Preservationists, and architecture and history fans will converge on the Pritzlaff Building, 315 N. Plankinton Ave., at 4:30 p.m. on Thursday, Feb. 8 for the “Architectural Artifacts: Strategies for Finding & Reusing” event.
Organized by the UWM School of Architecture & Urban Planning’s Historic Preservation Institute, the event will include talks by Kendall Breunig, who led the renaissance of the Pritzlaff complex, and Mike Jackson of the National Building Arts Center in St. Louis.
Legendary Milwaukee preservationist, architectural historian and architect H. Russell Zimmermann will also be in attendance at the event, which is free and open to all.
While Zimmermann won’t have a presentation, he will likely speak off the cuff on his incredible career in Milwaukee history and preservation.
Breuning will open the event, speaking about his work to transform the long-neglected Pritzlaff Building into a bustling hub of retail, dining, events space and residential units.
Then, Jackson will talk, too.
“The National Building Arts Center is an incredible place; I take my students there,” says Matt Jarosz, coordinator of the Certificate in Preservation Studies program. “They've just been collecting and collecting artifacts: terracotta, full building facades from New York City. Incredible stuff: steel, iron, stone, all kinds of building products, and Mike runs the show down there.”
Jarosz will bring a variety of historical building artifacts from the Historic Preservation Institute, too.
“Mike will talk the Building Arts Center,” says Jarosz, “but what's even more important is he's going to explain the Heritage Library that is within the the Association for Preservation Technology.
“It is an online library that he's been doing forever that is jaw-dropping and is accessible to anybody. You’ve got a problem with the radiator in your house? There are dozens of publications on the radiators that were built back in 1912 or whatever, plus electrical, stonework, Sears Roebuck house catalogs. He's going to walk people through it.”
According to Jarosz, the event will also include a meet and greet, refreshments and food. No RSVP or reservations required.
Born in Brooklyn, N.Y., where he lived until he was 17, Bobby received his BA-Mass Communications from UWM in 1989 and has lived in Walker's Point, Bay View, Enderis Park, South Milwaukee and on the East Side.
He has published three non-fiction books in Italy – including one about an event in Milwaukee history, which was published in the U.S. in autumn 2010. Four more books, all about Milwaukee, have been published by The History Press.
With his most recent band, The Yell Leaders, Bobby released four LPs and had a songs featured in episodes of TV's "Party of Five" and "Dawson's Creek," and films in Japan, South America and the U.S. The Yell Leaders were named the best unsigned band in their region by VH-1 as part of its Rock Across America 1998 Tour. Most recently, the band contributed tracks to a UK vinyl/CD tribute to the Redskins and collaborated on a track with Italian novelist Enrico Remmert.
He's produced three installments of the "OMCD" series of local music compilations for OnMilwaukee.com and in 2007 produced a CD of Italian music and poetry.
In 2005, he was awarded the City of Asti's (Italy) Journalism Prize for his work focusing on that area. He has also won awards from the Milwaukee Press Club.
He has be heard on 88Nine Radio Milwaukee talking about his "Urban Spelunking" series of stories, in that station's most popular podcast.
