Honoured. Gratified. Vindicated.
That's how Humboldt's Water Tower Committee feels after they were presented with a prestigious Heritage Architecture Excellence award by Lt.-Gov. Dr. Gordon L. Barnhart on June 14.
The juried awards, presented to 11 projects in Saskatchewan this year, are sponsored by the Architectural Heritage Society of Saskatchewan, and have the lieutenant-governor as a patron.
The Water Tower in Humboldt was honoured in the Exterior Conservation category.
A large contingent representing the Humboldt Water Tower Committee and the City of Humboldt was on hand to receive the award at the ceremony at Government House in Regina.
"It's certainly gratifying," said Norman Duerr, co-chair of the Water Tower committee, about receiving the award. "You feel that your efforts have not been in vain."
"The City of Humboldt is very pleased to offer congratulations to the Humboldt Water Tower Committee for this special recognition of their achievements in restoring our historic water tower," Mayor Malcolm Eaton stated following the awards ceremony. "We are very fortunate to have such a committed and dedicated group working to preserve a very significant part of the province's early prairie architecture here in our city. We are looking forward to the continued success of the restoration work."
Eaton also encouraged residents and visitors to stop by the tower when it is open for tours.
The historic building, the architecture of which makes it resemble a lighthouse, was built in 1914-15 and was actually scheduled for demolition in 1997, due to its then dilapidated condition.
When town council at that time passed a motion to have the tower burned down, Duerr went on a rampage, he told the Journal with a grin.
They had a town hall meeting to save the historic tower, which Duerr believed, because of its design, served as a beacon and a landmark for people in the early days of the settlement of this area. Soon, the Save the Water Tower committee was born and they lobbied unceasingly to keep the tower from burning.
Eventually, town council agreed not to burn it down, and efforts to clean the tower up and restore it began under the auspices of the re-named Humboldt Water Tower committee.
The early members of that committee had a rough go at the beginning.
In the fall of 1997, Ed Brockmeyer, Hubert Possberg and Duerr took on the unenviable task of cleaning up the bird droppings from the tower's interior.
They called themselves the "pigeon pooper-scooper detail," Duerr recalls, and they cleaned up about 16 inches of pigeon dropping from the top of the tank alone. It took them two weeks to get it all out.
In 1998, the real restoration work began. To date, that has included reinforcing the foundation, stabilizing the roof structure, re-shingling the roof, restoring the exterior siding and the windows of the 1940s water treatment annex, and building a stairway to access a maintenance tunnel leading to beneath the water tank.
"Vindicated" was the word that sprang into Duerr's mind as he thought about the award. "Fifteen years of struggle, of planning, lobbying, fundraising, writing letters... and work," he said, from the initial cleanup of the tower to the latest restoration work, has been vindicated with the presentation of this award.
This award, he added, is recognition and a reward for all those efforts.
He had much praise for the members of the Water Tower Committee, and thanked them at a meeting last week.
"I can't begin to say how thankful I am of the support all of you have given, the loyalty, the hours, days, weeks, months of volunteer labour - without pay, often without recognition, the skills and talents you have brought to this project," he stated.
Today, with its exterior restored and efforts continuing to restore the interior, the tower still stands, "a tribute to the vision and dedication of a small volunteer group, Humboldt's Water Tower committee," Duerr stated in a description of the tower which was submitted with an application for this award.
The tower, designed by Chipman and Power, a Toronto engineering firm, is one of only four such remaining structures in Saskatchewan.
The three other towers like this one are not open to the public, and have not been restored to the point that Humboldt's is, Duerr said.
The exterior coastal lighthouse design consists of a wooden housing pierced by four slender windows spiralling to the top, suggestive of an interior spiral staircase, and supported by steel struts attached to an interior riveted steel tank.
Technically referred to as a standpipe water reservoir, the tank measures 20 feet in diameter and 80 feet high. An outside catwalk circles the cone-shaped cedar shingle roof.
That catwalk, Duerr said, is the only place in Saskatchewan which will have 360 views, 80 feet above ground level, of the city and surrounding countryside.
A stairway leading from the bottom of the tank to the catwalk now spirals the tank's interior, with railing and some treads still to be completed. This will provide access to the top of the tower via a roof dormer.
When the staircase which winds up the interior of the tank is completed, along with future interpretive displays, Humboldt's water tower promises to become a major tourist attraction, Duerr believes.
"Today it stands proud, framed by a blue sky, a little lighthouse in a sea of prairie grass," he said.
Much of the restoration work has been done by Mike Labelle and his crew from Western Restoration, based in Manitoba. The committee and other community volunteers have also contributed time and expertise to the project.
Other projects honoured with Heritage Architecture Excellence awards this year include the Bell Barn in Indian Head, Government House landscaping in Regina, Heritage Park in Eatonia, Holy Trinity Ukrainian Church in Prince Albert, Independent Order of Odd Fellows in Moose Jaw, The Leader Building in Regina, the mezzanine expansion to the Saskatchewan Legislative Library in Regina, the Opera House in Battleford, Rumley Distinctive Lofts in Saskatoon and the war memorial in Moose Jaw.
Assumption Church in Marysburg was honoured with one of these awards two years ago.
