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Local Craftsman Re-creates 1910 Campus
by Nicole Robinson & Mee Vang
Click to enlarge
The past is present
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In a small workshop in a renovated building in downtown Marshall, Doug Mackenzie works to make Mars Hill College history come alive.
The French Broad River runs right under his workshop. Beside the river is the railroad track where the trains come through town unpredictably.
Here Mackenzie and his assistant Liam Andrews, a 2005 Mars Hill College graduate, are building a three-dimensional scale model of Mars Hill College as it was during the year 1910. The model, commissioned for Mars Hill's sesquicentennial celebration, is scheduled to be unveiled on June 3, during the 50th reunion of the class of 1956.
In Mackenzie's workshop you smell the strong and fresh scent of wood and see the craftsman's tools he is using to build a timeless Mars Hill College treasure that will be with the college for years to come.
Mackenzie is a self-employed carpenter who started building scale models after being a set designer for the Asheville Community Theatre and a prop master for TV and film commercials. He also builds staircases and entranceways for houses. He built a spiral staircase for his own combined workshop and house, which he is renovating. His house used to be a movie theater, then a supermarket, and later a muffler shop.
Mackenzie puts a lot of man-hours into the work he does. The scale is 30 feet to one inch.
It takes him about three days to put together each building. "It's taking a lot longer than it should because of the research," he said. He has to look at numerous old photos to figure out what the buildings looked like and where they were located in 1910. He then redraws the sides of each building in PhotoShop, then reduces them to scale and glues the printouts to the models.
Andrews is assisting him, and Mars Hill College Senior Amber Ponder is helping with the research. They are using photographs from archives in the Ramsey Center, the Appalachian Room, and other libraries. Ninety percent of the photos have come from the college.
Mackenzie is also using topographic maps of the Mars Hill area to help re-create the landscape. As he was working with the maps, he realized that "all the grading work done over the last hundred years has changed the topography of the area."
He and Andrews have also made about 2,500 handmade trees, using a dried plant or some type of twig.
Click to enlarge
Hilltop reporters Mee Vang and Nicole Robinson with Doug Mackenzie in his shop
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The Class of 1956 has agreed to underwrite the cost of the models. If the money can be raised, Mackenzie is scheduled to do two more models of the campus as it looked in 1966 and as it will look in 2007. Those years were chosen because they are times when the presidents organized major expansions of the college.
In 1910 there were no buildings on Men's or Women's hills. Mackenzie's model so far shows Marshbanks and Founders Hall and "First Building" - the first building on campus, built in 1856. It also shows Treat Dormitory, which stood on the site of the present Blackwell Hall until it burned in 1977. The footprints of other buildings are already laid out on the model, and Mackenzie will add some cows and some wagon trails.
The 1910 model will display the campus during winter, with snow covering the the beautiful North Carolina countryside. The 1966 model would show the colors of autumn spreading rapidly around the campus. The 2007 model would be a summer scene, showing the new dormitory, the new science building addition, and the greenery of nature.
The 1910 model is 4-feet by 5-feet and will weigh about 150 pounds. "It is REALLY heavy", said Mackenzie's assistant, Liam Andrews. It will be on display in Blackwell Hall on the first floor. It will be under glass on an oak table, which Mackenzie will also build.
Editor's Note: The unveiling of the scale model of Mars Hill College during the year 1910 will take place on Saturday, June 3, at 11:30 a.m. in Blackwell Hall.
Reader Comment:
Liam Andrews 10/17/2007, 10:09 a.m.
I must say it was an honor, a blast, working with Doug Mackenzie, and I was just amazed at how much I learned from him. I must say that I was very sorry to to leave N.C., for I was hoping for another chance to work with Doug. Doug has a wonderful family, and my time was more then well spent working with him. Hope every one enjoys the model. Cheers.
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