Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: THURSDAY, February 7, 1991 TAG: 9102080260
SECTION: NEIGHBORS PAGE: S-3 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: MARY JO SHANNON/ SPECIAL TO THE ROANOKE TIMES & WORLD-NEWS
DATELINE: LENGTH: Long
That was the beginning of a career in architecture and engineering and a partnership in the Roanoke architecture and engineering firm, Hayes, Seay, Mattern and Mattern.
Hayes, 85, recently sat in the cluttered study of the Southwest Roanoke County home he designed and built 30 years ago and reminisced about his career.
As he talked, he leafed through a scrapbook filled with pictures of buildings, all of which he was instrumental in designing. Included are a number of Roanoke landmarks, such as the American Theatre, First Presbyterian Church and the Norfolk and Western General Office Building.
He paused as he reached the Norfolk and Western building, which has been described by Lee Winborne and Tony Whitwell in "The Architectural Heritage of the Roanoke Valley" as an outstanding example of art deco architecture.
"My first, and in my estimation, my best work," Hayes said pensively, before proceeding to describe the journey that resulted in those photographs.
Hayes retired in 1971 and now devotes his time to writing and helping his daughter operate a hobby shop at Towers Shopping Center. He has written his memoirs, and is writing a history of the American Theatre for the Roanoke Valley History Museum.
"When I wrote my memoirs, I made a rule to avoid romance, religion and politics," Hayes said, confessing that he frequently watches two soap operas - "As the World Turns" and "The Guiding Light" - "if I don't go to sleep" after eating lunch.
His memoirs describe a career that was influenced by an older brother.
Hayes was 11 when his father, a building contractor, inherited his old home place in Randolph County, N.C. The only son at home - four brothers and four sisters had left home - he learned from his father to use carpentry tools. At an early age, Hayes decided to become an architect.
"I admired my older brother, Tom, and saw that he was making a good living as an architect in Winston-Salem [N.C.]. He encouraged my interest in his career and gave me a T-square, a triangle and some scales and then taught me how to make some drawings. I made my own drawing board,"he said.
After several years in a two-room school, and tutoring in high school subjects, Hayes left home at age 18. He was determined to become a registered architect, "come hell or high water."
He got a three-year apprenticeship as office boy and draftsman for the Winston-Salem firm where his brother worked. An architect on leave from the faculty of Carnegie Tech helped Hayes enroll in a correspondence course at Beaux Arts Institute in New York. He also supervised Hayes' drawings for a manor house for Bowman Gray, president of R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Co. That house, "Graylyn," is used by Wake Forest University as a conference center.
Hayes came to Roanoke in 1927 to work in the office of Louis Phillipe Smithey, architect/engineer. Smithey, who later joined Henry Boynton to form the engineering firm, Smithey and Boynton, was like a second father, Hayes said.
"He was a great influence in my life, not only as an architect, but also as a man."
While working for Smithey, Hayes helped prepare drawings for the American Theatre, a Jefferson Street movie house that was torn down in 1973. He helped complete the work when the architect hired to do the project left town.
During this time, Hayes also helped design the Salem Theater, the Lyric Theater, the South Roanoke fire station and a number of Roanoke schools and residences.
One of his most interesting projects was First Presbyterian Church. He made several working drawings and some details for the church, which, he said, taught him "quite a bit about Gothic architecture."
This experience was useful when he designed the Huntington Court United Methodist Church on Williamson Road.
Although he was gaining practical experience, Hayes felt the need for formal instruction to achieve his goal. In the fall of 1928, he enrolled in the junior class at Carnegie Institute of Technology in Pittsburgh and received credit for his previous work at Beaux Arts. He worked as a carpenter and waiter to finance his education.
June 1929 found him back in Roanoke with Smithey, but business was slow, and many draftsmen were "farmed out." Hayes went to work on plans for the N&W office building.
The N&W management had decided that plans submitted by an outside firm were unacceptable so Hayes asked for the opportunity to submit a design. His plan for the General Office Building was approved unanimously.
Hayes returned to work with Smithey after completing the N&W job, but now he had a wife, the former Elizabeth Smith. And the Great Depression had started. Smithey had to close his office.
Hayes said he survived with the help of his wife and his carpentry skills until Smithey called him back to work. Contracts for schools and armories, under Roosevelt's Public Works Building Program, kept the firm busy.
Hayes began preparing himself for registration as an architect. In the spring of 1938, he passed the exam on the first trial and began to dream of opening his own office.
His dream was put on hold because of World War II. Hayes moved his wife and daughter, Elizabeth, to Norfolk while he worked for a firm that did jobs for the military. Gilbert Seay, an electrical engineer from Roanoke, also was working for the company.
Hayes returned to Roanoke in 1946 with his family that now included a son, Edgar Paul, and opened his own office on Kirk Avenue.
He became consulting architect for Ed and Gil Mattern, a fledgling engineering firm, and later he and Seay joined the firm to form Hayes, Seay, Mattern and Mattern.
The firm's work includes the State Office Building in Richmond; the first interstate highway section in the state, south of Richmond; the Richard Poff Federal Building and a Roanoke post office.
Keywords:
PROFILE
by CNB