Mississippi Heritage Trust Announces
2004 Heritage Awards
Tatum Lumber Company Project Among Recipients
The Mississippi Heritage Trust is pleased to announce the new list of the 2004 Heritage Award winners, which includes the Tatum Lumber Company Project. This year 14 awards will be given out to outstanding preservation projects from across Mississippi at the Heritage Award Luncheon during the Experience Mississippi Historic Preservation Conference in Hattiesburg on April 23, 2004. The projects demonstrate excellence in the preservation, rehabilitation, restoration and interpretation of our architectural and cultural heritage.
This year the award winning projects ranged from the rehabilitation of an abandoned lumber company headquarters’ in Hattiesburg, to the restoration of the Woodworth Chapel at Tougaloo College in which Dr. Martin Luther King and Robert Kennedy gave speeches, to the restoration of a historic theater in Biloxi, to the restoration of depots in Eupora and Oxford. These rehabilitations represent a commitment to the preservation of Mississippi’s history and desire to save and reuse important landmarks of the past.
“A diverse group of dynamic preservation projects worthy of awards are being recognized this year,” said David Preziosi, Executive Director of the Mississippi Heritage Trust. “The variety of projects show that with dedicated owners, organizations, or local governments preservation is a financially viable and publicly beneficial option for properties in need of rehabilitation. The projects that are recognized with the 2004 Heritage Awards demonstrate that a little vision of the possibilities of a deteriorated and neglected property can result in a building that is beneficial to the entire community. The Heritage Award recipients exemplify the thought that preservation is about more than saving buildings. These projects prove that preservation is good for business, it changes lives, and it lays a strong foundation for the future.”
The Molpus Woodlands Group was chosen to receive one of two Awards of Excellence given this year for the rehabilitation and restoration of the Tatum Lumber Company buildings for their Timberlands Management offices. The site of the Molpus Timberlands Management headquarters was, in the early 20th century, a thriving company town, complete not only with sawmills, planer mills and dry kilns, but also with a headquarters building, company store (commissary), church, school, doctor, and workers houses, all owned and operated by the Tatum Lumber Company. Notwithstanding the deterioration around them, the office and the commissary building were remarkably intact. Utilizing the tax-credits, the owners were able to complete the restoration and rehabilitation of two of the buildings.
The rehabilitation of the original office building was complicated by the desire to preserve the pristine heart pine finishes throughout. To minimize the changes to the historic interior the air conditioning equipment was visually suppressed by lowering the grade behind the building. Modern conduit and wiring was routed beneath the building, in the attic, and behind the baseboard to maintain the paneled pine walls. The existing asbestos flooring was removed and the original pine floors were restored. Even the original light fixtures were retained.
The commissary building had been abandoned in the 1970s and surprisingly many of its interior fittings were remarkably intact. The original accounting cage was preserved and adapted into a small conference area. Nearly the entire existing U-shaped counter was preserved and new filing cabinets were placed underneath the counter out of view. Even the original paint scheme was reproduced.
The Mississippi Heritage Trust is the only statewide nonprofit organization dedicated to the preservation of the prehistoric and historic cultural resources of Mississippi.
Heritage Award: Tatum Lumber Company
