preservation

Morning Notes

By ARLnow.com

A Bolivian dance troupe outside St. George's Church in Virginia Square on Aug. 18 (photo courtesy @LemurFestival)

Jack Melnick Dies — Lifelong Arlington resident and former General Assembly member John “Jack” Melnick died on Wednesday at the age of 78. A funeral service will be held next week. In addition to representing Arlington County in Richmond, one of Melnick’s claims to fame was being the owner of an impeccably restored 1931 Ford Model A. [Sun Gazette]

Town Hall for 9/11 Responders — Two town hall-style meetings will be held next week in Arlington for responders to the Pentagon on (and, in some cases, after) Sept. 11, 2001. Firefighters, police officers, cleanup and construction crews and Red Cross volunteers who responded to the Pentagon in the aftermath of the terrorist attack are now eligible for a federal health care program specifically for 9/11 survivors and responders. [Patch]

Preservation Arlington Lauds ‘Three Sisters’ Development — Preservation Arlington is lauding a residential development in Cherrydale. The group says a project to build two new houses on a half acre site on the 1800 block of N. Randolph Street properly took into account the history of the site and the architectural style of the original house on the property. [Preservation Arlington]

Photo courtesy @LemurFestival

‘Blue Goose’ Makes New ‘Endangered Historic Places’ List

By ARLnow.com
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The 1960s-era “Blue Goose” building in Ballston has been named one of the most “endangered historic places” in Arlington.

The nonprofit group Preservation Arlington (the new name of the Arlington Heritage Alliance) released the Most Endangered Historic Places list this morning. Included on the list is the Blue Goose building at 1000 N. Glebe Road, which is currently home to Marymount University’s Ballston campus but is set to be torn down to make way for a new office building and apartment building.

Also on the “endangered” list are Arlington’s National Register of Historic Places neighborhoods, like Lyon Village, Cherrydale, Ashton Heights and Penrose. “The social and architectural fabric of these older neighborhoods is being threatened by over-sized and incompatible in-fill development,” Preservation Arlington says.

Other endangered places in Arlington include the Arlington House woods and Seneca Quarry boundary wall at Arlington National Cemetery, which are also on the Preservation Virginia endangered places list; remaining pieces of track from the Washington & Old Dominion Railway; low-rise commercial buildings from the 1930s-1950s; the Wilson School; and garden apartments on Columbia Pike and in Rosslyn.

Preservation Arlington, which says it is “dedicated to protecting and improving the quality of Arlington’s distinct architectural heritage,” will work to preserve historic places like those on the list through “education and advocacy.”

“Preservation Arlington hopes to influence the future of Arlington’s historic buildings, landscapes and communities,” the group says. It will also organize tours, events and lectures .

See the full Most Endangered Historic Places list, after the jump.

Photos courtesy Preservation Arlington

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Marine Corps Memorial to Host Movie Screening

By ARLnow.com

The Marine Corps War Memorial will host a movie screening on Friday and a ranger-guided history lesson on Sunday.

On Friday, May 3, the memorial will host a screening of the 1949 film Sands of Iwo Jima, starring John Wayne (see movie trailer, above). The public is invited to bring a lawn chair to the reviewing stand to watch the film, which will start at 8:00 p.m.

On Sunday, May 5, from 11:00 a.m. to 3:00 p.m., park rangers will give talks about little-known secrets of the statue.

A school group at the Iwo Jima memorialAccording to a press release: “Rangers will host activities and offer short talks on the contents of the memorial’s cornerstone, graffiti inside the memorial’s base, and the amazing process by which workers climbed inside the memorial’s figures to piece them together in 1954.”

The events are part of the “Partners in Preservation Open House Weekend.” Partners in Preservation, a partnership between American Express and the National Trust for Historic Preservation, is currently hosting a contest that lets members of the public vote to direct $1 million worth of preservation funding to  historic places in the D.C. area.

The Marine Corps War Memorial and Arlington House are both in the running. At the moment, however, they’re in 21st and 20th place respectively, out of a total of 24 entrants. The Memorial is seeking funding for a thorough cleaning and waxing.

“The Marine Corps War Memorial will compete for funds to carefully clean, wax, and re-gild the large outdoor sculpture at its center,” said a press release. “Each of the six giant bronze figures accumulates dirt, pollution, bird droppings, pollen, and natural weathering residues that must be removed with specialized pressure washing equipment. Because the statue is depicted with photographic realism, workers will need scaffolding and lifts to reach every angle and crevice of clothing and muscle, from the base of the memorial to its top 60 feet above the ground.”

Morning Notes

By ARLnow.com

County Adding Historical Preservation Tools — In an effort to preserve historic buildings in Arlington, the county is considering some new policies to its “toolbox.” Among the possible new strategies: purchasing properties threatened with demolition, using a “transfer of development rights” to convince developers to preserve historic properties and further surveying residential property in the county to find and catalog more historic properties. [Sun Gazette]

Man With Terror Links Owned Arlington Condo — Esam Ghazzawi, a Saudi Arabian national whose Florida mansion was regularly visited by the 9/11 hijackers, also owned property in Arlington. In the mid-1990s, Ghazzawi owned the Penthouse condo in Rosslyn’s The Atrium building. [Washington Post]

Old ACFD Truck Lives on in S.C. — A retired ACFD fire truck that was among the first to respond to the Pentagon on 9/11 is still fighting fires in South Carolina. Quint 109 was retired from Arlington’s Station 9 in 2005, and was sold to the Anderson County, S.C. Fire Department. Although Anderson County repainted the truck, fire officials were careful to leave its “Operation Noble Eagle” sticker — indicating it was at the Pentagon on 9/11 — in tact. [Independent Mail]

Morning Notes

By ARLnow.com

Board Awards Nearly Quarter Million to Arts Orgs — On Saturday the County Board voted to approve 25 grants, worth $249,077, to Arlington-based arts organizations. “Arlington has a thriving, vibrant, diverse arts community that brings not only economic benefit, but cultural enrichment, diversity and joy to our County,” County Board Chairman Chris Zimmerman said in a statement. The top grantees, at $44,625.14 apiece, are Signature Theater and Synetic Theater. [Arlington County]

Board Adopts Inventory of Historic Properties — The County Board has voted to adopts a list of nearly 400 Arlington properties deemed ‘historic.’ Each property on the list was assigned a ranking from “essential” to “minor.” While officials say the inventory is an important step in the preservation process, inclusion on the list doesn’t prohibit owners from making “by-right” changes to their property. [Sun Gazette]

Free Slurpees Today — In celebration of its “birthday” today — on 7/11/11 — 7-Eleven stores are offering a free 7.11 ounce Slurpee to customers while supplies last. The company hands out an average of about 1,000 free Slurpees per store. There are at least twenty 7-Eleven stores in Arlington.

Flickr pool photo by BrianMKA