Friday Photos – Page 3 – Preservation of Historic Winchester

Friday Photos and More

This week, we uncovered a stash of 30 more Holiday House Tour photographs while cleaning old files. The exact year of the tour depicted was unknown until some careful background detail sleuthing revealed the home was on Seldon Drive. With that knowledge and the database in progress cataloging our past tours, we were able to determine the images came from the 1990 tour “A Neighborhood Christmas,” the only year (so far!) Seldon Drive was featured. Enjoy this look back at the past in our Flickr album!

Holiday House Tour 1990 — One of the images from the 1990 Holiday House Tour held on Seldon Drive in Winchester.

As a friendly reminder, PHW’s 56th Annual Meeting is coming up on June 28th at 5 PM. The Annual Business Meeting will consist of the Proposed Bylaws Amendment, President’s Annual Report, and Election of the 2020-2021 Board of Directors. A full copy of the bylaws is available on PHW’s website.

Only PHW members with current dues who attend the meeting in person may vote on the actionable items. If you plan to attend the meeting, RSVP your name and number of attendees to 540-667-3577, phwinc.org@gmail.com, or on the Facebook event page. The meeting is capped at 50 guests.

The meeting will be held outside and no refreshments will be offered. Social distancing due to COVID-19 will be in effect. Wear face coverings and do not attend if you have been exposed or feel ill. Please bring your own seating. A livestream of the meeting will be hosted on Facebook. The meeting will not be rescheduled for inclement weather.

Last, we have a few curated reading links for you to enjoy this weekend along the theme of Juneteenth celebrations:

Early Photographs of Juneteenth Celebrations from the Public Domain Review

Stand for LOVE: 18 Museums and Historic Sites to Learn about Virginia’s Black History from Virginia’s Travel Blog

Take Free Courses on African-American History from Yale and Stanford: From Emancipation, to the Civil Rights Movement, and Beyond from Open Culture

Friday Photos: Limestone Covers and Our Instagram

While we were doing some filing this week, we found the selection of images taken for the 275th Anniversary Edition of Winchester: Limestone, Sycamores & Architecture. If you would like to see behind the curtain, check out the album on Flickr and see 17 larger and untouched images that were considered and used for the book.

We are also happy to announce work on the Bough and Dough Shop for 2020 is progressing. In addition to the nuts and bolts changes to make the shop as safe as possible for visitors, we have been working behind the scenes with artists. You can also get more updates on our new Bough and Dough Shop Instagram. If you would like a sneak peek at our online ordering platform, visit our online store. You can use it now to order both the remaining limited quantity of the first edition and the 275th edition of the Limestone volume, as well as other books and prints. At least some portion of our Shop items will be added to the store for remote shopping from home this winter. If you want to use curbside pickup at the Hexagon House, remember to put in the promo code “Curbside” to get free shipping!

Friday Roundup: Memorial Day Weekend

The PHW office will be closed Memorial Day. Stay safe and healthy as you enjoy your long weekend! For your reading pleasure, we have gathered links for you to enjoy:

Protecting Family and Heirlooms – If you started organizing photographs or sorting through other family memorabilia and are concerned on how to safely handle or sanitize them, this blog from the Library of Virginia may put some fears at ease and help keep your precious documents safe.

More Than Maintenance: Replacing the Glass at the Glass House – The National Trust offers a peek behind the curtain for a unique window replacement situation at the Phillip Johnson Glass House in Connecticut. This is an interesting look at how defining architectural features that wear out are replaced sensitively in respect to the building, its furnishings, and its function as an interpretive site for most of the year.

Atlas Obscura offers two articles, Fun Ways to Get Kids Into Photography and Dig This: An Online Field School for Junior Archaeologists to whet your children or grandchildren’s appetite for skills useful in historic preservation.

You may also want to check out Use Online Time with Family to Record Family Stories from West Virginia Public Radio. Be sure to scroll to the bottom for additional links to help you get started with question suggestions.

One of the things I have enjoyed is looking through some long forgotten boxes and finding treasures inside. If you like that thrill as well, you might enjoy the story On the Hunt for National Treasures With America’s Archive Detective following the discovery of missing items and the effort to recover them with Mitch Yockelson. (Sometimes, though, the items are just misfiled!)

If you’re looking for a longer read, Public Domain Review recently highlighted a book Old English Customs Extant at the Present Time (1896). In addition to the highlighted summary of what to expect from the Review, you can enjoy the entire book for free online and see what other traditions you may not have heard of before.

Clowser House Painting — Larry Webb shared ten more photos of the exterior painting progress at the Clowser House. You can drive by to see the exterior yourself at 152 Tomahawk Trail in the Shawneeland subdivision off Back Mountain Road in Frederick County. You can see the other photos at our Flickr.

Experience National Travel and Tourism Week from Home

The National Trust for Historic Preservation has launched a Virtual Preservation Month to help you explore and celebrate historic places from home. Be sure to check back every day in May to see the new tours, videos, and activities as they are added.

For other tours, workshops, and virtual exhibits you may want to enjoy this weekend or beyond, check out:

The Museum of the Shenandoah Valley’s upcoming virtual tours and programs, including the online Heritage Plant Sale.

The Virginia Museum of History and Culture’s page of Virginia History At Home. You might especially enjoy exploring the archive of Banner Lectures.

The Cranford Historic Preservation Advisory Board’s Historic Cranford, NJ audio tour. Be sure to check out the fantastic tile sign posts in stop #20!

The Preservation Society of Newport County’s Virtual Exhibitions and Mansions of Newport, RI. The Tiffany Glass exhibit may be of interest to many of our readers.

The Delaware Digital History Museum website launched by the Delaware Division of Historical and Cultural Affairs. The Virtual Tours section may be of the most interest to our readers to explore architectural features and historic sites.

The National Museum of Industrial History has made many programs available virtually. Follow their programming on their Facebook page, or visit their website for more information.

Last, don’t forget you can download several tours and activities from PHW’s website to better explore our local history and architecture!

You can revisit some of PHW’s visual history operating a cultural center in our Flickr album Kurtz Cultural Center.

Apple Blossom Articles

To tide you through a weekend without a celebration, we have uncovered and OCR corrected a number of historic articles on past Apple Blossom celebrations on the Virginia Chronicle website. Don’t forget you can watch last year’s Grand Feature parade on thebloom.com from 1-3 PM on Saturday to recreate some of the spring festivities in your home. Stay safe and enjoy a healthy Bloom!

Rappahannock Record, March 29, 1928: “Apple Blossom Festival“

Highland Recorder, March 25, 1932: “Apple Blossom Queen of Family of Washington“

Highland Recorder, May 13, 1932: “The Apple Blossom Festival in Retrospect“

Highland Recorder, April 16, 1937: “Apple Blossom Festival“

Highland Recorder, April 12, 1946: “19th Apple Blossom Queen“

Highland Recorder, April 18, 1947: “Apple Blossom Queen“

Southside Sentinel, February 19, 1970: “Winchester to Present 43rd Festival“

Friday Photos: Bough and Dough Shop, Clowser House Painting, and Baker Street Mural

Happy Friday! While uncertainty abounds for our Holiday House Tour and Bough and Dough Shop for 2020, we wanted to share images of the 2019 shop to potential and returning vendors. We will be contacting past vendors soon with our tentative plans to host the Shop in 2020. If you are interested in joining the Shop as a new artist, please reach out to us at PHW at phwinc.org@gmail.com for an artist packet. You can find a selection of 113 images of the shop setup in 2019 at our Flickr album.

The Very Merry Mittens display in the Bough and Dough Shop, 2019.

Larry Webb also shared images of work taking place at the Clowser House in Shawneeland recently. The pictures show the beginning the exterior painting by removing the old shutters. A new front door and new shutters for all the windows will be installed once the house is painted. George Sobien, the Property and Preservation Committee Chairman, is pictured performing the work. View the nine images at the end of the Clowser House album at Flickr.

Painting at the Clowser House, April 2020.

Last, in preservation news, the public hearing for additional demolition requests around the former Winchester Towers site and the former Glaize Lumber yard and Baker warehouses was approved at Thursday’s Board of Architectural Review. In a glimmer of hope, however, a portion of the wall with the ghost signs for Baker and Co. Wholesale Groceries may be incorporated into the final project. No details on exactly how the former advertising may be incorporated were available at the meeting yesterday, but we hope to see them in future BAR applications. If you like the look of ghost signs and wish to learn and see more, visit the American Ghosts website, which has catalogued and photographed unusual and iconic signs around America. The Baker Street wall is included in the database.

This portion of the wall on Baker Street may be preserved and incorporated elsewhere in the project for the former Winchester Towers site.

Friday Roundup: History and Preservation News

The new state historical highway marker for Spottswood Poles, announced in March, has been installed in the 500 block of North Kent Street near where he lived. Poles was an outstanding player who was born before a time when his achievements could be more widely remembered. You can read a brief article on his career and life at the Society for American Baseball Research and check the Winchester Star article for more details on the new marker.

If you are feeling a bit disconnected from our local tourist spots, local 360 degree tours may help fill in the gap. The Winchester-Frederick County Visitors Center has been posting videos on their Facebook page of local tourism spots like Bell Grove Plantation and Blandy Experimental Farm. If you’re feeling a bit shut in, you might enjoy a walk along rows of blooming peaches taken about two weeks ago:

Same video as a moment ago, just in full beautiful HD this time :)
Posted by Winchester-Frederick County Convention & Visitors Bureau on Friday, March 27, 2020

The Shenandoahvalleytv Youtube channel also offers looks at Apple Blossom time, Belle Grove Plantation, Patsy Cline exhibits, and many other events, museums, and activities in our area. Check out their quick (one minute and change) video on Route 11 potato chips if you aren’t feeling too fried!

Are you looking for more interesting images of Winchester’s past? we found a collection of images primarily of a horse and pony show, listed as happening in Winchester, that were taken for a Life magazine article by Edward Clark in Google Arts and Culture section. While we have not found the accompanying article, we’d be interested in sharing it in the future to put more context to the images – if you have any leads on the story this may have appeared in, please let us know!

Friday Photos and Events for February Celebrations

Looking for something to do tonight? The French and Indian War Foundation invites you to celebrate George Washington’s 288th birthday with them on Friday, Feb. 21, 5:30-8:30 PM at the Half Note Lounge in the George Washington Hotel, 103 E. Piccadilly St. This free event is open to everyone. A cash bar and appetizers at $20/plate will be available.

Next Wednesday, February 26, the City invites you to the Rouss City Hall Reveal from 4-6 PM to celebrate the recent renovation as well as Charles Broadway Rouss Day. There will be guided tours of the historic building, slideshows of the transformation playing on every level, Q&A with the architects Reader & Swartz, and refreshments. February 11 was Charley Rouss’s birthday. All are invited! Learn more about the event here.

If you missed the President’s Day Muster on Monday, we have you covered! Larry Webb provided photographic coverage of the muster and march. The images are available in PHW’s Flickr account at the top of the photostream or in the album.

President's Day Muster 2020 — See more photos by Larry Webb on Flickr.

Friday Roundup: Events and Tidbits

Formal garden, Colonial Williamsburg — Thanks to commenter Sarah Yi on Flickr, this unmarked slide in PHW’s collection has been identified as most likely being a garden at Colonial Williamsburg. Learn more about the gardens of Williamsburg here.

Looking for something to do this weekend? This Saturday is the 7th annual Chocolate Escape in Old Town Winchester. Look for red balloons at participating businesses between 2-5 p.m., or find more information at the Old Town Winchester site.

The French and Indian War Foundation invites you to celebrate George Washington’s 288th birthday with them on Friday, Feb. 21, 5:30-8:30 PM at the Half Note Lounge in the George Washington Hotel, 103 E. Piccadilly St. This free event is open to everyone. A cash bar and appetizers at $20/plate will be available.

A monument at the site where Turner Ashby was mortally wounded in the Civil War was vandalized recently in Harrisonburg. Regardless of your thoughts on the vandalism, cleaning and restoring historic structures and monuments from paint vandalism is especially laborious. If you find yourself in a similar situation, you may wish to investigate the technical briefs Removing Graffiti from Historic Masonry and Preserving Grave Markers in Historic Cemeteries. The National Center for Preservation Technology Training also has a few blog entries dedicated to graffiti removal and sacrificial coatings for stone monuments (marble specifically for the study linked in the blog).

The Trapezium House was an unusual find in our news feed this week. Similar to theories we’ve heard about the Hexagon House, the house in Petersburg was built without parallel walls in an attempt to make the building free of evil spirits who would become trapped in the corners. A bit more history and images are available at Clio.

The Board of Architectural Review will have multiple positions opening at the end of April this year. If you are interested in joining the board, or another city commission, the online application can be found at the city’s website.

The new cover for *Limestone* features the Hexagon House. Copies are available for purchase for $25 plus tax at the PHW office, Winchester Book Gallery, or the Gift Shop at the Museum of the Shenandoah Valley.

Mark you calendars tentatively for April 3 and 4, when we hope to host a book launch party and sale weekend for the revised copy of Winchester: Limestone, Sycamores & Architecture. In addition to those books, we hope to have a small book sale of other new and used books (including copies of Why Old Places Matter) and magazines relevant to local history and architecture. If you have books or magazines in good condition to donate as you downsize your collections, stop by the Hexagon House between now and April. Sandra will be happy to look over your items and see what is suitable for the sale. More information will be finalized and available soon!

Friday Roundup: Ice Skating Edition

After an unseasonably warm December, winter weather is at last upon us! While it might be hard to find activities suitable for the freezing weather and short days, one of the historical activities people enjoyed would have been ice skating outdoors on ponds and streams. It is believed the so called Year Without a Summer at the beginning of the 19th century and the subsequent stretch of cold winters set the foundation for skating to flourish from Northern Virginia to New England. Indoor ice rinks began to emerge after the Civil War, and coupled with the mass production of ice skates the activity became more accessible to anyone at any time (1).

Many of these early indoor rinks have now been lost, including the examples known to have been in Winchester. The oldest known indoor rink still in use not just in America but in the world is is Matthew’s Arena at Northeastern University, constructed in 1910. If you have a hankering to explore some other ice rinks with a historic past, check out Three Cool Ice Rinks In Hot Historic Spots from the National Trust for Historic Places. One of the highlighted rinks is at Hot Springs at the Omni Homestead Resort.

If you get the urge to skate yourself this winter, it might be hard to find an rink these days, but you can check out options on Virginia.org, several options exist in the Roanoke area, and for a more group based activity, check out synchronized ice skating in Richmond. Happy skating!