Yesterday (Aug. 6), the Pittsburgh Historic Review Commission held a
public hearing on the nomination of the Pittsburgh Wool Company as a
city designated historic site. After my testimony on behalf of
Pittsburgh Wool, urging preservation in place (please refer to my
website for additional background on the Pittsburgh Wool case:
http://davidsr01.mindspring.com), the general counsel for the Pittsburgh
History and Landmarks Foundation announced that the organization was
withdrawing its support for the nomination because they did not believe
that development of the site for heritage tourism purposes was viable
and that the most "judicious" mode of preservation was to document the
structure and transfer some artifacts and the archives to the Pittsburgh
History Center to enable the City of Pittsburgh to condemn the property
via eminent domain and transfer it to the Heinz Co. for construction of
a 75,000 sq. foot warehouse. Newspaper coverage from yesterday's hearing
may found at this url: Pittsburgh Tribune-Review:
<http://triblive.com/news/pheinz0807.html> (Headline: Heinz 'seriously
considering' Ohio move). The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette did not load its
article covering yesterday's hearing.
On the one hand, I don't know enough about the Pittsburgh Historic Review
Commission: are they a bunch of syncopated lackeys of the powers-that-be, or a
genuine, independent/arms-length body with a will of its own? I could well see
how "development of the site for heritage tourism purposes" might very well not
be viable; the question now is: did you place too much emphasis on the possibly
non-viable tourism aspect, and ignore the fact that perhaps the overwhelming
majority of important heritage does not in and of itself have tourist appeal,
but should be preserved for other reasons anyway? In this case I imagine I'd
have to know if the company is a going concern in and of itself: does the wool
pulling pay its own way?
And on the other hand, I can't imagine placing Pittsburgh very high up
there on my list of "places to visit" as a perspective tourist anyway.
Now here's the dilemma (among others). Given that there is no local
support for preserving Pittsburgh Wool and that the only supported
mitigation involves documentation and demolition, despite my pleas to
PHLF to consider heritage tourism options, I am in a difficult position.
On the one hand, if this is the only way to preserve a modicum of this
once very important component of Pittsburgh's social and economic
fabric, then as a professional historian I should support it and let
the building be demolished for Heinz. On the other hand, however, the
business conducted inside the building -- wool pulling -- will not be
conducted if the owners are forced to relocate. That means that this
craft would disappear from the American landscape since Pittsburgh Wool
is the last wool pullery in the United States. By writing-off the
building, and hence the craft, I would be signing on to the eradication
of not just a demonstrably unique and valuable historic resource, but
also an intangible folklife resource: the wool pullers themselves.
Sort of like book-burning and Orwell's "memory hole": maybe Pittsburgh would
rather be though of as a city of ketchup bottlers than a city of wool pullers.
On the one hand it sounds kind of heartless to suggest sending the pullers off
to the nearest historical park, where they can pull wool to paying visitors,
but… how many other trades have gone by the wayside (sometimes unmourned):
paternoster makers, cuneiform scribes, etc. It's not the first extinction and
certainly won't be the last (typewriter designers, the whole LP-vinyl industry).
My sympathies, but… I look at all the funding shortfalls for hospitals, schools,
etc., and all-too often agree that some of the archaeology I'm doing and all
this cultural heritage stuff really is something of an unnecessary luxury (my
opinion largely a result of the general inefficiency and wastefulness of my
employers). But on the other hand, if Pittsburgh (and other cities, towns,
states, etc.) really is serious about trying to broaden its tax base
and enhancing its tourist appeal, then it has to start thinking about long-term
planning and goals, if it doesn't want to become just a subsidiary of the Heinz
World Domination Inc.
Furthermore, because of the way in which the City of Pittsburgh has
pursued the acquisition of Pittsburgh Wool on behalf of a rivate
corporation (Heinz) under the guise of the eminent domain proceeding
being in the public interest, it should be the property owners --
Pittsburgh Wool -- who decides ultimately what the outcome should be.
Not the City of Pittsburgh. Not the PHLF. Not Heinz. For the owner's
side of the story, their op-ed article (Sunday Aug. 8, 1999) is
available at the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette website:
<http://www.post-gazette.com/forum/19990808edkumer7.asp>
This is definitely draconian, and a cause for worry. Another case where we
"foreigners" (Canadian living in Germany in this case) definitely have a hard
time understanding so-called "American values:" stated freedom for the
individual, but even greater "freedom" for the large corporations which
mass-produce cigarettes, handguns, environmentally unfriendly cars and fossil
fuels, ketchup, etc.
As if that's not all to consider, I suggest that by withdrawing its
support for a resource it says is clearly historic, the PHLF is
facilitating the establishment of a dangerous precedent whereby large
corporations can acquire historic resources by pressuring economically
insecure local governments. Resources well beyond Pittsburgh's corporate
limits may be affected by this case because if successful, Pittsburgh
officials will be able to point to it at as a successful way of
thwarting local historic preservation efforts.
Yeah: just who is PHLF working for? I back at North America as being a
relatively soulless, lifeless place without history or other culture; here we
have yet another case of short-term gain overriding long-term interests
(remember the Talking Heads song about trying to "find myself/a city to live
in"?). Sort of used to such gunboat diplomacy in so-called "banana republics";
kind of strange to see it hitting closer to home, in what are generally
supposed to be enlightened, civilized parts of the world (then again, we tend
to think of American politicians as being corrupt, greedy, prone to graft,
pushed around by the most powerful lobbyists, etc.: some beacon for democracy).
Too bad we don't have any Heinz products to boycott here (so far as I know;
don't usually go looking for the stuff, not being much of a ketchup man myself).
Anyway. Just another reason not to visit Pittsburgh, I suppose; another
nail in the coffin known as the liberal belief in "enlightened self-interest."
Money makes the world go round, Might is Right, and the underdog only wins in
movies.
geoff carver
http://home.t-online.de/home/gcarver/
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