Amanda Herterich: Historical preservation from the Alaskan forests to the City of Tyler

Venture through the intriguing world of historical preservation with Amanda Herterich, the new executive director of Historic Tyler. As an East Texas native, Herterich shares her experiences of preservation work in Southeastern Alaska in the Tongass National Forest, a project that not only solidified her love for preservation but also her relationship with the man who would become her husband, Conor. Her captivating narrative of working with limited resources in extreme conditions will make you appreciate the dedication behind preserving history. 

Herterich offers an exclusive preview of what the future holds for Historic Tyler. Hear about the ongoing projects that are shaping Tyler's historical narrative and her plans for a greater focus on advocacy, education, and investment in historic preservation. Herterich shares her passion for reviving rundown buildings and their potential to serve the current generation in this insightful journey into historic preservation.

(Show notes are automatically generated and may contain phonetic spellings and other spelling and punctuation errors. Grammar errors contained in the original recording are not typically corrected.)

Episode Transcript

LANDESS (00:04):
Tyler, texas, was founded 173 years ago with fewer
than a thousand residents andfive streets running north and
south and four streets runningeast and west.
Today, that history is sharedby the Historic Tyler
organization, which partnerswith six different historical
district organizations.
Just recently, historic Tylerwelcomed a new executive
director who's a native EastTexan and shares her 1893 Greek

(00:29):
Revival home in the BrickStreets district with their
husband and two daughters.
Welcome, amanda Herderick.

HERTERICH (00:34):
Thank you, I'm happy to be here.

LANDESS (00:36):
Your educational background is history and art
history, but you've got hands-onpreservation experience in
Southeastern Alaska.
Tell us about that.

HERTERICH (00:44):
It was early 2017.
At the time, my boyfriend who'snow my husband he found this
opportunity to do hands-onpreservation work in Southeast
Alaska in the Tongass NationalForest, so it's near Ketchikan.
At that time, I didn't haveanything lined up for the summer
.
My teaching gig was about toend, and so I needed a job too.

(01:05):
He said hey, why don't youapply for this with me?
Let's just see what happens.
I said okay, sure enough, theyselected the both of us.
We got on a plane in Dallas andlanded in Ketchikan, alaska,
for the summer and we workedwith the National Forest Service
to restore three differenthistoric sites in the Tongass
National Forest, which is hugeit's over a million acres and

(01:28):
it's also Alaska, which meansit's rugged.
The situation we foundourselves in was the first site
was like an Adirondack-styleshelter and the only way we
could go into that site was by atwo-hour boat ride.
We had to take in all of oursupplies, which meant all of the
logs to rebuild this CCC1930s-era shelter.

(01:51):
We had to filter our ownrainwater and because it's the
National Forest Service, therewere sound protections in place
so planes could fly over andwhatnot intermittently, but we
could not use power tools, so wehad to do it all by hand.

LANDESS (02:07):
Oh, my goodness.

HERTERICH (02:08):
Yeah, a felling trees perlums.
We lived in tents for abouteight days in this wet,
50-degree weather conditionsdoing preservation work and
chiseling and felling trees andpeeling bark off the trees and
doing all that kind of reallyintense labor as a crew of five

(02:29):
people total, counting me andhim.

LANDESS (02:32):
Well, now, that was a test, for a variety of reasons,
certainly of your newrelationship.

HERTERICH (02:37):
Yes, it was.
It was certainly a labor oflove.

LANDESS (02:40):
I was about to say you stayed in love and got married
anyway.

HERTERICH (02:44):
Yeah, at the end of the trip he proposed to me.
So then he became my fiance.
Well, there you go.
That all worked out.
It was all worth it.

LANDESS (02:50):
Now you're from East Texas, but you've only called
Tyler home for a few years now.
Tell us about your move here.

HERTERICH (02:56):
So I was raised about an hour and a half south of
here on a 100-acre cattle ranchabout 25 miles west of Nacodotus
.
So for me Tyler was the bigcity.

LANDESS (03:07):
Oh yeah.

HERTERICH (03:07):
Yeah, very much the big city, so it's familiar.
I'd been here numerous times.
But once my husband and I hadfinished grad school, he got an
opportunity to go to Bloomington, indiana, to be a short
preservation officer, so wemoved up there.
Then all of a sudden I gotpregnant and then we had a baby,
and 10 days later there wasthis strange virus identified in

(03:28):
Wuhan, china.
And then the world changed.

LANDESS (03:31):
I've heard about that.

HERTERICH (03:33):
Every single person right affected on earth.
And then we had another baby,so we had two babies in quick
succession.

LANDESS (03:39):
Was that a COVID baby?
I can't tell you how manypeople I've interviewed.
And then we had a COVID baby.

HERTERICH (03:47):
Yep, we had two of them and he got an opportunity
that put him back here in Texasand I was raising babies.
And then this opportunity atHistoric Tyler came open and it
just kind of felt like a godsend.
I felt like it was the perfectjob for me and the timing was
really right.

LANDESS (04:05):
Yeah, sounds like it.
What kinds of projects areplanned or underway at Historic
Tyler, and what would you liketo see happen?

HERTERICH (04:12):
So we're currently wrapping up two projects that my
predecessor, ashley Washman,had begun before me.
So we're at the absolute tailend of the Pollard Farm National
Register nomination.
So that will be the ninth, Ibelieve, historic District in
Tyler, the eighth one thatHistoric Tyler has been involved

(04:33):
in.
So downtown was a separateproject, but with the Pollard
Farm nomination we've got over1200 properties in total, so
it'll be the largest one and atthis point it's just months away
from tying up.
So homeowners will be notifiedsoon about that.
The other one is the coffeetable book.
She's finishing that up andwe're crossing our fingers.

(04:54):
We're hoping to have that forsale in April for Historic Tyler
on tour.

LANDESS (04:59):
Oh nice.

HERTERICH (05:00):
So those are the ones kind of finishing up and as far
as looking ahead.
So our mission, of course, ishistoric preservation within the
city of Tyler and it's kind ofhas a it's three pronged there's
advocacy, there's education andthen there's public and private
investment.
So, for instance, me being here, that's advocacy in and of

(05:20):
itself, right, and then anotherpart of that is education.
So a project I'm taking on nowis to kind of build upon the
website revamp that we did and Iwant to get more information
out there to the public.
As far as you know, how didhistoric preservation become a
profession in America, kind ofthe history of it.
If you're interested innominating your home or building

(05:44):
to be on the National Registeror to be like a THC Recorded,
texas Historic Landmark, if youwant it to be a Tyler local
landmark, how do you do that?
You know what protections doesthat mean?
Not mean that kind of thingit's.
Historic preservation is a veryniche field and if you're, if
you're not involved in it, itcan be kind of confusing and I
want to kind of give someclarity to it and help people

(06:07):
better understand it andhopefully support it and buy
into it, because that's I thinkit's very worthwhile.

LANDESS (06:13):
You talked about hands on experience with preservation.
Are there or will there beopportunities like that for
folks in our area listening tothis conversation?

HERTERICH (06:21):
So this is a conversation my husband had last
night.
Actually we were talking aboutthat.
So he is the Northeast Texaspreservation officer for
Preservation Texas.
So he works for the statewidenonprofit entity for historic
preservation and I'm here at theTyler local level, so we just
happen to be in the same field.

LANDESS (06:42):
But in the same house and in the same house.

HERTERICH (06:45):
But we talk about that, you know how.
Might you know if historicTyler might be interested in
offering some hands on workshops?
I think they've done that inthe past and we might look to
that in the future.
Or I mean, we are a smallnonprofit and when I mean small
I mean tiny, because I'm theonly employee, so of course
money is always a factor.
So if we can't afford to dothat on our own, can we partner

(07:08):
with other local groups?
Can we partner withPreservation Texas to kind of
make this happen?
Because I want I want people tokind of learn how to do this
themselves so they aren'tterrified when they see a
historic building or somethingthat needs a little bit of love
or TLC.
So they, they look at it lessas this rundown eyesore and more
of you know what.

(07:28):
I see the potential and I seewhat this could be.
It just needs a little love andinvestment and time.
And if we can give people theeducation and the tools and
resources to do it, then itmight help turn some of these
buildings around and that waythe buildings can still serve
the people of today.

LANDESS (07:47):
Our guest has been Amanda Herderick, Executive
Director of Historic Tyler.
To hear this conversation againor to share it, go to our
website kvutorg.
I'm Mike Landis for UT TylerRadio.