Murder in Highland Park
The shocking photographic evidence after the jump:
An HP man writes in:
Yesterday over a dozen trees were murdered at the corner of Cowper and Harvard. I could only get three in the picture, but there are many more.
I am quite certain that it was done in the name of progress…..real or imagined.
Sorry I borrowed from the NBC 5 playbook on this post.
21 Comments to “Murder in Highland Park”
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I saw more going down this morning on my way to work…
Hey, this house was on the Preservation Park Cities home tour a few plus years back. The house was built in 1917 and the front entrance faced Harvard. Since then the entrance has changed to face Cowper. At the time of the tour, the house was owned by Katherine Crosland and her husband. According to DCAD the current owners are Pierre and Catherine Lavie. I do hope they are not planning to tear this beauty down or even extend it to where the trees once stood. Then it would be a double murder.
You’ll probably see a chain link fence around the property within a week or two. If they were going to widen the house, they wouldn’t have cut down the trees in front.
I’m really suprised that in the Park Cities you can cut down every tree on your property without having to replant. Even the suburbs have guidelines stating that if the tree is a certain diameter and you cut it down, you have to replant with either a similar size, or two that are half the size, or four that are a quarter the size (you get the point). Anyway, that’s not the exact formula, but it prevents all the trees from being mowed down.
Maybe the trees had a disease…and tree removal was the prudent action.
That is a shame. And while PLD’s comment is charitable, it’s hard to imagine that so many trees were diseased beyond saving.
this house recently sold (in the last month)
terribly sad.
Gadfly, the Preservation Park Cities tour may have been a bad omen. Last fall they included a brand new mansion on Crescent on their tour. To build the mansion, the builder razed an updated historic home along with many trees. Most amusing, or saddest, the Morning Snooze ran an announcement for the tour along with a picture of that Crescent address — a picture of the house that was not preserved and was no longer there!
I’m repeating this post, because the server doesn’t seem to want to take it. Maybe it’s tired. So let me try this again.
anon, I went on that tour and was hugely disappointed with the inclusion of that over-done French Fried number (or whatever other dubious European hodge podge name they described it as at the time) and the Preservation Society itself (I’m way too tired to type the new ridiculously long name). Their excuse for the inclusion was to show us mere ignorant mortals an example of a newly built house designed with architectural integrity. After hearing this explanation from one of the guides, I felt like screaming “You have got to be kidding! Are y’all smoking some serious crack or what?!” My opinion is this silly annual tour has now become a giant real estate showcase extravaganza. Thank goodness for Christine Allison’s house. That made the whole tour worth while. Now that is a “real” home.
Perhaps the Preservation Society thought the historic home in the DMN file photo was still there when they put the address on the tour, and then invented a rationale for the new house when they learned their mistake.
Or maybe you are right, Gadfly, that real estate people control the tour. The mansion was built by a PC builder who was living in it at the time. It sold a few months ago. I don’t doubt it is beautiful and has architectural integrity, but nothing was “preserved” in its construction.
anon, oh dear. I thought you were a friend. It seems you liked the builder’s french fried number, even though nothing was preserved. It had way too much bling going on. Good architecture doesn’t require excessive accessories. And something tells me he hasn’t spent much time in Europe absorbing the historical buildings, much less browsing available books on European architecture, much less visiting any of our museums (unless it’s a party honoring tycoons). He’s probably way too busy making money. When you’re that successful, who needs culture?
Let me clarify one point. Even though the outside was portentous, it was the inside that stupefied me.
Didn’t mean to suggest I liked it, just that it was on the wrong tour. I don’t like the outside and your description tells me I wouldn’t like the inside either. Perhaps its address is now spelled “Croissant?”
The builder at least knew what some buyers want. It sold for more than $6,000,000.
yea, probably sold to another nouveau riche tycoon, who’s been too busy making money to learn that you can’t buy culture. Can you tell that I’m cranky?
While I’m still cranking, let me describe another nouveau riche type’s house that has me all bent out of shape. Because it’s catty-cornered to me, I’m forced to avert my modest eyes from its obscene landscaping. I call it the “penis” landscape, because all the plantings are vertical erectiles. The poor lady of the house was allowed one tiny spot for colorful flowers. I really do need to sign off and take a “nice” pill, because I’m too tired and lazy to use my delete button.
Captcha words are Dickoff Host
The Lavies sold the house within the last month. Rumor has it when they bought the house a few years ago, they were the only interested family. All other interested parties were builders.
The home was unfortunately sold to a builder, which is a shame, because it was lovely & gracious and only needed a kitchen/bathroom remodel.
The builders’ complete disregard for our history and environment (12 trees chopped down!!) is disgusting. What is even more disgusting is that there is a demand for the builders’ product- homes without charm, grace, or character that take up every available inch on the lot. We are tearing down our city’s history, one house at a time.
Gadfly, great Captchas, true or not. Will be on the lookout for the testoster-lawn.
Is the market for mega-million, agressive-on-the-lot mansions really doing well enough to justify so many builders tearing down history? Already a lot of For Sale signs.
typo: aggressive
anon, I just don’t know. I have no talent for economics, much less making money. But I do have foresight and can see that if we continue this greedy trend along with other developing countries, we will eventually run out of resources. I, too, have seen a lot of “For Sale” signs go up suddenly within the last month, along with quite a few “For Lease” signs. Unfortunately, 2 of the for sale signs are up because the families (each with 2 kids) want something bigger than 4500 square feet.
Where I live in UP, the historical charm has been completely eradicated within the last 10 years. Most folks around here and in the metroplex don’t give a rat’s titty about architectural history or integrity. My little bungalow will soon be the soul survivor of UP’s early days.
Does anyone know why they cut down ALL the trees? I can’t imagine the trees in front would have been in the building footprint.
If the builder hadn’t cut down the trees, he would have still killed them during the construction process. They pile sand, dirt, stone, and brick right on top of the root system. The longer the construction process continues then the longer the tree is deprived of water and nutrition. Then when that part of the kill is over with, they viciously grade the land, doing away with the most important part of the root system. The tree is left looking like an anemic version of its former self and slowly dies over the next few years. To make things worse, the builder then plants new trees in the parkway, way too close to each other, and under the original tree’s canopy, hoping to disguise the failing health of the original tree. Even these new ones will be fighting among each other for the same resources as they grow bigger. It’s a lose lose situation no matter how you look at it. But most buyers are totally ignorant of this murder and think it all looks all so “mighty purty”. Murder for the sake of instant curb appeal.
Captcha: Conquest will
The house is gone.
May it rest in peace in some anonymous landfill. I wish bad karma for those who are responsible.