Efforts to save rare 'Prairie Style' home on VA campus to resume
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Jan. 17—A continuing effort to save a rare, Prairie Style home from demolition by the Manchester Veterans Affairs Medical Center will once again seek the backing of Manchester aldermen Tuesday night.
The Manchester Heritage Commission is requesting that the Board of Mayor and Aldermen take action to open up a line of communication with Kevin Forrest, director of the Veterans Affairs Medical Center (VAMC) to find a way to save the manager's residence on the VA campus.
Aldermen voted to help the Heritage Commission with this issue in November 2019, but Aurore Eaton — a member of the city's Heritage Commission — said a letter sent to then-VAMC manager Alfred Montoya by Mayor Joyce Craig at that time was met with silence.
Forrest, the current director, was appointed in June 2020. Eaton said efforts to save the manager's residence were put on the "back burner" in recent months, as Forrest and city officials grappled with the pandemic and other matters.
In 2018, the VA endorsed a Vision 2025 plan to upgrade veterans' health care in the state. It calls for the Manchester VA to host specialty health services for veterans such as mental health, radiology, pain care, addiction treatment and amputation care. The VA plans to demolish the building as part of that expansion.
Eaton said the 2,000-square-foot manager's residence doesn't stand in the way of planned construction projects and could potentially be saved, rehabbed and used to benefit veterans through a type of public/private partnership.
The building exemplifies Prairie Style architecture, a type that originated in Chicago and is associated with renowned architect Frank Lloyd Wright.
In 2018 the New Hampshire Preservation Alliance included the structure on its Seven to Save list and urged U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs officials to consider alternative uses for the structure, which has been vacant for years.
