Mrs. M. J. Divine Wins "Magaziner" Award

by Susan Glassman, Director, Wagner Free Institute of Science (Reprinted from The Philadelphia Architect, June 2003, AIA Philadelphia)

The Historic Preservation Committee of AIA Philadelphia is pleased to announce the selection of Mrs. M. J. Divine, better known as Mother Divine, to receive the Magaziner Award for 2003. The award, named in honor of well-known Philadelphia architect and preservation advocate Henry J. Magaziner, EFAIA, recognizes an individual, organization or project that significantly contributes to historic preservation in the region. Mother Divine was presented with the Magaziner Award at the Preservation Alliance's Awards Luncheon on May 15.

This year's recipient is particularly worthy of recognition. Mother Divine‹continuing the work of her husband, Father Divine, who founded the International Peace Mission Movement‹has been responsible for maintaining and restoring many significant historic buildings in the Philadelphia area.

The Peace Mission Movement was begun by the Reverend M. J. Divine (Father Divine), who first gained recognition as a preacher in the South during the early years of the 20th century. Father Divine established his first mission in Sayville, NY, in 1919 and rose to prominence over the next decades through preaching and innovative social programs that fed and employed many thousands of people during the Depression. In the early 1940s, the churches he founded were formally incorporated under the Peace Mission Movement, whose headquarters were moved during the Second World War from New York to Philadelphia. Father Divine¹s Peace Mission is notable for having embraced racial integration long before the national Civil Rights movement.

Although historic preservation was never an explicit goal of Father Divine or of the Peace Mission, he and Mother Divine (whom he married in 1946) nevertheless became loving stewards of a large number of historic properties. From the 1940s to the 1960s, they bought houses, churches, hotels and other public buildings in Philadelphia and its suburbs to house the Peace Mission's services, its followers and the businesses that they ran. Many of their acquisitions were once-fashionable Victorian mansions that had gradually fallen prey to neglect. Through the Peace Mission, these houses found new life.

Father and Mother Divine's efforts presaged the renewed interest in Victorian architecture of the 1960s and '70s. Among the many buildings they saved from demolition or disfigurement was the grand Lorraine apartment house on North Broad Street, which they bought in 1948. Originally built in 1893-94 by the architect Willis G. Hale, the building was converted into the Divine Lorraine Hotel, which is celebrated as one of the first high-end, racially integrated hotels in the country.

The houses they purchased were also carefully maintained and preserved and include three in Philadelphia with remarkably complete period interiors that feature leaded glass skylights, richly carved woodwork and elaborate decorative paint schemes. In 1948-the same year that they bought the Lorraine-Father and Mother Divine purchased the Disston House at 1530 N. 16th Street. Designed in 1881 by architect Edwin F. Durang, it is one of only a few houses in the country with an intact interior design by George Herzog. Finally, two other houses deserve special mention: 1420 North Broad Street, a circa-1870 brownstone, and 507 South Broad Street, an exuberant red brick and sandstone design influenced by the work of Frank Furness‹both of which maintain lavish interiors with a high level of historic integrity

In 1952, Father and Mother Divine acquired Woodmont, the Gladwyne country estate built for Alan Wood Jr., owner of the Alan Wood Iron and Steel Company in Conshohocken. Designed in 1892 by Quaker architect William L. Price, Woodmont is an outstanding example of chateau-style architecture, which preserves not only the striking forms of the house itself but also its ensemble of outbuildings and the dramatic sweeping lawn that frames the view of its elegant and gracefully elongated facade. Woodmont has served as the home of the Divines and the headquarters of the Peace Mission since its purchase. In 1998, the National Park Service designated it a National Historic Landmark.

In recent years, Mother Divine has developed an ongoing program of restoration and maintenance for the properties. She has worked with preservation architects to properly care for the buildings and carefully restore important architectural features. The large number of properties, their size and the range of building types and styles‹other buildings owned by the Peace Mission include the Unity Bible Mission Church Annex at 41st and Westminster Streets, originally built as a YMCA, and the Circle Mission Church and Training School, a converted double house at Christian and South Broad Streets‹make this a formidable and important endeavor.

For her protection and care of these historic properties, for her sensitivity in restoring and rehabilitating the sites, for her appreciation of the value and meaning of historic buildings, for her graciousness in opening the doors of the sites to the public and, above all, for a record of enlightened architectural stewardship that has extended over half a century, the Historic Preservation Committee is delighted to present the 2003 Magaziner Award to Mother Divine.

Mother Divine purchased and maintains the Disston House at 1530 N. 16th Street.

Above, Woodmont has served as the home of the Divines and the headquarters of the Peace Mission since its purchase