By Katie Farrell Lovett
NEWBURYPORT — About two years ago, Pauline "Polly" Chase-Harrell began fully pursuing her idea of having the city designated as a National Historic Landmark District.
Since then, Chase-Harrell spent countless hours talking to different groups the city, meeting with city officials, and working with her friend and fellow architectural historian Brian Pfeiffer to get the process moving ahead.
Her firm, Boston Affiliates, recently worked with Nantucket to gain the designation for that town.
Chase-Harrell died on Tuesday at the age of 69, after battling melanoma for three decades. On the day before she passed away, her brother, Dick Chase, was able to tell her that her dream was moving forward. Mayor John Moak was signing and sending a letter to National Registrar of Historic Places asking how the city could begin the process of gaining that designation.
According to the National Park Service, a National Historic Landmark District is a nationally significant historic place, as determined by the Secretary of Interior.
"They possess exceptional value or quality in illustrating or interpreting the heritage of the United States," according to the agency's Web site.
Fewer than 2,500 historic places have this distinction.
If Newburyport earns this designation, it would be listed on Web sites and in publications distributed by the National Park Service, who would market it nationwide.
"It would help bring Newburyport national, and to some extent, international attention," resident Bill Harris said.
Harris said Chase-Harrell hoped the designation could also led to the National Park Service creating a waterfront visitors center in the city, which would provide tours with trained rangers. That isn't an automatic part of gaining the designation of a National Historic Landmark District, but it is a possibility.
"The potential is there," Harris said.
Dick Chase said yesterday that his sister saw the goal of making Newburyport a National Historic Landmark District as "the capstone of her career."
Being named a National Historic Landmark District would bring "a multitude of opportunities" to the city, he said, adding that he will work with her company to keep the project moving forward.
Learning that the letter was being sent, Polly was very pleased, Dick Chase said.
"She went with that knowledge," he said.
Chase-Harrell fought melanoma for 35 years and was told four different times that she only had a period of months to live, Dick Chase said. She kept living and enjoying life, he said of his sister, who was 11 years older than him and someone he calls "his kindred spirit."
Two weeks ago, she entered the hospital again.
In the letter he sent this week, Moak said the city "possesses national significance" under two of the program's criteria. Those criteria include "properties that are associated with events that have made a significant contribution to, and are identified with, or that outstandingly represent the broad national patterns of United States history and from which an understanding and appreciation of those patterns may be gained;" and "properties that embody the distinguishing characteristics of an architectural type specimen exceptionally valuable for a study of a period style, or method of construction, or that represent a significant, distinctive and exceptional entity whose components may lack individual distinction."
"The City of Newburyport retains one of the nation's most architecturally significant concentrations of urban architecture representing the late Georgian and Federal styles," Moak wrote. "This collection of architecture includes a rare concentration of brick commercial buildings erected after the 1811 fire in the downtown, as well as several important Georgian style mansions and a large number of three-story Federal style mansions, with dozens of high-style examples scattered the length of High, Green, State, Market and Federal streets, and many more simple examples of the same three-story type built for mechanics and artisans throughout all of the city's neighborhoods."
The process of seeking the designation could take one or two years.
Pfeiffer said yesterday he hopes to see the process through.
"Polly spent a good deal of time talking to a lot of people," Pfeiffer said.
A native of Newburyport, Chase-Harrell's family has owned Arrowhead Farm for generations. She has stayed active in the city, keeping her property here while also having a residence in Boston.
She was president and owner of Boston Affiliates. Polly was an Historic Preservationist affiliated with Boston Landmark Commission, the Boston Athenaeum, Victorian Society of America, Preservation Boston and multiple historical societies.
Pfeiffer said yesterday he hopes to bring Chase-Harrell's vision into reality, saying Newburyport is a "unique place with unbelievable historic architecture."
"She and I spent a lot of time wandering around Newburyport to try to lay this out," he said. "She was quite passionate about making this happen."
