The Historic Landmarks Commission meets Thursday the 21st and they will consider a "Reconnaissance Level Survey" of buildings in a portion of the Grant Neighborhood.
The survey developed in the conclusion to the debate over the 1928 German Baptist Church. From the interim City Manager:
[T]he City of Salem entered into a Memorandum of Agreement (MOA) with the State Historic Preservation Office (SHPO) regarding the renovation of the Evergreen Presbyterian Church for the purpose of constructing a 19-unit multi-family affordable housing complex at 905 and 925 Cottage Street NE, Salem, Oregon. The MOA required an update to the existing SHPO Historic Sites Database to reflect current physical characteristics of the properties in the Grant Neighborhood.
Much of the neighborhood had already been surveyed in 2006, and though the report is vague on overlap, it appears that some of the area in this survey may not have been included in 2006.
From the survey:
The City wishes to use this baseline historic resource data as a basis for preservation planning and policy decisions within the survey area, with an objective to decide if the Grant Neighborhood maintains sufficient historic resources with integrity to be eligible for listing in the National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) as either a historic district or for inclusion in a Multiple Property Document (MPD)....
[The consultant] surveyed nine city blocks defined by the following boundaries: on the north by the centerline of Market St. NE; to the south by the centerline of D St. NE; to the east by Cottage St. NE; and to the west by 5th St. NE. As this survey was completed at a reconnaissance level only, the survey assumed eligibility under Criteria C for Architecture, and Criterion A for Community Planning and Development, with a period of significance of 1890–1972, a period capturing all architectural resources within the survey area that meet the 50-year age threshold defined by the NRHP. Of the 108 resources included in the RLS, 70 (65 percent) are recommended eligible/contributing (EC); 36 (33 percent) are recommended not eligible/non-contributing (NC); and 2 (2 percent) are recommended not eligible/out of period (NP)....
[The consultant] does not recommend the City pursue an MPD for resources within the Grant Neighborhood, as assessment as a district seems more appropriate for the resources.
Here is the map of the area surveyed. The church is in the lower right quadrant, at the corner of Cottage and D Streets. Buildings in black are regarded as potentially "contributing" to a historic district, those in crosshatch are out-of-period or remodeled so much they lack "integrity" and are "non-contributing," and buildings in white are new construction. (No building is awarded the status of "significant"; "contributing" is the highest status here.)
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| Map of survey area in Grant Neighborhood (Four buildings highlighted from survey notes) |
Four buildings are highlighted with details from the survey. Two of them have been named and surveyed already. Yet what gives the buildings significance is age and siding material. In the survey method we have a great bias for visual appearance, for aesthetics.
You can see this in the chart summary, where the "material" table is all about siding, and not about any other building materials.
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| The summary - Note emphasis on siding material |
It's all about curb appeal and value.
What we don't have, then, is any attempt to tell a history. What we have is an inventory of pretty houses.
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| February 10th, 1922 |
You may recall this 1922 letter:
The need of restrictive zoning laws was never more apparent to protect residence property against unnecessary business invasion and to maintain the desirability and beauty of the city....a proper zoning law should be rushed through the council to safeguard our scenic assets and protect property values.
The survey here is clearly an expression of this exclusionary zoning function of historic preservation.
And rather than developing any narrative for "eligibility under Criteria C for Architecture, and Criterion A for Community Planning and Development," it begs the question and assumes what was to be argued and proved.
The actual history of the neighborhood is more interesting, but also less neat.
Back in 1921-22, the City foreclosed on nearly an entire subdivision, its most celebrated portion and featuring the "H" alley system, in the Grant neighborhood.
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| Jan. 28th, 1922 |
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| March 11th, 1922 |
This episode, and any fraud or misrepresentation behind it, has not been discussed in histories of the neighborhood. You may also recall the phantom streetcar line running up Belmont and Nebraska to Englewood school on the 1911 map. Land speculation and hype is at the center!
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| Depression, but not the earlier foreclosure Also note the autoist triumphalism (Houses of Grant Neighborhood, 2015) |
The history generally has been slighted. You may recall its naming and namesake, General and President Grant, hasn't got much attention.
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| More on Grant, please! (Houses of Grant Neighborhood) |
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| March 7th, 1908 |
Col. Hofer closed with an eulogy of General Grant, a man who had been showered with the wealth and honors of the whole world, but by misfortune had died poor, so poor that he had not even an officer's suit in which to be [clothed] for his burial, or a sword to lay upon his coffin. As the school in South Salem had been named Lincoln school he suggested that the North school be from this day on named the Grant school. This met with hearty approval...
Nor has Governor Gaines, his slave-holding, and Gaines Street. Gaines Street was originally North Oak Street, and the public conversation that led to the renaming might be revealing.
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| Gaines is much more complicated (Houses of Grant Neighborhood) |
The historic side of things has been underpowered and undernourished.
As an entity, a "neighborhood," it may not date any earlier than mid-century. The first instance in the paper I could find of the phrase "Grant neighborhood" comes from 1954.
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| March 12th, 1954 |
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| June 1st, 1954 |
It may be more than a coincidence that the phrase and concept "Grant neighborhood" came into existence and common usage at the same time as the school was rebuilt. Self-awareness as a neighborhood, with boundaries and distinct from other neighborhoods, also has a history and a social formation. The initial period of significance used in the survey, from 1890-1972, is so broad as to be meaningless, and until the school was rebuilt the area may not have had a distinct identity as a neighborhood.
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| A repurposed school locker full of canned foods (Also the demerit of an out-of-period picture window) |
And there are other currents we might consider. One of the houses in the survey, a 1928 "horizontal board craftsman," has a grab-and-go food pantry on the sidewalk across from the school. There is poverty, hunger, and homelessness nearby. But this is a kind of "dirt" or "disorder" historic districts and their advocates too often want to banish or ignore, and could be at risk here.
A better, fuller history of the Grant neighborhood is not possible here at the moment, but I do want to underscore than the main thing going on in this survey is not "history" but is an inventory of pretty homes to assist the exclusionary function of historic preservation. It may very well undergird an attempt, as we are seeing in Portland in Laurelhurst and Eastmoreland, to evade the new requirements of middle housing and to evade greater housing abundance in walkable areas near urban amenities.
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| Now legal everywhere! (Houses of Grant Neighborhood) |
The City is accepting public comment on the survey until 4pm on Wednesday the 20th. Comments may be submitted via email to Shelly Ehenger, sehenegr@cityofsalem.net. The HLC convenes at 5:30pm on Thursday the 21st.
(As a footnote, it is also interesting to note that this has more public process than for the Strategic Plans of Fire and Police.)
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