmaster did a great blog on the house and its destruction on this site on aug. 29, 2009. a variety of details that i didn’t mention, of course. it’s in the ‘buildings of biloxi’ book, of course.
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oops==sorry about the use to two ‘of course’ s so close together in my last contest— i caught the ‘contest’ as i was walking out the door!
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Tullis-Toledano House in my hometown, Biloxi. I miss this place!
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There is a wanna be copy of this house in Eastover in Jackson
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What a beautiful home! Such a sad loss! Katrina was certainly no lady, either.
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Now I’m just sad. I don’t like this game anymore. :-(
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When Mary Rose Carter and I were working on “Must See Mississippi” in 2005, we were putting off our Coast sites until the last, as we were both living in North Mississippi and it was just hard to get down there. Bad decision. By the time we went down in 2006, all fifteen or so of the places we had chosen to highlight were gone. Including Tullis-Toledano. Waiting for someone (not me) to do “Lost Mississippi Gulf Coast.”
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i think we will all be sad at the end of this week–with this ‘concentration’ of ‘lost ms’ structures. i had some good memories of my late father this morning when i saw the photos, but, great sadness when i thought of the loss of the house. does anyone know if the small service building in the rear is still standing?
and, yes, so many losses along ‘the coast’, from the la border to the al border— and (yes, my opinion) so much bad new architecture…
i treasure my memories of the coast which began in the early 1950s—does anyone remember a handsome, two storied wooden greek revival house, with square columns(6 or 8), that sat near hiway 90–perhaps between gulfport and biloxi? my mother’s family(from hburg) rented it a couple of summers when she was a child–it was in bad condition when i first saw it, maybe 1952— and, the grand italianate piaggio(sp?) house of the 1920s, also between gulfport and biloxi? it was built by (i think–and, i’m stretching my brain right now) by the italian consul in new orleans– my mother visited the widowed mr p in that house when she(my mother) was a child—-i think it was a nightclub later, then it was surrounded by a trailer park–occupied by squatters when i went in it as a child—-
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Henry Piaggio left an interesting built legacy on the coast. I believe he was responsible for the original Biloxi welcome sign, a reconstruction of which was rebuilt on the corner of Main & Hwy 90.
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Oops, obviously I am thinking of Salvatore Pizzati, but both men left an interesting built legacy on the coast. Piaggio’s house was later referred to as the Merry Mansion.
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Both the main house and the lovely Shingle-style Crawford House at the back were leveled.
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i should always spend some time on the net before i ask questions! the italianate house about which i just asked was the henry m piaggio home, mississippi city. haven’t found a specific date but maybe 1920s; piaggio was an italian emigrant who ‘did good’, beginning in fl, and eventually moved to the coast–lumbering and shipping and shipbuilding were his businesses. his dates, 1874-1921. house had a variety of uses til very badly damaged in camille in 1968. some images and info on the net henry d piaggio,. apparently not the italian consul in new orleans,. piaggio is buried in evergreen cem in gulfport. a few images of the house on the net.
in my search for the above info, have also found an interesting section of the biloxi historical society’s web page— it describes architects and contractors who worked in the area. this could be some informative reading when i get the chance., congrats to that group for doing this,
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