tool name
closeFrom dying mansion to thriving museum
Jackie Melander was driving force in Centre Furnace restoration
by Chris Rosenblum
She was old and worn down, largely forgotten, her features dulled by time and neglect.
Nabil K. Mark
Jackie Melander, President of the Centre County Historical Society, inside the Centre Furnace Mansion. CDT/Nabil K. Mark
Centre Furnace Mansion was dying, but Jackie Melander looked at the cornices and gables and saw new life.
Jackie, the longtime Centre County Historical Society president, thought the three-story house outside State College could, and should, be returned to the grandeur of yore. Some of the county’s earliest iron had been forged on the property. Inside the mansion, the sale of land to create Farmers High School, the forerunner of Penn State, had been signed.
Here was one of the area’s first estates, the birthplace of a major university, languishing in decay when she could be reborn as a showcase headquarters for the society
And so, on a day about 23 years ago, Jackie found herself giving a tour for potential donors, selling a dream by showing off a nightmare of peeling wallpaper, grubby carpeting and scarred linoleum.
“It did not look promising,” Jackie said. “I’m sure more than one head shook.”
Today, there’s no doubt about the state of the mansion and its park-like grounds, a tranquil oasis just minutes from town.
The whitewashed basement, dubbed the ‘hearth room’ for the giant stone fireplace, displays a permanent exhibit on Centre Furnace’s history and serves as a meeting hall for community groups. Upstairs rooms have been meticulously restored to Victorian appearances and filled with period furniture, most of which once belonged to the original owners, ironmaster Moses Thompson’s family, and was donated by their descendants.
For the past two decades, the mansion has been both a museum open to visitors and an archive for the society’s extensive collection of local photos, historical documents and memorabilia. The rebuilt ice house has been turned into a gallery for exhibits, the current about Centre County and the Civil War.
Plant sales, Easter egg hunts and Independence Day celebrations draw crowds to the mansion. Even when nothing’s going on, people drop by. Many a lunch has been brought to the gazebo or to the shade under the massive 250-year-old sycamore.
The success story stands on a knoll tucked behind commercial buildings, and those who helped draft it consider Jackie Melander its chief author.
“She really was the sparkplug with a lot of great ideas,” said Lee Stout, a retired Penn State librarian and archivist and former society vice president.
The current vice president, John Ziegler, recalls that Jackie became the driving force behind the restoration, especially in the early days, as she presented the plan to the community and enlisted support. She persuaded Marge Dunaway and her late husband, Wayland, to chair the fundraising campaign.
“She was so effective,” Marge Dunaway said of Jackie. “She got all these things done, yet I never remember her antagonizing anyone. That was Jackie. She was able to get people to work together and enjoy it.”
For her part, Jackie notes, “There were lots of people who thought this was a good thing to do,” and casts her role in simple terms. “In some sense, I became the cheerleader.”
In 1978, when the society acquired the mansion, there wasn’t much to cheer.
Hard times had befallen the estate known as The Evergreens for the towering trees along the road. David Garver had bought the vacant and deteriorating mansion in 1920, eight years after it passed out of the Thompson family. On the property, Garver built a swimming pool and roller-skating rink — both now gone — but his plans for an amusement park fell through. Later, he divided the mansion into apartments and rented to students.
Most importantly, he willed the place to the society.
At the time, Jackie, a Minneapolis native, had lived in State College for years, raising her family and working on a county historic registration project. Long interested in history and architecture, she joined the society in the early 1980s, just as the decision was made to restore the structurally sound but dilapidated mansion.
That was the easy part.
Nobody knew how the job should be done, but Jackie’s experience with historic architecture proved helpful. “What I didn’t know, I knew who to call,” she said. Her advice: Follow federal guidelines for restorations.
“I think that was really critical, not only to knowing how much money we had to raise, but also: ‘Are we for real? Are we doing this in an accepted way?’ ” she said.
Joined by newspaper publisher Blair Bice and Penn State history professor Philip Klein, two other key figures, Jackie set out to teach the community about the mansion’s historical significance. “A lot of people didn’t have the foggiest idea it was here,” Jackie said.
Seeking at least $300,000, the group next hired a fundraiser. The drive started slowly, and Jackie began to sweat.
“Three months of fundraising, we probably raised $1.95,” she said. “That’s when I thought [my family] could always move.”
Eventually, though, donations started rolling in, and Jackie no longer imagined leaving in shame. Instead, she rolled up her sleeves to clear out the broken sinks and other junk in the basement.
The hope was a restored cellar — which had been the property’s first dwelling from 1791, a half-century before the Thompsons arrived — would inspire pledges. It did.
“People liked the way it looked,” Jackie said. “It was easier to imagine the upstairs done.”
By 1986, nobody had to guess anymore.
Often assisted by Jackie, who called her time spent an “obsession,” restorers Bill Butler and Joe Stowell removed wood paneling, scraped wallpaper, pulled out carpeting and replaced ancient wires and pipes. Out of the dinginess a lost beauty emerged.
“The old house started to breathe again,” Jackie said. “The darkness was really disappearing, and we were increasingly seeing the grand lady the house had been.”
Each discovery — a hidden stairwell or covered-up door — and each triumph — a rebuilt front porch, the exterior painted an 1860s scheme — fueled the confidence of Jackie and her colleagues. They actually were going to pull this off.
In truth, Jackie never finished, even though the mansion today is, in Marge Dunaway’s opinion, “a community treasure.” Sitting in the afternoon sun near carefully tended flowerbeds, Jackie recently looked up and noted that the roof must be replaced.
But mostly, when her eyes take in Moses Thompson’s homestead, she sees a job well done.
“As I drive by, I think, ‘Gee, that looks pretty good. The old girl came together.’ ”
In Print
news.mcclatchy.com headlines
7 Wonders Of Centre County
