LEXINGTON (June 2, 2017) — The University of Kentucky Department of Historic Preservation in the College of Design was presented with the Service to Preservation Award from the Kentucky Heritage Council at the annual Ida Lee Willis Memorial Foundation Historic Preservation Awards ceremony held May 30, at the Berry Hill Mansion in Frankfort, Ky.
The award was given for the Historic Preservation Symposium, an annual conference that Professor Clyde Carpenter and Michael Spencer (former department co-director) premiered in 2005.
Carpenter and Spencer (now associate professor at University of Mary Washington) created UK’s Historic Preservation Symposium to introduce students and others in the field to innovative work shaping the boundaries of historic preservation practice; the symposium brings together a range of regional, national and international speakers to discuss current topics in an accessible format. The 2017 symposium explored how designers, planners, preservationists and others shape the landscape when working with sites strongly associated with violence, discrimination or tragedy.
The Service to Preservation Awards honor those who have demonstrated a strong commitment to historic preservation, had a positive impact on preserving historic or prehistoric resources through advocacy or education, or developed innovative or model preservation programs. Through the award, the council recognized the efforts of Clyde Carpenter, Michael Spencer, Douglas Appler, Allison Carll-White and students in the Historic Preservation Graduate Organization at the UK College of Design. In addition to UK’s Historic Preservation Symposium, Midway’s Eric and Ellen Gregory and Lexington’s Martin Luther King and William Wells Brown Neighborhood Associations received Service to Preservation Awards.
“The Historic Preservation Symposium grows in strength and character each year as people realize the issues involving historic preservation extend beyond the physical building and into our culture,” said Allison Carll-White, chair of the Department of Historic Preservation. “We are grateful to receive this award in honor of our work to push the boundaries of preservation awareness.”
The Kentucky Heritage Council presents awards each May during National Historic Preservation Month to recognize excellence in the preservation of historic buildings and cultural resources through investment, advocacy, volunteerism, building partnerships, public involvement, lifelong commitment or significant achievement. The awards program is named for Ida Lee Willis, the first executive director of the Kentucky Heritage Commission (now Kentucky Heritage Council) and widow of former Gov. Simeon Willis at the time of her appointment in 1966. The foundation was chartered in her memory in 1979 to create an annual awards program and honor her legacy.
“It is such an honor for our program, and a tribute to Clyde Carpenter, to have this recognition, and to be among so many in the Commonwealth who are enthusiastic about the history of place and its ability to teach us,” said UK College of Design Dean Mitzi Vernon. “Moreover, this is incentive to further define this department as the best in the nation — totally doable!”
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