On Monday, March 2, 2010, Brian Conway, Michigan’s State Historic Preservation Officer, received an email from Pauline Saliga of the Society of Architectural Historians in Chicago, Illinois, informing him that representatives from Yamasaki, Inc., the successor to Minoru Yamasaki and Associates, Inc., had been given one day to return to their former offices to retreive the firm’s archival materials. Those materials not collected would be destroyed.
Conway alerted State Archivist Mark Harvey, who, in turn, worked with the Michigan History Foundation to secure a moving van and movers.
Harvey, archivist Matt Klein, and the movers, along with Amy Arnold and Todd Walsh of the State Historic Preservation Office, met at the Yamasaki offices early Tuesday morning, and spent a good number of hours evaluating and packing materials to be taken to the Archives of Michigan.
As a result of the swift action, and cooperation among multiple state agencies and nonprofit organizations, hundreds of slides and photographs, many drawings, and Minoru Yamasaki’s personal library are now in the care of the state of Michigan.
“The Archives of Michigan is honored to be the repository of the international legacy of Minoru Yamasaki,” stated Harvey.
Download the official press release here.
You can view more photographs at the MISHPO Flickr site.
Read more at The Atlantic, the Detroit Free Press, or the New York Times.
Thank you for your swift action on securing these historical documents.
Thanks for doing this. So sad the notice was impossibly short, but so glad the four of you were able to get it done!!!