Oregon Historical Quarterly/Volume 35/Historic American Buildings Survey

by Jamieson Parker

HISTORIC AMERICAN BUILDINGS SURVEY

By JAMIESON PARKER

HOWEVER DUBIOUSLY we may regard some of the advantages supposed to have been gained from the economic depression, there can be no doubt of the value of some others, including the historic American buildings survey, which was established to aid unemployed architects. It will be a short lived project, probably terminating in May with the civil works administration; but be fore that time the thousand architects organized throughout the nation may be expected to make substantial progress toward the goal. Moreover, we can hope that the government's commencement of the work, and recognition of its value, may lead eventually to further and more thorough researches.

The project is administered by the bureau of national parks, buildings, and reservations of the department of the interior, with Thomas C. Vint, chief architect of the bureau, as active head. Assisting Mr. Vint is a national advisory committee, com posed of the following: Dr. Leicester B. Holland (chairman of the American Institute of Architects-committee on preservation of historic buildings and chief, fine arts division, Library of Congress) Washington, D. C.; John Gaw Meem (architect) Sante Fe, New Mexico; William G. Perry (architect) Boston, Massachusetts; Albert Simons (architect) Charleston, South Carolina; Dr. Herbert E. Bolton (professor of history, University of California, past president of the American Historical Association) Berkeley, California; Miss Harlean James (executive secretary American Civic Association) Washington, D. C.; and Dr. Waldo G. Leland (executive secretary American Council of Learned Societies).

The scope of the project can be presented by quoting from several official bulletins:

A qualified group of architects and draftsmen will be enlisted to study, measure and draw the plans, elevations and de tails of the important antique buildings of the United States. Our architectural heritage of buildings from the last four centuries diminishes at an alarming rate. The ravages of fire and the natural elements, together with the demolition and alterations caused by real estate "improvements," form an inexorable tide of destruction destined to wipe out the great majority of the buildings which knew the beginning and first flourish of the

nation. The comparatively few structures which can be saved by extraordinary effort and presented as exhibition houses and museums, or altered and used for residences or minor commercial uses comprise only a minor percentage of the interesting and important architectural specimens which remain from the old days. It is the responsibility of the American people that if the great number of our antique buildings must disappear through economic causes, they should not pass into unrecorded oblivion.

The general scope of the project contemplates measuring and recording the complete field of early American architecture from the earliest aboriginal structures to the latest buildings of the Greek revival period. The date selected as a final terminus is 1860, but this is more or less arbitrary as there may be individual buildings of a later date of a character worth recording, and on the other hand, buildings erected before this date may not necessarily be of a character to make it advisable to record them. Buildings of historic importance, such as birth places of statesmen, eminent artists, or scientists, will be re corded even though their erection was subsequent to the date set.It is intended that the survey shall cover structures of all types, from the smallest utilitarian structures to the largest and most monumental. Barns, bridges, mills, toll houses, jails, and in short, buildings of every description are to be included so that a complete picture of the culture of the time as reflected in the buildings of the period may be put on record.

Absolute priority will be given to buildings of architectural or historical interest, or buildings of unusual type, or buildings exhibiting unique or exceptional features of plan or design which have not been restored or remodelled and which are in imminent danger of destruction or material alteration.

It will be proper to encourage the designation of informal working committees of local historical or patriotic clubs and societies to cooperate in this work, to assist in locating buildings appropriate for inclusion, and to prepare the supplemental historical data.

The work of producing the measurements, drawings and photographs is done by architects, architectural draftsmen and photographers through employment by the civil works administration.

For the purpose of local administration, the United States has been divided into 39 districts, each covering a part of a state, a whole state or several states, and each under the direction of a district officer, who is assisted, as in the national administration, by an appropriate advisory committee. The committee for district number 39 (the states of Oregon and Washington) consists of the following: A. H. Albertson (architect), Seattle, Washington; W. P. Bonney (secretary, Washington State Historical Society), Tacoma, Washington; Walter E. Church

(architect), Portland, Oregon; Nellie B. Pipes (librarian, gon Historical Society), Portland, Oregon; and Professor B. Willcox (head of the department of architecture, Univ of Oregon), Eugene, Oregon. The writer is being assiste Paul Richardson (architect), Seattle, Washington, in sup sion of work in the state of Washington. Twenty arch and two photographers will constitute the working staff. The government has given the district officers every sary freedom in the means of securing material and inform It is wished, naturally, that a few months of preparation m have preceded the actual work, but perfection of details be expected in an emergency.

Even though the project is still in an early stage, it mi of interest to mention at this time some of the plans fo in this district of Oregon and Washington, and some o impressions gained by the district officer and the advisory mittee in their preliminary searches for material.

The question of the general age limits of buildings to cluded soon settled itself. Investigations began to disclos an abundant supply of interesting material of early origin within the presumable limits of the program it will be i ble to do justice to it all. The average age of buildings in will therefore be greater than was at first hoped for; been thought that most of the buildings in this district date between 1860 and 1870, but now it seems that the majo will be of the 185 Os and earlier.

The number of buildings to be surveyed will be doubtf til experience shows the length of time required for a work and the future of the civil works administration b more settled.

Under the present plan of procedure, the work is don groups of four architects, one of whom is in charge. The r followed by these squads are planned beforehand for ec of time and transportation, so that they move from one tory to the next most conveniently reached, measuring ings on a list arranged in priority. The buildings listed been previously visited by the district officer and memb the advisory committee, approved, and written permiss

take measurements and photographs, secured from owner and occupant. It has been found convenient for the men to mea sure four buildings in succession; then, returning to their head quarters, they work simultaneously, each man making the drawings for one building with the mental impressions still clearly in his mind.

A regulation which is wise, yet occasionally irksome, is that buildings must invariably be recorded in their exact present state. This does not apply to small parts obviously out of repair or missing, but must be followed with respect to all deliberate changes and additions made in the past, no matter how inharmonious and easily detected the alterations may appear. The advisability of this ruling is apparent, in that restoration drawings must always be based on conjectures or assumptions, which belong in their own special field of research. But in the cases of several old and important houses now in ruined state, the temptation to reconstruct them in drawings has been tantalizing. It is to be hoped that such work can be done, while there are still existing indications of the original designs.

The search for material is continually proceeding. Many promising parts of the district, where early or especially interesting settlements are known, are still to be covered. Doubtless there are splendid examples hidden in unsuspected places, and, it is greatly feared, some may remain hidden to the last. It can be seen how extremely helpful any suggestion might be to the district officer.

In the whole district there is no territory so rich in numbers of suitable buildings as the valleys of the Willamette and its tributaries, this being the natural result of extensive settlement along these rivers in the earliest period. Other important regions are the Rogue and Umpqua valleys, the Cowlitz Valley, the southern end of Puget Sound, and various sections of the coast. In eastern and northwestern Washington are many in teresting buildings of rough frontier types, such as forts, block houses, log cabins and mission churches. Information on eastern Oregon is at present meagre, but this great area doubtless contains significant survivals of early ranching and mining days. Portland is the headquarters for all workers in Oregon. From

this northern edge of the state, two campaigns are pl move south, on both sides of the Willamette, providing t with increased experience in their work as they go farthe Selections of material are still somewhat scattered, but th Willamette Valley has been given first attention. The following are approved buildings in Oregon (an couver, Washington), for which permission has been re Officers' Club, Vancouver Barracks Lewelling house, Milwaukie McLoughlin house, Oregon City Ainsworth house, Oregon City Holmes house, Oregon City Curry house, near Wilsonville Keil house, Aurora Brown house, near Gervais Conser house, Jefferson Haight house, east of Albany Wolf Creek Tavern, Wolf Creek Birdseye house, near Rogue River Bybee house, near Jacksonville House of J. W. Watkins (present owner), Phoenix Tolman house, south of Ashland Reed house, Reedville Old College Hall, Pacific University, Forest Grove Smith house, Forest Grove Hagey house, near Dundee "Fort Yamhill," Dayton Fletcher house, south of Lafayette Nesmith house, Rickreall Dickey house, near Molalla Elam Morris house, near Yamhill Several very desirable buildings, in addition to the have been selected and approved, but permission to mea been delayed, for one reason or another. It is hoped th termination of the civil works program, about 70 buildin have been surveyed, half of them in Oregon.

The final records, to be filed in the Library of Congres consist of drawings, photographs and historical notes. The drawings will be made in India ink with great c standard sheets of heavy tracing paper. It is the aim of t vey to include on the drawings all the information (dimen details, materials, colors) which would be necessary to the building, excepting hidden details of construction. will be seen that these records may in cases have a very d practical use.

To supplement the drawings at least two photographs will be taken of the exterior of each building, and as many interior views as may be desirable.

A most important part of the records will be the historical notes, the aim of which is to preserve the history of the building from its origin to the present time concisely and accurately, including a brief biography of the original owner. The sources of information are to be stated in every case. We are informed by the official bulletin, "Long accounts of genealogical matter and sentimental mythology have no place in this program. Only factual matter . . . is desired."

For the present no plans have been announced for publication of the records, but it is hoped that a selection of them may some day be printed by the government, or the American Institute of Architects. In the meantime, blueprints of the drawings, photographic prints and copies of written matter may be had by eligible persons or groups, for the price of reproduction. The district officer is allowed to issue these copies before the originals are sent to Washington.

In this district the buildings to be surveyed fall into two dis tinct classes: the more or less isolated structures of distinctly frontier type, planned for the simplest life, built with rough tools, and often designed to withstand attack, such as the log or square-timbered cabins and blockhouses; and the buildings, for a variety of uses, which sprang up when men began to settle in communities or on farms, after danger from the Indians had passed and a more orderly life could be attained. Occasionally one finds an interesting building with characteristics of both. The Birdseye house near Rogue River, still occupied by the Birdseye family, is an example; this has the general form of a two-story farm house with well-made sash in orderly arrangement, but the walls are of huge timbers adzed to a plane surface inside and out. The sash, considered a necessity, were shipped and carried overland a long distance; a few light boards also, for interior finish, could be transported from afar without too great trouble. But for the wall construction, men skilled in the use of woodsmen's tools, and possessing few others, adopted as the easiest method one we would now consider very laborious.

Buildings of the true frontier type naturally belong, as a r to the period of exploration, fur trading, Indian mission Indian wars, which preceded settlement of farms and vill 'Western Oregon now has comparatively few well preserved vivals of this type; parts of Washington, where frontier life tended to a later date, contain more examples. Perhap most interesting of these in Oregon is "Fort Yamhill," bu an outpost against troublesome Indians of the Grande Ro Valley, and now fortunately preserved in the public par Dayton. Its form is different from the usual blockhouse, w had upper walls parallel to those below and widely overh ing; here the upper block is of the same size as the lower turned on a true diagonal, with small hipped roofs on three ners of the lower part and the entrance platform, with retr ible ladder, on the fourth. It is an example of creation in tectural form as a result of functional needs; with rifles pos on each of the eight walls, there was a normal line of fire ev 45 degrees instead of the 90 degrees of the ordinary blockho The system of construction is also very logical. It is a rule the most satisfying architecture is created when form is der from both function and structure, and this is no exception. Another truism is that the architectures of all times a places give the interpreter a seemingly infallible insight into lives of their creators. Man betrays in building, probably inevitably than in all other works, the picture of life that t perament and environment have subtly formed in his min a survey of early Oregon architecture this fact is always a ent. It applies equally to all stages, starting from the ru cabin, but its truth is never more enlightening than in study the buildings of pioneer settlers, who, having outlived the d of struggle for mere existence, were able to give fuller ex sion to their ideals, and incidentally to many of the tradi and influences which combined to produce these ideals. One of the first observations is great evidence pointing to t fact, not always realized, that a very large proportion of gon's early settlers came from definitely southern states or t southern fringe of the middle west. These settlers not only b houses with unmistakably southern characteristics for t

selves, but also established a vogue for houses in the southern style; so that among the survivals one finds comparatively few houses of distinctly northern lineage. Distinguishing marks of the southern influence are low-pitched roofs, high ceilings, and a fondness for porches of all varieties. These are all characteristics of the Greek revival, which had been particularly favored in the south; but the conventional details of this style were left behind, for some reason, at a time when they were most popular in the south. There is seldom a suggestion, in Oregon work, of the heaviness and bombast seen so often in southern Greek revival buildings.

In the course of the renaissance there have been several strangely parallel cases of metamorphosis by transplanting, each bringing forth a more refined development. The Florentine renaissance itself was more a spiritual than physical rebirth of Roman architecture. French offshoots of Italian baroque were less robust than their parent. Georgian architecture, transplant ed in America, adopted forms of fresh delicacy. Doubtless there are specific influences contributing to each of these changes, but possibly the recurrence is not entirely a coincidence. A similar refinement seemed to take place in buildings of the southern style in Oregon. Columns were slender, cornices less brutal, ceiling heights more moderate, and moldings, though coarse compared to Georgian work in New England, not so bald and stony as their prototypes. The classic portico of large proportions is seldom seen.

One is struck with the variety of forms that porches take. Among them are the "ttwo-decker" covered by an extension of the main roof, the "two-decker" with its own roof, the broad one-story porch applied to the front, the narrow one-story porch, the narrow two-story portico and the double-deck portico. There are also variations and combinations of these types. The arrangement of the porch or several porches generally establishes the effective form of the composition. This is an approach to house design different indeed from the tradition of New England, where the small entrance porch or stoop was slowly, and rather reluctantly, adopted for practical purposes and appended to a completely designed facade.

There are a few details by which the relative ages of e buildings may be surmised at a glance. In western Orego fore 1860 roof pitches were almost invariably low, win panes small, and exterior walls covered with narrow clapboar Roofs gradually became steeper, long before the Gothic reviv through increasing familiarity with the rainy climate. improved manufacture and transportation, glass sizes ste became larger. Double-hung windows were generally panes wide in the few earliest houses; then for a long time t was the standard in a window of about the same width. T after 1860, one vertical muntin appears more and more finally the triumph (mechanically but not architecturall one pane was achieved. A discovery of interest to present architects is the fact that wooden muntins were of much gr delicacy (never exceeding a half inch) than is considered ticable by modern sash makers; yet these old windows have long and useful lives, often performing their functions per today in a newer house, having outlived the original struc The clapboards prior to 1860 are remarkably uniform standard was a half-inch board, not beveled, showing about f and one half inches below the lap. Later, when shaping accomplished mechanically, the era of "rustic siding" cam Exterior walls were usually framed, with studs often hewn various sizes and spacing. Generally interior partitions, occasionally outside walls, were built of solid vertical two planking, finished with boards on both sides. Hewn rafte common, and the roof boards are almost always hand-sa slabs from the log, of random widths up to 20 inches, the b still remaining on the undressed edges.

The moldings in these early buildings are always interes when judged with understanding of the effects desired an laborious hand work of producing them. For obvious rea plane surfaces were often used to approximate the effe curved moldings, and the results are frequently original, str and altogether admirable. These are perfect illustrations o power and significance of design under physical limitat Many architects of today, as well as artists in other fields that modern industrial technique has made the produci

effects too easy, and the reaction from this is a strong contributing factor to modern emphasis of form, and suppression of ornament. No architectural detail, for example, could seem more significant through elemental form, or more in accord with the modern spirit, than the type of cornice on the Simeon G. Reed house, consisting as it does of one plane surface connecting wall and roof. The effect leaves nothing to be desired. So, in study of our oldest buildings we can be startled to find characteristics of our newest. This broadening experience may well teach us that in general, applications are discovered, truths re-discovered.