Ohio Historic Site Preservation Advisory Board recommends Libbey High School for register
Written by Staff Reports | | news@toledofreepress.comMembers of the Ohio Historic Site Preservation Advisory Board have voted to recommend that Edward Drummond Libbey High School and three other buildings in Ohio be forwarded to the Keeper of the National Register of Historic Places for consideration.
A July 15 press release by Tom Wolf of the Ohio Historical Society said that Libbey as well as Franklin County’s Athletic Club of Columbus, Stark County’s Louisville Historic District and Cuyahoga County’s Moreland Theater Building were all approved for recommendation on Friday, July 15, 2011, during a meeting held at the State Library of Ohio in Columbus.
The nominations for each of the properties will be forwarded to the Keeper of the National Register, who directs the program for the U.S. Department of the Interior. If the Keeper agrees that the properties meet the criteria for listing, they will be added to the National Register of Historic Places. A decision from the Keeper is expected in about 90 days.
National Register listing often raises community awareness of a property, according to the release. A listing does not obligate owners to repair or improve their properties and does not prevent them from remodeling, altering, selling, or even demolishing them if they choose to do so.
Owners or long-term tenants who rehabilitate income-producing properties listed on the National Register can qualify for a 20 percent federal income tax credit if the work they do follows the Secretary of the Interior’s Standards for Rehabilitation, guidelines used nationwide for repairs and alterations to historic buildings.
Libbey was recommended for nomination to the National Register for its history of association with the growth and expansion of Toledo Public Schools in the 1910s and 1920s; as an example of how public education evolved in the nation’s growing urban centers during the early 20th century; as a state-of-the-art public high school building of the time; and as an example of the Collegiate Gothic style of architecture popular from about 1900 to 1930. The Ohio Historical Society release said remains Toledo’s largest high school building, and is one of the city’s few remaining Collegiate Gothic style buildings.
