Preservation

Growing up in Tucson’s Barrio Historico, I was just a few blocks from significant urban renewal destruction, the likes of which tore through many US cities in the 60s and 70s. Newburgh itself saw more than 1,400 buildings razed to earth through those renewal programs, with next to nothing built in place of a once pre-eminent Hudson River waterfront district. It was the similarity of destruction and neglect of a once proud place that first caught my attention, but also the defiant vibrancy of this beautifully built city, despite everything done to it.

Sited dramatically on a broad hillside overlooking the most beautiful stretch of the Hudson, this is the birthplace not only of the American Republic but of American historic preservation, with Washington’s Headquarters the first site acquired as a publicly owned historic place in 1850. Today, Newburgh is resurgent, with a dense, diverse, and walkable core that comprises New York State’s second largest contiguous historic district, and hundreds of individual preservation and infill projects completed and underway. 

In partnership with colleagues at the Fullerton Foundation, I worked to secure a 2023 Preserve New York Grant through the New York Preservation League to survey the historic sections of the city left out of the 1985 National Register nomination for the East End Historic District. Working with the Fullerton and our project’s historic preservation consultant, Marissa Marvelli, we’re endeavoring to expand the official narrative to include more than just grand building typology, but also the story of this city as a 300-year microcosm of national immigration, industrialization, and urbanization trends. 

If you couldn’t already tell, I’m a Newburgh architecture and cityscape evangelist and am at work on the restoration of my own home, an 1836 Greek Revival townhouse attributed to Thornton MacNess Niven, check it out on Instagram @OneQualityRow. I also serve as a Commissioner for Newburgh’s Architectural Review Commission and as a Trustee of the Historical Society of Newburgh Bay and the Highlands.