Hotel Vote Came as Rare Setback for Pasadena Heritage

It was a rare setback for Pasadena Heritage last week when voters decided to permit demolition of the historic main building of the Huntington Sheraton hotel.

Trying to save the building was the latest cause of the private, nonprofit preservationist group. In the 10 years since its founding, Pasadena Heritage has gained a nationwide reputation for effectiveness and political clout in a city known for a strong interest in its heritage.

Even though the group lost, Claire Bogaard, its executive director and driving force, refuses to call Tuesday’s vote a defeat.

“Along the way, some demolition occurs,” she acknowledged.

Stopping Wrecking Ball

More often than not, however, Pasadena Heritage has helped stop the wrecking ball.

Saving the picturesque but aging Colorado Street Bridge and convincing city officials and businessmen that the dilapidated buildings in Old Town were worth restoring and renovating are two of the group’s major successes.

But there have been failures, too.

The group has been unable to retrieve interior fixtures worth about $1 million which were stripped from the historic Blacker House two years ago by a Texas rancher.

From its beginnings as a small, all-volunteer group, Pasadena Heritage has grown to a 2,000-member organization with an operating budget of $120,000. It is funded through membership fees, grants and donations and has four paid staff members and a 13-member board of directors, including lawyers, an architect, a banker, a real estate broker, a historian and an urban planner.

“We held our first architectural tour in 1976 and got our first 250 members that day,” Bogaard said.

The group incorporated in January, 1977. Since then, much of the preservation and restoration of many of Pasadena’s historic buildings can be credited to its efforts.

“Pasadena Heritage is one of the better local preservation organizations in the country and has fought a lot of worthwhile battles,” said Greg Coble, director of the National Trust, which has a membership of 3,500 local and state preservation groups. “Pasadena is a city that people in preservation look to because there is a lot of public support and citizen participation for it.”

Buildings Moved, Sold

Besides speaking at public hearings and working with the city on restoration plans for public buildings such as City Hall and the Public Library, the group conducts architectural tours, presents slide shows to community groups and provides a listing of local craftsmen to residents who need help with restoration.

But its main function is pushing for the preservation of historic buildings, something that began when Bogaard and a few other residents obtained grants with which they bought structures earmarked for demolition. The homes and office buildings were moved, renovated and sold to new owners.

“All the buildings we have saved are being used as residences or businesses,” said Bogaard, 48, whose husband, Bill, is a former Pasadena mayor.

“They are not looked upon as museums but are recycled and used in a productive manner. This is not restoration for the sake of restoration,” said Bogaard, who works full time at “a modest salary” for Pasadena Heritage.

Without Pasadena Heritage, said Mayor John Crowley, “our heritage would not have been as well protected because they have raised the consciousness of the community.”

While some businessmen have complained privately that the group has tried to block projects necessary to the economic health of the city, no one is willing to speak openly against Pasadena Heritage.

Developer Lary Mielke, who obtained voter approval to proceed with his plans to demolish the Huntington’s main building and replace it with a similar-looking modern hotel, does differ with the group on just what should be preserved.

“Sometimes they view preservation as paramount to anything else,” Mielke said. “Life is a matter of compromise, and if they are too adamant and unrealistic they damage the process (of providing a balance between development and preservation).”

Although this was one of several instances in which Pasadena Heritage locked horns with developers, not all of its projects have been controversial, said Linda Dishman of the urban conservation section of the city’s Planning Department.

“The preservation controversy is on a project-by-project basis,” she said. “There are no groups of people consistently against preservation.”

Phyllis Goddard, a real estate agent and treasurer of Pasadena Heritage, said that “there have been necessary trends toward development and revitalization of the business community to increase the tax base. This has sometimes come in direct conflict (with preservation).

“Preservation is emotional and subjective, so everyone likes the things Pasadena Heritage does except when we step on toes,” she added. “We try to work constructively with everyone, but we also have to face the reality of urban living. Those of us on the board discuss the economic realities, not preservation for the sake of preservation.”

The Gartz Court project, a joint venture with the city, was applauded by everyone, including developers.

The six bungalows arranged in a U were built in 1910 on North Madison Avenue. When they faced demolition in 1984, the city provided land on Pasadena Avenue where Pasadena Heritage moved and renovated the bungalows.

“The bungalows were sold to low- and moderate-income first-time homeowners,” Bogaard said. “It was a $520,000 project, and we broke even on it. It was important because it was one of the earliest remaining bungalow courts in Pasadena, and it is believed that the concept of bungalow courts developed here.”

Source of Funds

The money came from the group’s Preservation Fund, which was initiated to purchase, restore and return endangered buildings to the community. Bogaard will not say how much money is in the fund.

Neighborhood preservation was the goal of the group’s first Preservation Fund project, the purchase, renovation and sale of Easton House on South Marengo Avenue.

The fund was begun in 1979 with grants from banks and the state Office for Historic Preservation. Pasadena Heritage bought Easton House, built in 1905 by Craftsman designer Louis Easton. The fund was replenished when the home was sold.

“Easton House was scheduled to be developed for condominiums, so the neighbors came to us for help,” Bogaard said. “We sold it with an easement, and it became a bed-and-breakfast inn.”

Changes Reviewed

The purpose of an easement, which Pasadena Heritage holds on 36 buildings, is to ensure that the group can review any changes the owner wants to make to the physical appearance of the property. When the group buys and resells a building, it seeks a buyer whose interest in its historic value will help assure its continued preservation.

Purchase of Easton House helped preserve the South Marengo neighborhood when Pasadena Heritage was able to obtain a new zoning category: business overlay.

“This permitted the Craftsman bungalows to be used as low-use office space that would not generate a lot of traffic,” Bogaard said. “About seven buildings were involved, and most of them had been rooming houses. So the street became a buffer between the commercial area of Arroyo Parkway and the residential area of Euclid Avenue.”

The group used a novel approach to help save the Colorado Street Bridge, which Bogaard called the third most beloved structure in Pasadena, after City Hall and the Huntington.

Graceful Example

The bridge over the Arroyo Seco was built in 1913 and is considered one of the more graceful examples of vertical span construction.

After the state, for the third time, proposed demolishing the bridge in 1977, Pasadena Heritage came up with a novel way of attracting attention. The group held a party--complete with music, dancing, antique cars and costumes of the early 1900s--on the bridge in 1979.

The party, which also raised funds for other projects, was so popular that it has been repeated every two years.

The publicity helped the city gain jurisdiction over the bridge, which, while little used, is still standing.

Taken by Surprise

But the group has not found a way to gain control of the Blacker House’s original light fixtures. It was taken by surprise two years ago when the Texas rancher bought the house and immediately stripped it of the fixtures.

The house was designed in 1907 by Pasadena’s most famous architects, Charles and Henry Greene. The 50 fixtures are valued at $1 million, nearly as much as the rancher, Barton English, paid for the Craftsman bungalow. After English stripped the house, Pasadena Heritage said it would try to find a buyer if he would return the light fixtures. English has refused.

“That was an interesting battle because it underlined the importance of protecting artifacts nationwide,” Bogaard said.

“Pasadena made a lot of headlines nationally with the Blacker House fight,” said Coble of the National Trust.

Bogaard held a seminar on the Blacker House at a meeting last year of the National Trust. At that meeting, English told preservationists from all over the country that the fixtures would not be returned to Pasadena.

Next Project

The group’s next project involves Lincoln Triangle, part of which the city hopes to clear for commercial development. Lincoln Triangle is a residential neighborhood of 125 homes bounded by Fair Oaks Avenue, the Foothill Freeway and Orange Grove Boulevard.

Homes in the area, part of the city’s earliest subdivision, are modest working-class residences built between 1885 and 1930. They are a rare find, Bogaard said, because they are basically intact and remain together in a neighborhood setting.

Luke Sims, principal planner for the city’s development department, said the city is working closely with Pasadena Heritage on the proposed project.

The city’s plans, he said, include retaining much of the existing housing through rehabilitation. Clusters of about three town houses, architecturally compatible with the neighborhood, will be built on vacant lots, he said.

Some Development

The city would like to invite industrial development on five acres at the south end of the project area. Most of this land is vacant, but the project would require the removal of a few historic properties, Sims said.

However, he said, the area in which Pasadena Heritage is most interested would not be affected.

Although Bogaard said she did not get involved in preservation until she moved to Pasadena in 1971, her experiences living in Europe made an impression on her.

“We have an obligation to save the best of the past to pass on to generations after us,” she said, “and there still is plenty of opportunity to make way for the new.”