In this issue:
-LPA Seeks Properties eligible for listing on the State or National Registers
-Fuller House at 1005 Sunset & Lane-Duncan Stable
-Kansas Historic Preservation Conference: June 1-3, 2011

 

Attention County Residents, LPA Seeks Properties eligible for listing on the State or National Registers
LPA is seeking historic structures and sites in Douglas County, but outside Lawrence city limits, for inclusion in a nomination project to the State or National Registers of Historic Places. LPA will accept up to five separate sites for the project, and is hoping to find compelling sites spread throughout the county.

Once the sites are chosen, LPA plans to submit a grant application for Douglas County Natural and Cultural Heritage funds to complete the project. For each site chosen LPA will donate $500 towards the nomination process, and will require each partnering owner to also provide $500. Researching and writing individual nominations to the National Register of Historic Places typically costs about $3,000.

Benefits of listing on the State or National registers are substantial and include eligibility for grants and tax credits for qualified work. Interested owners of historic properties need to contact LPA by June 15, 2011 and include your contact information, a description of the property, its historical significance and pictures, if you have them.

LPA will evaluate the responses, select the properties to be included in the project and apply for the grant in late August. If our grant is approved, LPA will act as project manager to contract for and oversee the research and writing of the nominations.

So come on, Douglas County residents! If you own an historic property and you’ve always wondered about listing it, it’s never been easier or more economical to do so. Email us through or Write us at P.O. Box 1073, Lawrence, KS 66044 or. We want to hear from you.

Fuller House at 1005 Sunset & Lane-Duncan Stable
One of the earliest built structures in Lawrence was accepted onto the Kansas State Register of Historic Places in February 2011. And a substantial outbuilding a short distance east has been documented and awaits nomination later this year.

The Fuller House, 1005 Sunset, is a wood frame National Folk style residence built in 1864 on an 80 acre parcel that was a full mile west of the Lawrence city limits. Set back on what is now a double lot and framed by large native cedars, this structure could be a surprise to many who think that they’ve seen all the city’s historic structures.

Ferdinand Fuller arrived in the first party of the New England Emigrant Aid Society in August 1854. As the first architect in the state, and credited with coining the term “Mount Oread”, he designed North College, the first building at KU, the Free State Hotel, burned by bushwhackers in 1856, and Round Corner Drugstore. Steven Scannell, Assistant Director of Design and Construction Management at KU, who now lives in the Fuller house with his wife Lynn, prepared the extensive nomination.

Slightly down the hill, on KU grounds, is a building that most locals remember as the student radio station KJHK. It was built possibly as early at 1861 as a stable on Senator Jim Lane’s property. Shelley Hickman-Clark, an Associate Professor at KU and a previous LPA board member, prepared the nomination for the Lane-Duncan stable at the request of professor Frank Baron of the Max Kade Center for Germanic-American studies. The stable, unusual for its native stone construction, went from Lane to the Duncan family and later was sold to Dr. Mervin Sudler, who built a house next to it in 1927 and converted the stable into a garage. Sudler was a professor of surgery and anatomy, and in the early 1920s was Dean of the University of Kansas Medical School. The State Sites Review Board will take up the nomination after KU completes the environs definition of the stable, and the nomination and environs definition passes review by the Campus Historic Preservation Office. KU’s future plans for the structure include a rehab for office and meeting space.

Kansas Historic Preservation Conference recap: LPA takes home award
We hope you joined us at the annual Kansas Historic Preservation conference June 1–June 3 at the Kansas Historical Society facility in nearby Topeka.

On June 1st, three free pre-conference sessions explored how to identify and document historic properties in your community, steps to getting a property listed on the National Register of Historic Places and funding for preservation with information about grants and tax incentives to owners of listed properties.

Then on Thursday and Friday workshops and discussion groups explored the themes of the conference: Kansas vernacular architecture and practical rehab techniques for working with historic properties. Among the presenters were the following Lawrence presevationists: Dennis Domer spoke on “Kansas Territory: An Architectural Review”. Dennis Brown discussed LPA’s recent collaboration with Tenants to Homeowners in restoring 1120 Rhode Island. Mike Goans and Dennis Brown demonstrated how to restore wood windows, Judy Billings and others talked about how to market historic properties to the tourism trade.

Kansas Preservation Alliance (KPA) held a reception and Awards ceremony on Thursday at the Florentine Room of Jayhawk Towers. Of the eight awards, four went to Lawrence projects and people:
Honor Award for Rehabilitation to the Lawrence Preservation Alliance–1120 Rhode Island
Preservation Stewardship Award to St. Luke AME Church–St. Luke African Methodist Episcopal Church
Medallion Award for Rehabilitation to the City of Lawrence–Carnegie Library
Preservation Advocacy Award to Judy Billings
Go to the Kansas Preservation Alliance website for more info about the awards.