When Tyler McDaniel was about 10, and Radford’s Harvey House was 117, they met. Every morning, walking to school, Tyler would gaze down the mossy walk to the handsome Queen Anne house its arcaded porch gallery, its oriel and gable windows and its strong roofline, like a castle or a ship, and wonder what it looked like inside, what was in there.
For years he wondered until he and his Dad found the owner of the historic property, A.C. Wilson.
“They pulled up in the backyard and his Dad said his son were interested in the house. We showed him around and thought, Oh it’s a passing fancy and we’d never see him again,” he said.
Not so, Wilson said and invited the young man to visit the Harvey House as well as Ingle’s Castle with its civil war cannonball in the library.
“High caliber young man. We thought, This is the real thing,” he said.
By 2016, Tyler fashioned his Eagle Scout project around the house.
“He was working on an Eagle Scout project with Troop 244 Radford. He wanted to inventory the house. We were delighted and happily accepted,” Wilson said.
He documented the chairs, egg beaters, pots and pans, mirrors and mantles, the stoves – creating a cataloging system for the house built by noted Philadelphia architect Frank Miles Day.
“He would go room by room and look at the pieces, photograph them and describe everything. It was a dream come true,” Wilson said.
“From this point on, I became involved with the restoration process and the cataloging of the collections inside the house,” McDaniel recalls.
The rest, as they say, is history.
He wrote a letter to Bill Cecil Jr., the owner of the colossal 1890s American fairy-tale castle The Biltmore Estate in the forests of Asheville, NC. McDaniel asked about how the Biltmore catalogued the vast estate.
Birds of a feather, Vanderbilt heir, Cecil, called “a champion of the house’s preservation and success” wrote back and invited the young man to meet with Biltmore’s Collections Manager, Laura Cope and have a behind the scenes look at Biltmore House
“At Biltmore, Laura showed me how to safely clean historic fabric, wood, etc., as well as how Biltmore catalogs their collection,” McDaniel said.
She could see during their meeting, said Cope, that he has potential for historic conservation.
“It’s encouraging to see someone at such a young age inspired by this kind of work,” she said. “It’s a lot of detail work and it takes a specific type of person to want to do it.”
At Virginia Tech now, majoring in architecture, he’s recently been awarded the Presidential Sites Summit scholarship by the White House Historical Association.
The essay he submitted describes his interest in historic preservation and restoration and, importantly, the experiences he made happen at the Harvey House and the Biltmore.
The Presidential Sites Summit is a gathering of people in Washington, DC every two years to talk about the architecture, interiors, furnishings, gardens and grounds of the White House itself and houses important to American presidents – people who are keepers of the art and science of conservation, research and preservation in the context of the American presidency.
“Within a couple weeks, I heard that I had been awarded the scholarship and before I knew it, I was off to DC,” McDaniel said.
The event was held at the Willard Intercontinental Hotel, which was, said McDaniel “very nice” and “several Presidents have stayed there or lived there.”
There were several speakers during the lunch, including a former White House chef who worked for three presidents who shared memories of working in the White House.
This year’s summit brought together leaders from presidential sites around the country, presidential libraries, Monticello and Mt. Vernon, entitled “Back to the White House “because the White House is what all presidents have in common,” McDaniel said.
Notably, the conference explored the importance of White House, presidential history, and the importance of the preservation of the White House as a landmark,” he said.
“The highlight of the summit was a reception at the White House hosted by President and Mrs. Trump. At the reception, all of the tour ropes were down and we could sit on the furniture and walk on the carpets,” he said.
“Later in the evening, we were all gathered into the East Room and I happened to be in the front where the President would soon speak. “The President of the United States” was announced and President Trump and Melania walked in.”
“Melania gave an introduction and then the president spoke for 20 minutes or so and introduced Vice President Mike Pence and Karen Pence as well as Ben Carson and several others.”
“At the end of the speech, President Trump allowed us all to tour the West Wing and Oval Office.”
“As he and Melania stepped down from the podium, they walked down to greet and shake the hands of the guests in the front row, one of which was me. “
“The Trump’s were so gracious as they greeted us. They would stop and hear everything we had to say before they moved along to the next person,” McDaniel recalled.
Just few years earlier, on a family trip to DC, standing outside the White House gates he had viewed the House from a far.
“I never thought that I would be granted the opportunity to attend a reception hosted by the President and First Lady, get to meet them and walk through the Oval Office,” he said.
Currently, a sophomore at Tech, once he graduates, he hopes to open his own firm that specializes in historic restoration and custom residential design.
He merits his “crafting ability in architecture from my Dad [a machinist at Kollmorgen] and my hard work ethic from my Mom,” McDaniel said.
