Columbus Landmarks to help historic preservation in five neighborhoods

On Mar 15, 2022

Hilltop resident Betty Jaynes worries about what the future holds for West High School if it is closed by Columbus City Schools as part of its facilities master plan. The Hilltop was one of five neighborhoods identified by Columbus Landmarks in a three-year plan to address disinvestment and preserve historic buildings in Columbus.

Over 100 years old and still standing, West High School is known by everyone on the Hilltop. The brick building on Powell Avenue, with its thick columns and neoclassical construction, is hard to miss.

But residents like Betty Jaynes, a community advocate who has lived in the neighborhood for 40 years, worry that the property’s future is shaky, and that if the school is closed by Columbus City Schools as part of its facilities master plan, part of what makes the area unique could be lost, too.

“The rich historical architecture on the Hilltop is what sets us aside from suburban communities,” Jaynes said. “It is our culture, and it is who we are.”

To help, Columbus Landmarks announced last month a three-year initiative to address disinvestment and preserve historic buildings in five Columbus neighborhoods, including the Hilltop. The others are Milo-Grogan, Linden, the South Side and King-Lincoln Bronzeville.

Susan Keeny, preservation director at the nonprofit, said the organization discovered these five areas with the greatest historic building loss were also neighborhoods that experienced disinvestment with its 2021 Atlas of Columbus Landmarks.

Saving history on the Hilltop

Jennie Keplar, a member of the Greater Hilltop Area Commission and local historian, can name many properties worth saving on the Hilltop.

Tops on her list that she hopes Columbus Landmarks can help preserve: the building at 2456 W. Broad St., now home to Advanced Healthcare Concepts. The property was built in 1900, Keplar said.

First home to an undertaker, the property later served as the home of J. Curtis Allen photography. But it might be most well-known as the Pater Noster House, an HIV/AIDS hospice. In 1990, Ohio University journalism student Therese Frare took a picture of gay activist David Kirby surrounded by his family on his deathbed there; it landed on the cover of Life magazine and changed the face of the HIV/AIDS epidemic in America.

Stories like that are hidden all over the Hilltop, Keplar said, but she’s seen the neighborhood lose many historic properties in her lifetime.

“We’re gonna lose it if we’re not careful,” she said. “Every generation of Hilltoppers knows that house.”

Keplar said notable buildings in the northeast side of the Hilltop, near Glenwood Park, are great examples of preservation of the neighborhood’s history. These include the home of a Black couple who were involved in the Ohio civil rights movement, Benjamin and Mary Stewart, who bought a house on Fairmont Street in 1915.

“We are on the precipice of finding all these lost stories in the Hilltop just as people start to take an interest in these properties,” Keplar said.

Columbus Landmarks offers preservationists ways to help

Keeny said Columbus Landmarks can leverage resources to preserve historic properties and help owners invest in improvements to their homes for neighborhoods that lack economic investment.

The nonprofit held its first meeting with the Southern Orchards Civic Association and with the South Linden Area Commission last month, and Keeny said the organization will continue these meetings with the other priority neighborhoods.

Homes that are 50 years or older qualify for free guidance and consultations with Columbus Landmark’s Home Preservation Program, Keeny said, and the low-interest Home Preservation Loan Fund is available for homeowners looking to improve the architectural integrity of their properties.

The organization also has directed its Endangered Properties Fund, which is used for vacant or neglected commercial properties, to these five neighborhoods, Keeny said. With this fund, Columbus Landmarks buys historic properties and then sells them to owners with a preservation easement, a deed restriction that permanently protects the property.

“You don’t have to have big fancy buildings to have historical value,” Keeny said. “We start by working with one house, one block, one neighborhood and go from there.”

Projects underway on the Hilltop

Columbus Landmark’s work on the Hilltop already has begun.

Felisha Lyons is in the process of redeveloping a long-vacant property at 1945-1947 W. Broad St. into a restaurant, and Keeny is working to help her place the building on the National Register of Historic Places in a bid to receive historic tax credits.

Keeny said she would love to work with other Hilltop residents like Lyons who want to preserve historic buildings and access Columbus Landmarks’ resources and expertise.

“It shows that you celebrate the community and its past culture and history,” Keeny said. “It would be nice to see all these areas developed in three years, but that’s not the time limit for the care and concern for the neighborhood.”

Historic preservation also benefits the neighborhood economically.

Small commercial properties fill an important gap in affordable retail space in neighborhoods, Keeny said. New buildings often drive up the cost of retail properties and make them unattainable for smaller, start-up businesses in the community.

Jaynes said Lyons’ work on West Broad Street is a perfect example of historical and cultural preservation to better the neighborhood. And she said historic homes and significant buildings like West High School should not be left to rot if they are vacated, but instead repurposed and renovated to serve the community.