Master's Project
Eugene, Oregon
Presented on June 2nd, 2022
In cities in North America, either small or large, we can see the sidewalk stamps on concrete. The stamps have a variety of styles depending on stamp makers and cities, such as stamps and embedded plaques. In the United States, it had been common practice to have them generally in the early 1900s, so some of these are approximately over 100 years old. Some cities like San Diego have standards for preserving stamps, however, in Eugene, no standards are found and the treatment of the sidewalk stamps varies. For example, on 21st and Lincoln, the stamps are saved after consulting whereas stamps on 17th and Mill have been removed. Since more construction is coming on the 17th that’s causing some stamps to be removed some stamps are gone, this is an emerging issue to note. Therefore, this project aims to inventory and analyze the sidewalk stamps in Eugene and develop design guidelines for preserving sidewalk stamps. With over 150 miles of walking and biking for fieldwork, 430 sidewalk stamps were found in the seven neighborhoods. In the project, all stamps are plotted on the map by using Arc GIS Pro referring to the geolocations of the pictures taken in the fieldwork. The inventory and analysis section examines the stamps’ typographical details, characteristics, and current situations. The design guidelines are introduced through the decision tree, which guides you on the current situation, the decision tree will guide you to the solutions which are used in cultural landscape preservation strategies.
Preserving Urban History
Through Sidewalk Stamps
Presentation Script
1. Hi everyone. My name is Saya Akayama and I’m presenting on the topic of “preserving urban history through sidewalk stamps.”
2. First of all, I’d like to take the time to thank you all for coming. I would also like to take time to thank Mark, and Jeff for introducing this project, and for their incredible guidance through this process. Lastly, I would like to thank Allison for the research help from the Lane County history museum.
3.Today, my presentation is divided into three parts, introduction, inventory and analysis, and design guidelines.
4. I would like to start the presentation by introducing this quote from the Center of Cultural Landscape Preservation website, to talk about the importance of what is small. “Cultural landscapes, from private gardens and urban neighborhoods to farms and large national parks, are tangible records of our history. They are the physical reminders of great events that define generations, as well as everyday patterns that provide a sense of place for communities large and small.” This reminds us that cultural landscapes or cultural history aren’t only about the monumental scenery and something small like sidewalk stamps are also a cultural and historical landscape.
5. So, the sidewalk stamps are not only Eugene thing, but they are also seen in other cities such as Portland, Corvallis, Tucson in Arizona, and Boise in Idaho.
6. And in other cities like Chicago, there remains the city code to have stamps, and cities like San Diego have standards for preserving stamps.
7. However, in Eugene, I couldn’t find any standards to preserve them, and it seems like their treatments for those stamps vary. These are the pictures that I took at 17th and Mill, they started sidewalk construction in March and the sidewalk stamp was gone after April 11th. On the other hand, when I contacted the Public Works and Engineering department, they were saving those stamps when they replace sidewalks after consulting with the company that does cultural resource work. Since I’m seeing more construction coming on the 17th that’s causing some stamps to be removed some stamps are gone, this is an emerging issue to note.
8. I think preserving sidewalk stamps are valuable because it is living history at your feet, it is a direct example which we can see someone’s work in the past, it is a remnant of material culture, it is an important part of the story of how the city of Eugene has developed and it is more durable and will last longer than usual signage. I would like to share another quote that I think it’s relevant throughout this project, “Objects created in the past are the only historical occurrences that continue to exist in the present.” By material culture researcher, Jules David Prown.
9. So, this project is driven by the question of how we can preserve the sidewalk stamps in Eugene as local historic elements. This project aims to inventory and analyze the sidewalk stamps in Eugene and to develop design guidelines for the preservation of sidewalk stamps.
I’m showing the precedent studies I’ve found here. n the left, it’s a study in Vancouver, and on the right, this is the map in Eugene created by Jeff and his father Jim. As I said earlier, this project was introduced by Jeff when I took his spring studio 2 years ago, and I’ve used this map as a starting point and expanded the project. I referred to the way they plotted the stamp’s locations on GIS and the way they categorized the stamps.
11. So, for my project I’ve chosen these seven neighborhood associations in Eugene. I’ve walked and biked all over town shown in red lines, with my rulers to measure each stamp's size and depth. So far, I’ve walked and biked over 150 miles, which took about 50 hours in total.
12. In my research, I’ve found 430 stamps. I’ve plotted them on the map by using Arc GIS Pro referring to the geolocations of the pictures I took. I categorized them into three big groups: company name, street name, and date. There are stamps that have company names with dates or street names.
13. When we look at the company name stamps, a variety of company names are found. The dots in colors are showing the top 6 company names which appeared in over 15 locations.
14. Here are some of the company name stamps including those that are popularly seen. But these are just a few of them out of about 300 company name stamps.
15. This map shows the locations of street name stamps.
16. And these are some examples of street name stamps. They can be either Avenue names or street names.
17. The number of the date stamps is very small and just 5 stamps are found which have only date information.
18. And here are the 5 of them that I’ve found. Most of them are found on campus, in front of University Hall.
19. On this map, I’m showing all stamps that include the date information. The annexation map on the left-hand bottom gave me an idea of the time frame of how the city of Eugene had expanded over years, however, it is also hard to tell the relation between the date stamps locations and the expansion of the city boundary. (Because earlier, before the concrete sidewalk was installed, they used to have the wooden sidewalks, and the development of sidewalk construction and transition to the wood to concrete sidewalks will not necessarily overlap the annexation of the city. Observation on the relations to those or overlaying these annexation maps on top of this the date stamps map can be a future step to take.)
20. I’ve lined up the stamps with date information from 1907 to the most recent 2011 one. There is a variety of ways to show the date information and orientations. It tells us that these date stamps are commonly installed in the 1920s.
21. Moving on to the analysis part, we’ll look at stamps more closely. This is the collection of typographical errors, and it enables us to speculate how those stamps are installed. And this shows well that those stamps were actually somebody’s work in the past. Some are misspelled,
22. some are installed backward for those alphabets are rotational symmetry and this happened probably because they used the stamp tool upside down,
23. and there is the one which tells the wrong information. This stamp was found on E 23rd Ave but it actually says E 24th avenue.
24. In terms of the typographical aspect of the stamps, they are all capitalized and San serif and most of them are Bold though there are a few stamps that are installed in light font as you see in the picture in the center. I’m showing the text height variety in the graph, the x-axis is the street names, and the y-axis shows the text height in inches. Each plot has the label of what the actual stamp says, as you can see here, the type of height is basically around 2”. There are 7 stamps that are 3” in height and they were remarkable to see in my fieldwork.
25. This graph shows the variety of the text length. Again, the x-axis shows the street names, and in this slide, the y shows the text length. It obviously depends on what it tells, and it is common to see the stamps which
go over two concrete panels. But this fluff rug company is the only one that I saw which goes over three concrete panels and is the longest.
26. The orientation is another aspect that gives the diversity of the type of stamps. Stamps are basically seen in those locations.
27. From here, we’ll look at the N.T. Jorgensen stamps have the largest number of company name stamps. There are 6 with dates, and some are curved. Not all angles of the curves are the same, I could guess it might have installed each letter one by one and made these curves.
28. Alignment to the concrete panels on the sidewalk also varies, and some are diagonal.
29. And there are more. For the N.T. Jorgensen stamps, it is common to see the names in one concrete panel like these.
30. With all this inventory and analysis work, I’ve acknowledged the diverse type information, the details, and the different conditions of the stamps. Based on that, I set the goals under the big umbrella of safety for my design guideline goals and set two focuses on visibility and legibility.
31. As for the visibility factors, I list the coverage with vegetation and debris. Those are some examples of stamps that are partially or completely covered with vegetation or debris and it is hard to tell what the text says.
32. As for legibility factors, the depth, depositions, and fracturing matter. The more it has the depth, the more it gets easier to read and recognize, and for fracturing, the more it has cracks through the text, the more it gets harder to read. However, the deposition sometimes helps to read, sometimes doesn’t. It varies not only how much it is deposed, but also the weather.
33. So, I’ve created this diagram to analyze the condition of the stamps based on the legibility factors. The more the triangle gets bigger, the more it has high legibility. And if the triangle is small, it has more damage, it is covered by something and less deep.
34. Let’s take a look at how this diagram can address the current condition of stamps. I’ve selected all stamps on 20th avenue because this is one of the streets which has variety of ways to show the street name. Like sometimes East is abbreviated, sometimes the TH is located up and not aligned with the rest of the text.
35. On the 11th avenue, again there is also the variation of saying the 11th as you can see here. And the combination of street names and company names is less common and the one that has two street names is very rare to
see. This one is also misspelled and missing the O of Jackson.
36. So, I’ve talked about how we can assess the current condition of the sidewalk stamps until here, and now I’d like to talk about the design guideline. When I consider the design guideline, I referred to the cultural landscape treatment strategies from National Park Service, and there are 4 strategies: preservation, rehabilitation, restoration, and reconstruction. From top to down, the impact on the original works gets heavier as I color-coded the texts.
37. Based on those 4 strategies, I’ve categorized the solutions for each situation as you see in the boxes. I’ve added another category on top of these 4 strategies, which is dissemination. And I’ve created this decision tree which will guide you to the solutions based on the current sidewalk and stamp conditions. So, if there is a safety issue on the sidewalk, you move on to yes, and answer the next question, like is it covered with residential shrubs, and if the answer is yes, then Prune! Is it filled with moss, Excavate, if you need to replace the sidewalk and if you have cracks through the text, you can either install, transfer or archive. And if you don’t have any safety issues happening where you have the sidewalk stamp, there is the Do nothing option and keep it as it is and preserve them. We’ll take a look more closely with examples from here.
38. So this is the photo at Clark and Jefferson, and the stamps there are covered with residential shrubs. In that case, you can prune the overgrown part outside of the private area. Regular maintenance of vegetation is necessary.
39. If the sidewalk stamp is covered with a lawn, you need to trim the lawn so that the text is revealed.
40. If it is covered with leaves or debris, sweep them with a broom or leaf blower, and keep cleaning regularly.
41. When it is filled with moss, you need to scrape them out and keep excavating it.
42. When you need to replace the sidewalk and you don’t have cracks or you have cracks near the text, you can cut the stamp out. And replace the sidewalk and put the sidewalk that is cut out, keeping the original location and orientation. I’m showing here the bad and good examples. On the left, the stamp is cut through the text and can’t tell what it used to be. On the other hand, the good example shows that it is preserved in the new concrete sidewalk and also aligned to the concrete panels too.
43. When you don’t need to replace the sidewalk stamp, but you have cracks through the text, the solution is to fill. This brought me, as a Japanese, to the mind of the Kintsugi, the Japanese traditional art of fixing broken ceramics. This method uses lacquer to join the broken pieces and uses powder of gold to coat as the kin means gold in Japanese. Realistically, I chose bronze as the material to fill the cracks through sidewalk stamps.
44. When you need to replace the sidewalks and there are cracks through the text, one solution is to install. In this treatment, you make a mold from the existing sidewalk stamp and make a stamp from the mold, and use the stamp and install it on the new concrete sidewalk. And have the bronze cast around it, to protect it from further cracks.
45. Another way when you need to replace the sidewalks and when there are cracks through the text is to transfer the sidewalk stamp to a different material such as paper. The picture showing as a precedent here is from a book that has the whole collection of rubbings of stamps in Portland. I’ve tried this by using ink and paper for Japanese calligraphy, and it needed some techniques to do well, but I found this can show the
depth of the stamps well.
46. Another option is to archive the stamps of photographs and other information online when you need to replace the sidewalk. This is part of the work that I started on the Arc GIS story map and this kind of digital resource makes it accessible online. So, I’ve walked through how you can use the decision tree and I think the solutions are pretty simple and straightforward. But I’ve intentionally chosen something realistic to do
so that this decision tree will hopefully be used by the city of Eugene when they make the decision of replacing the sidewalk and take into consideration preserving those sidewalk stamps as local historic elements.
47. The future steps for this project can be further the development of digital resources and make them accessible to everyone, further the research stored in the archives. And further the research done on stamps.
48. Here are the resources. Thank you so much for listening.