Post by Aggie One on Sept 23, 2004 7:57:55 GMT -5
Old firehouse answers new call for A&T
9-23-04
By Jim Schlosser, Staff Writer
News & Record
GREENSBORO -- The old firehouse, where horses pulled the fire wagon until a truck replaced them in 1913, lost its purpose 40 years ago when the fire department moved to a new station.
After that, the narrow two-story, 100-year-old structure survived a demolition spree that felled houses and buildings around it on Martin Luther King Jr. Drive.
Today, the former station gets a new community assignment. It's becoming a schoolhouse of sorts.
It will serve as a base for professors and students from N.C. A&T to work in partnerships with the city, churches and other groups to help restore old houses and conduct safety studies in southeast Greensboro.
Southeast residents will come to the building for classes in computers, construction and other skills. A building boom around the station may mean jobs for those who acquire construction know-how.
"All the area around us is going to have new housing," said Robert Pyle, seated at a conference table on the second floor, where firefighters once bunked near a brass pole that they slid down to the firetruck below.
Pyle, a professor in the Department of Construction Management, Occupational Safety and Health, will join university officials for a ribbon-cutting and grand opening at 11 a.m. today. The building will be rededicated as the university's Community Outreach Resource Center.
This will be the second time recently that A&T has involved itself with a historic structure off campus. Two years ago, the university became a partner in the creation of the International Civil Rights Museum that is scheduled to open downtown in the former Woolworth dime store, which is being renovated. A&T students staged sit-ins there in 1960 to integrate the store's lunch counter.
The Woolworth building was built in 1929. The Southside Hose Co. station dates to 1904-05.
Until it closed in 1964, the station served as a south Greensboro landmark. It anchored a thriving commercial block. Firefighters sat on a bench outside and passed the time with passersby. Until 1913, when horses Nick and Booker were retired, neighborhood children stopped in to see them.
Redevelopment and street improvement projects in the 1960s and 1970s cleared nearly every building except the firehouse. Since the fire department left, the building has been occupied at times by a radio repair shop, a graphics art business and, most recently, the Gate City Community Development Corp.
When Gate City, a nonprofit that provided job training and other services, closed, it asked A&T to take over some of its programs and the firehouse.
The building now is owned by the nonprofit A&T Foundation. The foundation has placed it under the management of the School of Technology.
A&T arrives at an ideal time. Up and down Martin Luther King Jr. Drive and on the side streets, old houses are being renovated. New townhouses are open, and more are being built in the nearby Southside project.
More new houses will arise from vacant lots in the vicinity.
The School of Technology has conducted community outreach programs since 1996-97. Presently, A&T students in construction management are helping a nonprofit put a roof on Magnolia House, a former lodging place on Gorrell Street that's being rehabilitated.
Outreach programs reflect an effort in higher education to get students and faculty into communities for learning experiences and to help people.
A&T students and faculty and others will conduct seminars at the station on such topics as home safety. Afterward, students and faculty will go into homes to size up problems. Pyle, who is in charge of the outreach program with professor Musibau Shofoluwe, can foresee students working with city inspectors on a lead paint study in south Greensboro.
The building includes three offices. People with start-up businesses will be welcomed to conduct business there.
Until now, the outreach program has been using temporary spaces off campus.
The firehouse building provides the first permanent home for what formally was called The Community Empowerment and Urban Renewal Initiative Project." Money for the project comes from a $548,000 federal grant. When it runs out, more federal money will be sought.
The university could have placed the outreach program on campus, but Pyle said, "To do the things we want to do, we need to get off campus."
He said he hopes the building eventually can be expanded. Plenty of vacant land borders it.
The location proved convenient for a fire station, and Pyle said he thinks it will make an ideal outreach center. City buses stop in front.
"There is no one who can't get to this place," he said.
The other day, Pyle sorted through vintage photos of the station. He said he wants everyone who comes there to learn about the building's long history. The photos now decorate the lobby.
The interior has drastically changed over the years, although if Pyle's students dig into the layers of flooring, they may hit the original concrete floor.
When last seen years ago, the concrete still had the grooves that kept the horses' hooves from slipping.
Pyle promised that the building's outside wouldn't be altered.
"G.F.D. Southside Hose Co., No. 4" will remain across the front -- as it has for 100 years.
Contact Jim Schlosser at 373-7081 or jschlosser@news-record.com
9-23-04
By Jim Schlosser, Staff Writer
News & Record
GREENSBORO -- The old firehouse, where horses pulled the fire wagon until a truck replaced them in 1913, lost its purpose 40 years ago when the fire department moved to a new station.
After that, the narrow two-story, 100-year-old structure survived a demolition spree that felled houses and buildings around it on Martin Luther King Jr. Drive.
Today, the former station gets a new community assignment. It's becoming a schoolhouse of sorts.
It will serve as a base for professors and students from N.C. A&T to work in partnerships with the city, churches and other groups to help restore old houses and conduct safety studies in southeast Greensboro.
Southeast residents will come to the building for classes in computers, construction and other skills. A building boom around the station may mean jobs for those who acquire construction know-how.
"All the area around us is going to have new housing," said Robert Pyle, seated at a conference table on the second floor, where firefighters once bunked near a brass pole that they slid down to the firetruck below.
Pyle, a professor in the Department of Construction Management, Occupational Safety and Health, will join university officials for a ribbon-cutting and grand opening at 11 a.m. today. The building will be rededicated as the university's Community Outreach Resource Center.
This will be the second time recently that A&T has involved itself with a historic structure off campus. Two years ago, the university became a partner in the creation of the International Civil Rights Museum that is scheduled to open downtown in the former Woolworth dime store, which is being renovated. A&T students staged sit-ins there in 1960 to integrate the store's lunch counter.
The Woolworth building was built in 1929. The Southside Hose Co. station dates to 1904-05.
Until it closed in 1964, the station served as a south Greensboro landmark. It anchored a thriving commercial block. Firefighters sat on a bench outside and passed the time with passersby. Until 1913, when horses Nick and Booker were retired, neighborhood children stopped in to see them.
Redevelopment and street improvement projects in the 1960s and 1970s cleared nearly every building except the firehouse. Since the fire department left, the building has been occupied at times by a radio repair shop, a graphics art business and, most recently, the Gate City Community Development Corp.
When Gate City, a nonprofit that provided job training and other services, closed, it asked A&T to take over some of its programs and the firehouse.
The building now is owned by the nonprofit A&T Foundation. The foundation has placed it under the management of the School of Technology.
A&T arrives at an ideal time. Up and down Martin Luther King Jr. Drive and on the side streets, old houses are being renovated. New townhouses are open, and more are being built in the nearby Southside project.
More new houses will arise from vacant lots in the vicinity.
The School of Technology has conducted community outreach programs since 1996-97. Presently, A&T students in construction management are helping a nonprofit put a roof on Magnolia House, a former lodging place on Gorrell Street that's being rehabilitated.
Outreach programs reflect an effort in higher education to get students and faculty into communities for learning experiences and to help people.
A&T students and faculty and others will conduct seminars at the station on such topics as home safety. Afterward, students and faculty will go into homes to size up problems. Pyle, who is in charge of the outreach program with professor Musibau Shofoluwe, can foresee students working with city inspectors on a lead paint study in south Greensboro.
The building includes three offices. People with start-up businesses will be welcomed to conduct business there.
Until now, the outreach program has been using temporary spaces off campus.
The firehouse building provides the first permanent home for what formally was called The Community Empowerment and Urban Renewal Initiative Project." Money for the project comes from a $548,000 federal grant. When it runs out, more federal money will be sought.
The university could have placed the outreach program on campus, but Pyle said, "To do the things we want to do, we need to get off campus."
He said he hopes the building eventually can be expanded. Plenty of vacant land borders it.
The location proved convenient for a fire station, and Pyle said he thinks it will make an ideal outreach center. City buses stop in front.
"There is no one who can't get to this place," he said.
The other day, Pyle sorted through vintage photos of the station. He said he wants everyone who comes there to learn about the building's long history. The photos now decorate the lobby.
The interior has drastically changed over the years, although if Pyle's students dig into the layers of flooring, they may hit the original concrete floor.
When last seen years ago, the concrete still had the grooves that kept the horses' hooves from slipping.
Pyle promised that the building's outside wouldn't be altered.
"G.F.D. Southside Hose Co., No. 4" will remain across the front -- as it has for 100 years.
Contact Jim Schlosser at 373-7081 or jschlosser@news-record.com