SUPPORT LANDMARK’S LATEST PRESERVATION PROJECT
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Call for Volunteers
The uncertainly of the past few months has challenged us all. Our environment changes daily and will continue to change for some months to come. We know that the summer of 2020 will be unusual and Landmark is continuing to plan our summer activities with flexibility top-of-mind.
The good news is that we will be able to finish the re-survey of the Park that we started last year and so we are calling out to both former and new volunteers to sign up now. |
For those of you who are new to this: Thousand Island Park was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1982. A lot has happened in TIP since then and an update of our information on the National Register is overdue. In addition, all information will be organized into an electronic database. We are also applying for additional historic certification for four of our major buildings: the Tabernacle, The Main Dock Pavilion, the Library and the Chapel. The project will significantly expand access to our important architectural history.
Thanks to your support last year, we completed 215 cottage surveys, 63% of our total. This summer, we plan to finish the on-the-ground work of surveying the remaining cottages and the boathouses, which have never been surveyed.
We hope that last year’s volunteers will be with us again and we welcome new recruits. Katie Eggers Comeau, our historic preservationist, will provide training and other practical support. She will be joined by London Hainsworth, the summer intern shared by Landmark and Preservation Board. London is working on her Masters in Historic Preservation at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago.
We know that we will likely need to do some things differently to comply with public health directives, for example, training and choosing which properties volunteers will survey next. We continue to work on this as the situation changes and will be in touch about our workarounds. However, we are confident that the actual surveying can be done safely.
Please join us for the big push to finish the survey. The 2020 volunteer sign-up form is located at the bottom of this page. If you are a new volunteer, please complete and submit the form. Katie will contact the 2019 volunteers personally regarding their participation this year. If you wish further information from her, you may contact her at kcomeau@beroarchitecture.com
We are looking forward to working with you and will keep you updated regarding training and other survey logistics as they develop in consideration of our responsibility to keep everyone safe and well.
Thanks to your support last year, we completed 215 cottage surveys, 63% of our total. This summer, we plan to finish the on-the-ground work of surveying the remaining cottages and the boathouses, which have never been surveyed.
We hope that last year’s volunteers will be with us again and we welcome new recruits. Katie Eggers Comeau, our historic preservationist, will provide training and other practical support. She will be joined by London Hainsworth, the summer intern shared by Landmark and Preservation Board. London is working on her Masters in Historic Preservation at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago.
We know that we will likely need to do some things differently to comply with public health directives, for example, training and choosing which properties volunteers will survey next. We continue to work on this as the situation changes and will be in touch about our workarounds. However, we are confident that the actual surveying can be done safely.
Please join us for the big push to finish the survey. The 2020 volunteer sign-up form is located at the bottom of this page. If you are a new volunteer, please complete and submit the form. Katie will contact the 2019 volunteers personally regarding their participation this year. If you wish further information from her, you may contact her at kcomeau@beroarchitecture.com
We are looking forward to working with you and will keep you updated regarding training and other survey logistics as they develop in consideration of our responsibility to keep everyone safe and well.
What Can you do to help?
Volunteer to work with us on the survey. Learn more about historic preservation through the training that will prepare volunteers to do the survey. Get to know our community better as you survey our wonderful buildings. By May 23rd, you’ll be able to sign up online. When the Park is open for the season, you can sign up at the Landmark building.
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The Thousand Island Park National Register Resurvey Project Volunteer Training Manual can be downloaded by clicking "Download File" on the left.
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A Plan In Action
By Katie Eggers Comeau
As the days are getting longer and warmer, I’m happy to count myself among those looking forward to spending time at Thousand Island Park again this summer! It was a delight to meet many of you last year, and I can’t waitto spend even more time in the park this year as our resurvey and National Register project moves ahead.
For those of you who may be new to the project, a quick recap: Thousand Island Park has been listed in the National Register of Historic Places as a district since 1982, a status thatis mostly honorary but also enablesbuilding owners to take advantage of tax credits for rehabilitation. National Register designation brings no restrictions or design review, except in the case of tax-credit projects, and is completely separate from the local preservation commission that does review exterior alterationsand new construction. All cottages in Thousand Island Park are already part of the existing National Register district, so there will be no change in status; boathouses were excluded, butwill now be brought into the district in recognition of their importance to the social history of the Park. The main reasons to update the district nomination are to recognize any changes since the original nomination and to bring it up to current National Register standards, whichhave become considerably more demanding since the 1980s.
Last summer we embarked upon the first round of survey work; you may have seen people out in the Park recording information and taking photographs on tablets. Thanks to the dedication of this wonderful group of volunteersand our excellent intern MacKenzie, all of whombraved the challenges of a new-to-some technology and a new-to-all (myself included) coordination process, our survey work is on track, with over 60 percent of cottages documented. Most of the cottages that have been inventoried are located in the centralarea of the Park south of Prospect and Sunrise avenues and west of Centennial–the part of the Park where streets run in an orderly grid. This year’s survey teamwill be focusing on filling in gaps in that area, while also heading to the more challenging areas of the Park, where reality doesn’t always match the nineteenth-century maps! Meanwhile, I will be spending part of my time surveying the boathouses from the water, with Dick Greene as my captain.
During the “off season,” I’ve been reviewing last year’s forms, working on the narrative sections of the new nomination, and organizing all the material that last summer’s survey team collected. Lookingat photos of gorgeous Eastlake-style cottages is a great way to pass a winter afternoon, as is researching and writing about the fascinating history of this special place.In addition to the history of Thousand Island Park itself, I’ve been learning about the history of the Thousand Islands more generally, as well as the background of the camp meeting and Chautauqua movements, the development of the idea of a “vacation” in the nineteenth century, and more, all of which is important in establishing the historic context for the Park’s development and historical significance.
The project also includes completion of the initial stages of tax-credit application work for four buildings in the Park: the Chapel, Tabernacle, Pavilion, and Library. Completing this paperwork establishes that these buildings contribute to the historic district and therefore are eligible to take advantage of tax credits for rehabilitation if such a project were to be proposed. This past year, we submitted forms for the Chapel and Tabernacle; in 2020 we will complete the other two.
If you helped with the project last year, thank you, and I hope you’ll be back again this year for however much survey work you’d like to do! If you haven’t been involved in the project yet but would like to be, please get in touch with me at kcomeau@beroarchitecture.com, and I will add you to my list to receive information about upcoming training sessions as well as regular project updates as the summer progresses.
For those of you who may be new to the project, a quick recap: Thousand Island Park has been listed in the National Register of Historic Places as a district since 1982, a status thatis mostly honorary but also enablesbuilding owners to take advantage of tax credits for rehabilitation. National Register designation brings no restrictions or design review, except in the case of tax-credit projects, and is completely separate from the local preservation commission that does review exterior alterationsand new construction. All cottages in Thousand Island Park are already part of the existing National Register district, so there will be no change in status; boathouses were excluded, butwill now be brought into the district in recognition of their importance to the social history of the Park. The main reasons to update the district nomination are to recognize any changes since the original nomination and to bring it up to current National Register standards, whichhave become considerably more demanding since the 1980s.
Last summer we embarked upon the first round of survey work; you may have seen people out in the Park recording information and taking photographs on tablets. Thanks to the dedication of this wonderful group of volunteersand our excellent intern MacKenzie, all of whombraved the challenges of a new-to-some technology and a new-to-all (myself included) coordination process, our survey work is on track, with over 60 percent of cottages documented. Most of the cottages that have been inventoried are located in the centralarea of the Park south of Prospect and Sunrise avenues and west of Centennial–the part of the Park where streets run in an orderly grid. This year’s survey teamwill be focusing on filling in gaps in that area, while also heading to the more challenging areas of the Park, where reality doesn’t always match the nineteenth-century maps! Meanwhile, I will be spending part of my time surveying the boathouses from the water, with Dick Greene as my captain.
During the “off season,” I’ve been reviewing last year’s forms, working on the narrative sections of the new nomination, and organizing all the material that last summer’s survey team collected. Lookingat photos of gorgeous Eastlake-style cottages is a great way to pass a winter afternoon, as is researching and writing about the fascinating history of this special place.In addition to the history of Thousand Island Park itself, I’ve been learning about the history of the Thousand Islands more generally, as well as the background of the camp meeting and Chautauqua movements, the development of the idea of a “vacation” in the nineteenth century, and more, all of which is important in establishing the historic context for the Park’s development and historical significance.
The project also includes completion of the initial stages of tax-credit application work for four buildings in the Park: the Chapel, Tabernacle, Pavilion, and Library. Completing this paperwork establishes that these buildings contribute to the historic district and therefore are eligible to take advantage of tax credits for rehabilitation if such a project were to be proposed. This past year, we submitted forms for the Chapel and Tabernacle; in 2020 we will complete the other two.
If you helped with the project last year, thank you, and I hope you’ll be back again this year for however much survey work you’d like to do! If you haven’t been involved in the project yet but would like to be, please get in touch with me at kcomeau@beroarchitecture.com, and I will add you to my list to receive information about upcoming training sessions as well as regular project updates as the summer progresses.