It was built to be imposing, and staying there was definitely a punishment.

The Old City Jail.
Photo by David Sheppard

The Old City Jail in Charleston, South Carolina, was built in 1802, a four-story octagonal building with brick walls four feet thick, massive iron bars covering its windows, a sixteen-foot brick wall surrounding the one-acre grounds, and a 40-foot tower from which guards kept a watchful eye. The floors were divided into several large rooms, each of which held as many as one hundred prisoners.

Where prisoners were incarcerated depended on the severity of their crimes. The most violent criminals were held on the top floor, while those convicted of minor offenses, such as nonpayment of debts, stayed on the ground floor. It was miserably hot in the summer and unbearably cold in the winter. Along with the adjacent buildings for housing slaves and the Marine Hospital, it was an important part of Charleston’s municipal government.

On August 31, 1886, an earthquake struck Charleston. While the jail was the only one of its group of buildings to survive, it lost its top floor and the tower that had dominated the compound. Repairs were eventually made, and the jail remained in use for another fifty years, until a more modern structure was opened in 1939. The Old City Jail was forlorn and neglected for another fifty years—until Hugo blew into town.

The South Carolina Low Country was devastated by the 1989 hurricane. Shortly after the disaster, John Paul Huguley, a structural engineer from Boston, was invited down to help restore the many historic homes and buildings that had been damaged. To his dismay, he found only a small number of artisans who could match the quality craftsmanship of the original builders.

The imposing gate at the entrance to one of ACBA's three locations, the Old City Jail.
Photo by David Sheppard

This situation isn’t unique to Charleston. Across the U.S., historic structures from private homes to national treasures are deteriorating for lack of qualified craftspeople. Huguley decided it was time to reverse that trend, helped the project and idea gain momentum, and in 1998 the School of the Building Arts (SoBA) became a blessing to the church-filled town nicknamed Holy City.

SoBA was established to preserve and teach building arts such as carpentry, ironwork, masonry, plasterwork, stone-carving, and timber-framing through hands-on workshops, classes, lectures, and fieldtrips. The Old City Jail was an obvious example of the urgent need for the school. When SoBA purchased the building in 2000 for its headquarters, it had been inhabited only by ghosts and pigeons for 61 years.

Today, the Old City Jail is still an imposing structure, but it has the sad look of a once-vibrant building waiting to be brought back to life. Tall grass covers piles of rocks, slabs of brilliant white marble, and pieces of rusting metal. Rows of rusty folding chairs lean against the building. Vines grow up the walls. Weeds sprout where the stucco has fallen away from the crumbling bricks underneath. On this July afternoon, the grounds are hot and dusty, and only a few mockingbirds seem willing to break the silence.

Long white tents set up in the yard shelter a large woodworking project, and apart from a couple of people in the tents, no one else is around. To get to the administrative offices, you enter a low door on the side of the building, first opening one of the heavy iron gates that block each door. The offices are at the top of a 150-year-old wooden spiral staircase inside one of the two towers that flank the main entrance. This part of the Old City Jail was added in 1850 to house the warden and his family

David AvRutick, President of the American College of the Building Arts. Photo courtesy ACBA.

Since 2003 David AvRutick has been president of the school, which changed its name to the American College of the Building Arts (www.BuildingArtsCollege.us) last year when it became college accredited. ACBA is the first U.S. school to offer a four-year bachelor’s degree in the traditional building trades.

AvRutick isn’t a craftsman—his background is in law and publishing. But with his confident, unassuming personality and his knowledge of (and enthusiasm for) ACBA and its mission, it’s easy to see why he was chosen to bring Huguley’s ideas to fruition. With the opening convocation and orientation for ACBA’s inaugural class only a month away, AvRutick is a very busy man.

Training facilities aren’t ready. Some faculty positions remain unfilled. Potential students—AvRutick hopes for an initial enrollment of 40—are still being considered. But he is unfazed. ACBA, like the jail building, is a work in progress.

The original plan called for the entire college to be housed in and around the Old City Jail, with restoration of the jail providing hands-on experience for all the disciplines. But in order for this plan to work, the school needed to acquire some adjacent property for its classrooms and workshops. After extensive negotiations fell through, it was decided to designate the jail as ACBA’s downtown campus, and the search began for a second, main campus site.

In December 2004, ACBA spent $850,000 to purchase the 38-acre McLeod Plantation—located on James Island across the Ashley River from Charleston—from the Historic Charleston Foundation. The plantation was first established in 1671 and had several owners until it was purchased by William McLeod in 1851. At its peak, McLeod’s plantation consisted of more than 900 acres, was worked by 74 slaves, and produced more cotton than almost any other South Carolina plantation.

McLeod’s circa-1856 house, five slave cabins, and several other outbuildings still exist on the property and will be renovated for use by ACBA. But despite what many saw as a perfect match, a group calling itself Friends of McLeod, Inc. opposed the sale and filed three lawsuits against the Historic Charleston Foundation. Its concerns centered around the additional buildings ACBA planned to build and the many—some estimate hundreds—of unmarked Gullah and Civil War graves on the property they felt would be desecrated.

Entrance to McLeod Plantation.
Photo by David Sheppard

In a letter to the editor of the Charleston Post and Courier, the trustees of Historic Charleston Foundation made their position clear: “the Foundation has committed 11 years and more than $1.5 million to protect and stabilize McLeod Plantation until such time as we can find a buyer with the resources and integrity to undertake its stewardship, a buyer committed to the same strict preservation standards as Historic Charleston Foundation, whose preservation ethics, initiatives and successes have set the national standard for preservationists across the country for half a century…. Through the plantation’s sale to the American College of the Building Arts…McLeod’s historical integrity and future are guaranteed.”

Philip Simmons, Blacksmith
David Sheppard

Phillip Simmons, 93. Blacksmith, instructor, advisor, and National Heritage fellow. Photo courtesy of ACBA.

According to American College of Building Arts president David AvRutick, Philip Simmons is the “inspirational founder” of the school. At age 93 and one of the last remaining African-American blacksmiths in the United States, Simmons continues to inspire nearly everyone he meets.

The master blacksmith was born in 1912 on Daniel Island, back when it was one of many sparsely populated rural communities around Charleston, South Carolina. As he described it in a 2001 oral history interview for the Smithsonian Institution, “Daniels Island was a place noted for farming, fishing, and hunting. That’s all went on on Daniels Island.” Today Daniel Island is an upscale development of townhomes and tennis courts.

When he was eight years old, his grandmother sent him to Charleston to get an education. ”They had better schools in Charleston than they had over on that island,” he says in the Smithsonain transcript. On his walk to school each morning, he would pass the shop of Peter Simmons (no relation), one of the fifteen blacksmiths active in Charleston at the time. The young Simmons was determined to learn the trade, but the blacksmith wouldn’t let him work in the shop until he was 13.

He started the day after his 13th birthday and worked in the same shop for 75 years. At first the work was shoeing horses and repairing wagons and buggies. As that era died out, Simmons made the change to working on automobiles, building trailers, and even making cargo hooks and other equipment for ships during World War II. During the 1940s he began producing the ornamental ironwork for which he is best known today.

There are more than 200 Philip Simmons gates in Charleston, as well as countless fences, balcony railings, and window grilles.
Although he marked all his pieces, Simmons kept no specific records and simply can’t remember everything he made.

The Philip Simmons Foundation was established to find and catalogue all his work in Charleston. To date, more than 500 pieces have been identified and recorded.
Simmons received the National Heritage Fellowship in 1982 from the National Endowment for the Arts—it’s the highest honor the United States can bestow on a traditional artist. He’s also the recipient of South Carolina’s “lifetime achievement” award and “The Order of the Palmetto,” its highest civilian honor.

Pieces of his work have been acquired by the National Museum of History, the Smithsonian Institution, and the Atlanta History Center, among others, and 80 years after he first picked up a hammer, he still designs commissioned ironworks. The garden of Charleston’s St. John’s Reformed Episcopal Church is dedicated to him both for his ironwork and inspirational character.

As an instructor and advisor for ACBA, Simmons will continue to inspire the unique students who want to make sure his legacy will continue to grow.

According to AvRutick, the legally binding preservation easements, as well as vigilance by the Historic Charleston Foundation and others, will make it nearly impossible for ACBA to compromise the historic, structural, architectural, or cultural integrity of the site.

The purchase of the McLeod Plantation was a great step forward for ACBA. Unfortunately, those strict preservation easements mean the site won’t be ready for ACBA use for at least two or three years. In January 2005, with the school scheduled to open in August, AvRutick had two campuses, neither of which would be ready in time for orientation. His solution? Find a third campus.

Over in North Charleston, the largest sustainable redevelopment project in the U.S. is taking place as a joint venture between the Noisette Company and the City of North Charleston. The Noisette Company (www.NoisetteSC.com), under the guidance of its co-founder and CEO John Knott, has built a worldwide reputation as a leader in sustainable urban redevelopment, historic preservation, and “green,” environmentally friendly construction. Part of what has become known as the Noisette Project involves the revitalization of the old Charleston Naval Base.

ACBA will move into one of the base’s warehouse buildings, a $2 million renovation project Noisette calls Ten Storehouse Row. While ACBA will occupy 40 percent of the 38,500-square-foot 1939-era facility, the remaining space is being divided into, among other things, six 750-square-foot studios for artists, architects, and designers; a coffeeshop; and a 3,000-square-foot restaurant.

With just over a month before the first students arrive and much work still to be done, it seemed unlikely that the building would be ready on time, but AvRutick, characteristically confident, is certain the renovation—which included the removal of asbestos and lead paint—will be completed by Noisette’s August 1st deadline.

As an accredited four-year college, ACBA graduates will receive either an associate’s or bachelor’s degree in Applied Sciences. In addition to studying the building arts, students must take regular academic classes such as mathematics and English. AvRutick says the academic classes will be part of an “integrated curriculum in which all of the classes relate to one another. We encourage all students, regardless of their educational background, to take all classes.”

The concept of integrating academic and craft components is an important aspect of Les Compagnons du Devoir, a 600-year-old French building-arts school which ACBA is using as a model for curriculum development as well as for the daunting task of preserving the historic integrity of McLeod Plantation while transforming it into a working campus within the strict preservation guidelines laid out by the Historic Charleston Foundation.

In brief, the integration means that no matter what the topic, it will be applied to the building arts. Instead of Biology 101, for example, the students will take Material Science, which explores the natural, physical, and chemical makeup of materials such as stone, mortar, and hardwood. An emphasis on cross discipline means a building being studied in history class can become the subject of an English essay.

Maximum enrollment once the college has four full classes will be 144 students—24 for each of six disciplines: architectural stonework, carpentry, masonry, plaster, ornamental iron-working, and timber-framing The criteria for evaluating student applications is like everything else about ACBA, i.e., not exactly traditional. “We look at academics, test scores, personality.” AvRutick says. “But we also want to see a passion for what we are doing. We look at creative ability.” By the end of June, 20 students had been accepted.

The Old City Jail will continue to house the administrative offices as well as ACBA’s youth program, continuing-education classes, and certification program. The youth program involves partnerships with both the College of Charleston and Drayton Hall, an historic Charleston plantation on the Ashley River owned by the National Trust for Historic Preservation. Local elementary- and high-school students visit Drayton Hall to help them understand the need for historic preservation, then spend time at the jail to see how preservation is actually undertaken.

Eventually the jail will house the certification program for builders and craftspeople already working in the field. It will allow them to take classes and workshops to earn certification at ACBA standards in a particular discipline. According to AvRutick, input from the professional community has been encouraging.

The feeling of one local craftsman, who has worked for the National Trust for Historic Preservation, could best be described as cautiously optimistic: “The state of the trades is pretty dismal, and these houses attest eloquently to that fact. We don’t have [skilled] workmen like that anymore. There’s lots of interest and support for what the college is doing, but placement [of graduates] is the big question.”

With pleas for skilled artisans coming in from around the country before the first class has even started, however, there’s nothing cautious about AvRutick’s optimism.

Funding for ACBA has come from a variety of sources, most notably a $2.75 million grant last December from the U.S. Department of Labor Employment and Training Administration, awarded because of the trained-worker shortage in the high-growth construction industry. In 2003 First Lady Laura Bush announced the Save America’s Treasures Project, a national effort to protect threatened cultural structures, collections, art, maps, and journals, had awarded the college a $500,000 matching grant. Half the match funding quickly arrived from the 1772 Foundation, which provides grants for brick-and-mortar projects.

The Florence Gould Foundation, a U.S. organization devoted to French-American exchange and amity, awarded the school a $200,000 grant to fund ACBA’s work with Les Compagnon du Devoir. And an anonymous supporter pledged $83,000.

In January 2005 the college announced the establishment of its first endowed scholarship fund, the Nancy D. Hawk Scholarship. Hawk is the current chair of ACBA’s board of directors; the endowment was created by her family.

ACBA is assembling an international faculty with literally hundreds of years of practical experience from Buckingham Palace to Colonial Williamsburg. In David AvRutick, the college has an impressive leader and perhaps its most enthusiastic and vocal supporter. Positive energy and an auspicious beginning, however, don’t guarantee continued success.

While much remains to be done before the first day of class, the real questions will take much longer to answer. Can ACBA secure long-term funding? Will enough students be able to pay the $20,000 annual tuition? Will the job market support ACBA graduates at a level that makes a $40,000 or $80,000 degree worthwhile? AvRutick sees beyond these questions

“The American College of the Building Arts is built on tradition,” he says, “and we want it to become a tradition that will still be here in a hundred years.”

David Sheppard has been restoring antique and vintage stringed instruments for 30 years. He specializes in Gibson guitars from the 1930’s and 1940’s.  An accomplished musician, he is also a large format photographer (primarily using a Deardorff 11x14 camera). He prints exclusively in platinum/palladium and his photographs have been in several solo and group shows. He lives with his wife near Charleston, South Carolina.