Wednesday, July 26, 2000 | 10:48 a.m.
The fate of the fire-damaged historic Whitehead House should be decided today after a group working to save the structure meets with city officials to determine if it can be repaired.
"We have a final consult (this morning) and will make the decision if it can be saved," said Louise Helton, president-elect of the Junior League of Las Vegas, the group that has been working for three years to save the house. But a Tuesday morning fire may put an end to the 1929 two-story, Mission Revival style house's journey from the brink of being torn down for a parking garage to being moved and preserved as a piece of Las Vegas history.
Whitehead House owners, the Junior League of Las Vegas, were handed an abatement/demolition order by the city because of the condition of the fire-marred building. The orders are standard procedure when a building has been damaged and is a danger.
"I'll certainly work with them," said Paul Wilkins, Las Vegas Department of Buildings and Safety director. "We'll have to see if there is a way to fix the house. They will need to do something pretty fast. I appreciated the older buildings, but we can't have any dangerous buildings."
In 1997 the Whitehead House was about to be demolished to make way for a parking structure on Seventh Street and Mesquite Avenue, but owners said the Junior League could have the house if they moved it off the lot. In 1998 the house was moved -- in three sections -- to a lot on 10th Street and Carson Avenue.
The Tuesday fire started in one section of the building and spread to another section. A third section -- an addition built in the 1960s -- was not damaged. The cause of the fire is undetermined, said Tim Szymanski, Las Vegas Fire Department spokesman. Homeless people have been chased out of the house several times in the past, officials said.
The house had been boarded up and a chain-link fence was erected around the building to keep out vagrants. Security guards were hired at one point, but vagrants still got into the house, Donna Levy of the Junior League said.
The blaze caused about $150,000 in damage to the house.
An architect and an engineer, working for free on the project to save the house, examined the building Tuesday afternoon.
Architect Gary Congdon wasn't too hopeful when he looked at the building, estimating that only 15 percent of the house could be salvaged.
But Helton said when an engineer looked at the house, he determined 60 percent of one section of the house and 75 percent of the other damaged segment could be saved.
"There have been so many people who have given so much to save this house just for the love of Las Vegas and the love of history," Helton said. "I don't want to give up on the house if there is any possible way to save it."
Helton said the house was a couple of months away from being moved to its permanent location at Ninth Street and Bridger Avenue. The group had trade unions lined up to start restoration work at no cost and had secured about $470,000 in state grants.
"I'd like to believe we can continue. We were so close," Levy said. "Louise (Helton) doesn't quit. I know if there is a way, she will find it."
If the decision is made not to proceed with restoration of the house, Helton said the lot would be sold and the grant money returned to the state.
The house's history is rooted in the first industrial boom of the area when Las Vegas was evolving from a small, dusty desert town into a city.
The home was designed and built for the Stephen R. Whitehead family in 1929 at a cost of $15,000. Whitehead was a prominent businessman and the first elected county assessor. A year after his death, the house was sold to the Sisters of the Holy Family in 1942.
It served for 43 years as a convent for the Sisters of the Holy Family and then as office space for an insurance company.
The house was registered with the National Register of Historic Places in 1987.
archive
