Contributing to the Cause
2007-

2007
The Society works with the City’s preservation office to save comedian Carol Burnett’s childhood home on West Commerce Street. A local non-profit moves the c. 1905 Queen Anne style house eight blocks for use as an after-school learning center.

Marcie Ince elected president

The Society joins with Scenic America and Scenic Texas to oppose a pilot program that will allow 15 digital billboards to be erected in San Antonio. Despite the Society’s efforts to persuade the city council to preserve the city’s scenic and urban corridors, only one city councilman votes against the pilot program.

The Society convinces the Board of Directors for the Bexar Metropolitan Water District to place a preservation easement on the 1848 James Trueheart House, its outbuildings, and the surrounding land prior to the sale of the property. The easement, which will be binding on all successive owners, will protect the historic integrity of the site.

2008
The Society opposes consideration of the Maverick Ranch-Fromme Farm as a site for the proposed Upper Leon Creek Regional Storm Water Detention Facility. The Maverick Ranch-Fromme Farm is listed on the National Register of Historic Places and serves as a wildlife preserve for two endangered species of birds.

The Society invites community leaders interested in Brackenridge Park to work with the Society, the Parks Department and the City in forming a conservancy. The Brackenridge Park Conservancy incorporates in September to act as a steward and an advocate to preserve and enhance the park’s resources.

As a result of a spike in the demolition of historic buildings, including the 1929 Jorrie Building and residences in the Tobin Hill Historic District, the Society works with the City Manager’s Office and the City Attorney to change the city’s emergency demolition process in the city code.

The Society obtains local landmark designation for ten historic farms and ranches, including five city-owned and five private ranches.

2009

The Society takes a stand against the sale of Healy-Murphy Park, which includes the historic Dullnig-Schneider House, on the city’s East Side.
The Society participates in the creation of the international award-winning River North Master Plan, which included a survey of potential historic landmarks in the river improvements project area. The master plan won the Charter Award given for the Congress for New Urbanism in June.

Rollette Schreckenghost elected president.

2010

The Society, working with Scenic San Antonio, proves successful at holding the line on digital billboards, with the number in San Antonio now capped at the original 13 erected as part of a City Council approved pilot program in 2007.

The Society joins with the San Antonio Zoo, Parks Foundation, Brackenridge Park Conservancy and Friends of the Parks to successfully oppose the proposed lease of land at the northern edge of Brackenridge Park. The proposed lease would go against the designated land use in the Brackenridge Master Plan adopted by the City in 1979.

The Hays Street Bridge, which the Society helped to save through its fundraising efforts, opens as a hike and bike trail connecting the East Side to downtown in July.

Lerma’s Nite Club, the oldest continuously operated venue for conjunto music in South Texas, receives the Society’s help to secure a grant from the National Trust for Historic Preservation. This grant covers the cost of a structural engineer’s report; the first step in preserving this historic property, which is eligible for nomination to the National Register of Historic Places.

Events from 1921 to 1995 excerpted from Saving San Antonio: The Precarious Preservation of a Heritage by Lewis F. Fisher.

Previous |  1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7