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Supporting Pennsylvania Hospital’s Save the Pine Building Initiative
April 24, 2007, Volume 53, No. 31

The Pine Building

The Pine Building, considered one of the finest examples of Colonial and Federal architecure in the city.

Executives of the third largest parking management company in North America, Impark Parking Corporation, headquartered in Vancouver, B.C., Canada, toured Pennsylvania Hospital’s Pine Building. The Pine Building, constructed in 1756, is the original hospital structure and represents the inception of healthcare and medical education in our nation.  In conclusion of the tour, Herbert Anderson, Jr., Impark Vice Chairman and CEO presented a check for $200,000, the first installment of a three-year commitment totaling $600,000 to Dr. Kate Kinslow, the hospital’s executive director and Board of Managers Chair Morris Cheston, of Ballard Spahr Andrews & Ingersoll, LLP.

This contribution represents a corporate benchmark gift and assists the Hospital in satisfying a matching gift prerequisite related to the receipt of a significant award from the National Trust for Historic Preservation—Save America’s Treasures 2007 Grant Program. In addition a number of individual donors, as well as Philadelphia’s First Hospital Foundation, join Impark and the National Trust, which gave a $350,000 grant, as contributors to the project and the $7 million goal established to address the building’s restoration, maintenance, and long-term preservation needs. The completion of this campaign will ensure that visitors, scholars, healthcare professionals, and school-age children will continue to tour the building, participate in structured program offerings, and use its historic resources for years to come.

In 2005 with funding received from the First Hospital Foundation, the Pennsylvania Hospital Board of Managers commissioned an architectural/engineering assessment of the condition of the Pine Building. Over a four-month period, S. Harris & Company, Philadelphia, conducted and completed the assessment of the existing and ongoing physical conditions that are present in the building with a goal of recommending a methodology of repairs for this National Historic Landmark.

As a result, the Save the Pine Building Initiative was launched in November 2006 by the Save the Pine Building Advisory Board. Henry Hope Reed, considered the nation’s foremost architectural historian, and Dr. C. Everett Koop, former United States Surgeon General who began his career as a Pennsylvania Hospital Resident, serve as the Board’s Honorary Co-Chairs. Alvin Holm, AIA, Philadelphia Chapter President, The Institute of Classical Architecture and Classical America, serves as the Board Chair. The Board is comprised of 14 members who represent medicine, historic preservation, architecture, philanthropy, and the community. They provide the leadership necessary to assist UPHS and Pennsylvania Hospital in bringing this magnificent structure to the forefront of Philadelphia’s historical built environment and to the forefront for acceptance as a national historic preservation priority.  

Pennsylvania Hospital—the nation’s first—was founded in 1751 by Benjamin Franklin and Dr. Thomas Bond. Today, the 515-bed acute care facility is part of UPHS and offers a full-range of diagnostic and therapeutic medical services and is a major teaching and clinical research institution. The hospital has over 25,000 admissions each year, including over 4,600 births. Pennsylvania Hospital is located in Society Hill.

Almanac - April 24, 2007, Volume 53, No. 31