Historic American Buildings Survey (HABS) Team

Heritage Documentation Programs (HDP) is a division of the U.S.

National Park Service The National Park Service (NPS) is an agency of the United States federal government within the U.S. Department of the Interior that manages all national parks, most national monuments, and other natural, historical, and recreational properti ...

(NPS) responsible for administering the Historic American Buildings Survey (HABS), Historic American Engineering Record (HAER), and Historic American Landscapes Survey (HALS). These programs were established to document historic places in the United States. Records consist of measured drawings, archival photographs, and written reports, and are archived in the Prints and Photographs Division of the

Library of Congress The Library of Congress (LOC) is the research library that officially serves the United States Congress and is the ''de facto'' national library of the United States. It is the oldest federal cultural institution in the country. The libra ...

Historic American Buildings Survey

In 1933, NPS established the Historic American Buildings Survey following a proposal by

Charles E. Peterson Charles Emil Peterson (1906–2004) is widely considered to be a seminal figure in professionalizing the practice of historic preservation in the United States. He is referred to as the "founding father" of the professional advocation of historic ...

, a young

landscape architect A landscape architect is a person who is educated in the field of landscape architecture. The practice of landscape architecture includes: site analysis, site inventory, site planning, land planning, planting design, grading, storm water manage ...

in the agency. It was founded as a constructive make-work program for architects, draftsmen and photographers left jobless by the

Great Depression The Great Depression (19291939) was an economic shock that impacted most countries across the world. It was a period of economic depression that became evident after a major fall in stock prices in the United States. The economic contagio ...

. It was supported through the Historic Sites Act of 1935. Guided by field instructions from Washington, D.C., the first HABS recorders were tasked with documenting a representative sampling of America's

architectural heritage ''Architectural Heritage'' is an academic journal published by Edinburgh University Press on behalf of the Architectural Heritage Society of Scotland in November each year. It was founded in 1991. The journal focuses on architectural history an ...

. They began to document America's

built environment The term built environment refers to human-made conditions and is often used in architecture, landscape architecture, urban planning, public health, sociology, and anthropology, among others. These curated spaces provide the setting for human ...

, carrying out multi-format surveys that amassed a "more than 581,000 measured drawings, large-format photographs, written histories, and original field notes for more than 43,000 historic structures and sites dating from Pre-Columbian times to the twentieth century." By creating an archive of historic architecture, HABS provided a

database In computing, a database is an organized collection of data stored and accessed electronically. Small databases can be stored on a file system, while large databases are hosted on computer clusters or cloud storage. The design of databases ...

of primary source material and documentation for the then-fledgling

historic preservation Historic preservation (US), built heritage preservation or built heritage conservation (UK), is an endeavor that seeks to preserve, conserve and protect buildings, objects, landscapes or other artifacts of historical significance. It is a philos ...

movement. Earlier private projects included

Eleanor Raymond Eleanor Raymond (March 4 1887 – July 24 1989) was an American architect. During a professional career spanning some sixty years of practice, mainly in residential housing, Raymond explored the use of innovative materials and building system ...

's ''Early Domestic Architecture of Pennsylvania'' (1931), Charles Morse Stotz's Western Pennsylvania Architectural Survey and the White Pine Series of Architectural Monographs. Many of their contributors later joined the HABS program. Important HABS photographers include Jack Boucher, who worked for the project for over 40 years;

Robert W. Tebbs Robert W. Tebbs (1875–1945) was an American photographer professionally active in the early to mid-twentieth century who specialized in architectural photography. Tebbs is most noted for his 1926 historical photo-essay of the plantations of Lo ...

New Orleans New Orleans ( , ,New Orleans

, Louis and Ida Schwartz in

Charleston, South Carolina Charleston is the largest city in the U.S. state of South Carolina, the county seat of Charleston County, and the principal city in the Charleston–North Charleston metropolitan area. The city lies just south of the geographical midpoint o ...

, James Butters in

Mississippi Mississippi () is a state in the Southeastern region of the United States, bordered to the north by Tennessee; to the east by Alabama; to the south by the Gulf of Mexico; to the southwest by Louisiana; and to the northwest by Arkansas. Miss ...

Richard J. Levy Richard is a male given name. It originates, via Old French, from Old Frankish and is a compound of the words descending from Proto-Germanic ''*rīk-'' 'ruler, leader, king' and ''*hardu-'' 'strong, brave, hardy', and it therefore means 'stron ...

Los Angeles Los Angeles ( ; es, Los Ángeles, link=no , ), often referred to by its initials L.A., is the largest city in the state of California and the second most populous city in the United States after New York City, as well as one of the world ...

. and Jet Lowe.

Historic American Engineering Record

The Historic American Engineering Record (HAER) program was founded on January 10, 1969, by NPS and the

American Society of Civil Engineers American(s) may refer to: * American, something of, from, or related to the United States of America, commonly known as the "United States" or "America" ** Americans, citizens and nationals of the United States of America ** American ancestry, p ...

. HAER documents historic sites, structures, mechanical, and engineering artifacts. The Maritime Administration works with HAER to "document historic vessels prior to their disposal." Since the advent of HAER, the combined program is typically called "HABS/HAER". Eric DeLony headed HAER from 1987 to 2003.

Historic American Landscapes Survey

In October 2000, NPS and the American Society of Landscape Architects established a sister program, the Historic American Landscapes Survey, to systematically document historic American landscapes. A predecessor, the Historic American Landscape and Garden Project, recorded historic Massachusetts gardens between 1935 and 1940. That project was funded by the

Works Progress Administration The Works Progress Administration (WPA; renamed in 1939 as the Work Projects Administration) was an American New Deal agency that employed millions of jobseekers (mostly men who were not formally educated) to carry out public works projects, i ...

, but was administered by HABS, which supervised the collection of records. In 2001, along with the Library of Congress, the NPS, and the American Society of Landscape Architects signed a Memorandum of Understanding which established a working relationship between the three organizations. Following the signing of this agreement, these organizations together signed the Tripartite Agreement in 2010, making "HALS a permanent federal program". The NPS deals with the planning and operations of HALS, standardizes the formats and develops the guidelines for recording landscapes.

Library of Congress

The permanent collection of HABS/HAER/HALS are housed at the

, which was established in 1790 (and reestablished after the disastrous fire of 1814 in Washington, D.C. by purchasing former third President

Thomas Jefferson Thomas Jefferson (April 13, 1743 – July 4, 1826) was an American statesman, diplomat, lawyer, architect, philosopher, and Founding Fathers of the United States, Founding Father who served as the third president of the United States from 18 ...

's personal library at Monticello in 1815) as the replacement reference library of the

United States Congress The United States Congress is the legislature of the federal government of the United States. It is Bicameralism, bicameral, composed of a lower body, the United States House of Representatives, House of Representatives, and an upper body, ...

. It has since been expanded to serve as the national library of the United States; U.S. publishers are required to deposit a copy of every copyrighted and published work, book monograph and magazine. As a branch of the

United States Government The federal government of the United States (U.S. federal government or U.S. government) is the national government of the United States, a federal republic located primarily in North America, composed of 50 states, a city within a feder ...

, its created works are in the

public domain The public domain (PD) consists of all the creative work to which no exclusive intellectual property rights apply. Those rights may have expired, been forfeited, expressly waived, or may be inapplicable. Because those rights have expired ...

in the US. Many images, drawings, and documents are available through the Prints and Photographs Online Catalog, including proposed, demolished, and existing structures; locales, projects, and designs.

References

External links

Records of the Historic American Buildings Survey (HABS)/Historic American Engineering Record (HAER) Division
Guide to Federal Records
National Park Service (NPS): official Heritage Documentation Programs website

Library of Congress HABS/HAER/HALS Collection

Photographer Stepen Schafer BLOG: Frequently Asked Questions about HABS, HAER and HALS website

New England based Photographer Andrew Baugnet specializes in HABS/HAER photographic documentation
* Historic American Buildings Survey (HABS) Collection at the

University of Maryland Libraries The University of Maryland Libraries is the largest university library in the Washington, D.C. - Baltimore area. The university's library system includes eight libraries: six are located on the College Park campus, while the Severn Library, an o ...