Chapter & Partner News for March 2020

Each month, the Society of Architectural Historians shares news submitted by SAH chapters and partner organizations on their new and exciting programs, opportunities, awards, and events.

Southeast Chapter SAH

SESAH held its annual conference from October 10 to 12, 2019, in Greenville, South Carolina. Located in the foothills of the central Appalachian Mountains, this city was for a century after the Civil War the center of the American textile industry, as witnessed by the historic mills that remain. About 140 attendees gathered for SESAH at a hotel in Greenville’s once declining but now flourishing downtown, a resurgence that began in the late 1970s when landscape architect Lawrence Halprin was asked to redesign Main Street. Over two days 85 papers were presented on a wide variety of themes relating to architectural history, theory, and preservation, and ranging from the early modern period to the present. A keynote address was delivered by noted historian and critic Sarah Williams Goldhagen. At the business luncheon, out-going president Robbie Jones announced the winners of fellowships for students and professionals to attend and deliver papers at SESAH and SAH. Awards were given for book and article publications, recognizing outstanding scholarship about the architecture of the South or by authors who reside therein. The Best of the South award, which recognizes a project that documents, preserves, rehabilitates, or educates the public about a historic property, was also presented. The conference ended with a day of study tours, visiting buildings in the county and city of Greenville. 

The 2020 SESAH conference will be held in Natchez, Mississippi.

Visit sesah.org for more information about SESAH’s conferences, its peer-reviewed journal ARRIS, and other announcements. 

James Oglethorpe Student Chapter

The James Oglethorpe Student Chapter of the Society of Architectural Historians, the student club of SCAD’s Architectural History department, organized a panel event on Saturday, February 22, “Rethinking Commemoration: A Panel on Inclusion in the Commemorative Built Environment,” that attracted about 75 attendees, including two members of Savannah City Council. It was the most ambitious event ever organized by the chapter.

The panel featured representatives of different local groups and constituencies: Dr. Tom Gensheimer, SCAD architectural history professor and member of the City of Savannah’s Historic Sites and Monuments Commission; Vaughnette Goode-Walker, owner and operator of Footprints of Savannah; Lilith Logan, lead interpreter at the Owens-Thomas House Museum and Slave Quarters; and Chassidy Malloy, local preservationist and 2016 National Trust for Historic Preservation Diversity Scholar.

Left to right: Chassidy Malloy, Vaughnette Goode-Walker, Tom Gensheimer, Lilith Logan, and moderator Clara Miller.

 

The panel was the brainchild of undergraduate major Clara Miller, the chapter vice-president who also served as the panel moderator. She was assisted in the organization by architectural history graduate students Monica Gann, Madi Alspector, Daniel Borrero and Heather Kelly-Swope.

The event garnered local press coverage in Savannah Now.