SAH MDR

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February 6, 2021 SAH MDR News

Amanda C. R. Clark

Dear SAH MDR membership,

Everything feels just around the corner these days as evening light sweetens, spring flowers promise to emerge, and vaccines seem just a reach away. You will find this newsletter bulging with news, a sign, I think, of the deluge of interesting things occurring despite (or perhaps because) of the pandemic.

First and foremost:

  • The board-comprised elections nominating committee—Chris Bell, Jenni Pace, and Ahsha Miranda—has drafted an exciting slate of board members for us to vote on in coming days – stay tuned!

  • SAH MDR will host a papers session this summer 2021! It will be virtual and conversations are underway regarding theme; the board will be moving swiftly in the coming days as we work on this. If one thing has become surprisingly clear from our sister SAH chapters, it is that such virtual meetings generally have high attendance and wide reach. Exciting ventures!

  • Our hoped-for, in-person 2021 annual meeting planned for Forest Grove, Oregon, will be delayed until 2022. Based on the pre-planning I’ve seen, it will be worth the wait!


Sending my best,
Amanda Roth Clark, SAH MDR President
amandaclark@whitworth.edu

In Recognition

We would like to recognize long-time SAH MDR member Don Peting for being awarded an Oregon Heritage Award in 2020 for his role in founding the Oregon Field School and other preservation activities in the PNW over time.

Preservationists in King County and the City of Tacoma put together an outstanding virtual conference for the National Alliance for Preservation Commissioners (NAPC) from August 3 – 9, 2020. Conference sessions are still available at: FORUM 2020 ~ at Home Recordings. The conference will be held in situ in Tacoma next year. One of the key organizers of this conference, J. Todd Scott,  also helped organize our 2018 SAHMDR conference in Astoria.

Members in the News:

  • Diana Painter, former long-time president of SAH MDR, has been recently appointed president of the Spokane Preservation Advocates in Spokane, a voluntary advocacy group.

Diana Painter, second from right, on tour at the 2019 Coeur d'Alene SAH MDR annual meeting.

  • Soon to be out-going SAH MDR president, Amanda Roth Clark, has been elected as an ex officio member of the SAH Board of Directors as SAH Chapter Liaison to the 20-some chapters of the international SAH.

  • Phil Gruen published a thoughtful piece reflecting on the loss of a significant structure in Whitman County during the summer fires: “Embers of Collective Memory: The Manning-Rye Bridge,” Bunchgrass Historian 46, no. 3 (2020): 21-5.

Manning-Rye Covered Bridge after fire, 2020. Photographed by Phil Gruen.

University of Oregon Preservation Program Receives Research Funds to Work
with African American Community in Portland (January 14, 2021)

The University of Oregon Historic Preservation program has received a 3-year research grant of approximately $400,000 to explore the history of Portland’s African American community as part of a major grant to the University from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation. The funds will support a digital mapping project that uses existing historical archives and residents’ oral histories to promote the history of the historically Black community of Albina. The project will be part UO’s Pacific Northwest Just Futures Institute for Racial and Climate Justice, a multidisciplinary collaboration between scholars in the College of Arts and Sciences and the College of Design.

Funds for the historic preservation work are part of a $4.52 million grant from The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation to support a new initiative envisioning a transformative research platform for racial and climate justice. Program Director James Buckley has been working with members of the Albina community and local preservation advocates to develop innovative ways to tell the story of Portland’s African Americans from wartime boom to urban renewal bust to the rapid gentrification of the neighborhood in the 21st century.

For more information:
Jim Buckley, Director
Historic Preservation Program
University of Oregon, Portland
jbuckley@uoregon.edu

Community members join students and faculty from the University of Oregon for discussion of African American history at the historic Billy Webb Elks Lodge in Portland's Albina neighborhood (June 2018). Photograph by University of Oregon.

University of Oregon students and faculty join representative of the National Trust for Historic
Preservation at the Sons of Haiti Masonic Lodge on Mississippi Street in Portland
(June 2018). Photograph by Kim Moreland.

In the Media:

The SAH MDR Facebook page offers recent postings regarding resources for researching the history of African Americans in the PNW – check it out! https://www.facebook.com/groups/sahmdr

Upcoming Talks and Events:

Larry Kreisman, who served as program director at Historic Seattle for many years, has been offering several engaging talks:  

And on YouTube:

Conference Update:

We anticipate holding our next in-person conference in the city and surrounding communities of Forest Grove, Oregon, in 2022. The Forest Grove Downtown Historic District was listed in the National Register of Historic Places in October 2020, based on a nomination written by former SAH MDR president Diana Painter. The preliminary historic resource survey and historic context for the nomination was prepared by long-time board members Dave Pinyard and Bernadette Niederer of Historic Preservation Northwest. Bernadette Niederer and Dave Pinyerd were awarded the Marion Dean Ross Award for their contributions to the chapter in 2017.

SAH MDR Board of Directors

 Amanda C. Roth Clark (Spokane, President)
 Chris Bell (Salem, Vice President)
 Kathryn Burk-Hise (Worley, Secretary)
 Mimi Sheridan (Monterey, Treasurer)
 Diana Painter (Spokane, Past President)
 Phil Gruen (Pullman, Washington Regional Delegate)
 Phillip Mead (Moscow, Idaho Regional Delegate)
 Jim Buckley (Portland, Oregon Regional Delegate)
 Jenni Pace (Vancouver, British Columbia Regional Delegate)
 Ahsha Miranda (Portland, Membership Coordinator)

Copyright © 2021 SAHMDR all rights reserved.
February 14, 2021

Our mailing address is:
645 Laurel Avenue, No. 3
Pacific Grove, CA 93950