THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Sunday, September 3, 1995 TAG: 9509050180
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B3 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY KERRY DOUGHERTY, STAFF WRITER
LENGTH: Long : 108 lines
When an immovable object meets the Matyiko brothers, something is going to move.
Houses, airplane hangars, a giant ape - you name it, these Virginia Beach natives have moved it. John, Joe, Jimmie and Jerry own Expert House Movers - the only company in the world to have moved a lighthouse.
Not just any lighthouse - one of the biggest in New England. A 2,000-ton, five-story brick building with deteriorating 100-year-old mortar.
You can witness their moving experience tonight at 9 p.m. on TBS when National Geographic Explorer documents the Matyiko's move of the Southeast Lighthouse on Block Island, R.I., in a segment entitled ``Lighthouse To Go.''
The show was filmed during the summer of 1993 when these four husky brothers who grew up in Blackwater dazzled islanders by dragging the historic lighthouse 350 feet - away from the eroding cliff on which it perched.
The Matyikos have been moving heavy things since their father, the late John Matyiko, decided to transplant a few houses in 1957. He was in the land-clearing business at the time, clearing runways for Langley Field. A few houses needed to be moved, and John Matyiko reckoned he could do it - with the help of his four sons. Before you could say hydraulic jack, the family was in the house-moving business.
Over the years they moved hundreds of standard ranch houses, but the boys acquired a taste for a challenge. They've lifted-up-here-and-put-down-there a hangar at Oceana, several historic buildings in Williamsburg, the Life-Saving Museum of Virginia and a building or two at the University of Virginia .
Remember the original Hugh Mongous, the giant ape who stood sentry at Ocean Breeze Festival Park? When Hugh was torched in 1989, the Matyiko brothers gently moved him to his final resting place.
``It's never routine,'' John Matyiko says, grinning. ``I couldn't stand it if the work got monotonous.''
No danger of that so far.
The brothers even have moved themselves. Two of them have moved away from Virginia Beach. Jerry operates Expert House Movers in Salisbury, Md., and Joe and his three grown sons opened Expert House Movers in Missouri, where they've been busy relocating houses out of the flood plain.
In fact, Joe and the boys moved an entire town to higher ground: Rhineland, Mo.
All the Matyikos came together for the lighthouse job. And they agree, it would be hard to conceive of a more difficult move.
``It was a nightmare in some ways,'' Jimmie says, sitting in the living room of his Chesapeake home. ``We floated most the stuff up there by barge, but being on an island, every little thing we needed in a hurry had to be flown in from the mainland.''
The Block Island move cost $2.25 million. Much of that money was raised by islanders determined to save their endangered lighthouse.
The Block Island job had been advertised nationally. The Matyikos won the contract in part because their proposal called for moving the lighthouse without slicing away the attached lightkeeper's dwelling.
Their complete preservation of the lighthouse, which was miraculously moved without a single visible crack in the brick work, earned the brothers an award from the National Trust for Historic Preservation.
``I'll tell you something, I had tears in my eyes when we hit the switch,'' John Matyiko recalled. ``No one had ever done anything like this before. We knew it would work but you never know.''
Jimmie said he suspected many of the spectators were hoping for a disaster.
``You know how people gawk at a car wreck?'' he asks. ``I think a lot of people didn't think we could do it. They were placing bets on it.''
The Matyiko brothers haven't yet seen tonight's television special.
``I can't figure out how they spent all summer with us and came up with 20 minutes of film,'' says John Matyiko.
``I hope there's some footage of the B-52 we moved,'' adds Jimmie.
Oh yes, they also move bombers. Anything, as long as it's big and weighs a lot.
After local New England television stations began covering the lighthouse, the Matyiko brothers got some strange requests for moving. One person wanted to move a house from Richmond to Texas.
``That's ridiculous. There isn't enough money in the world to move a house that far,'' says Jimmie Matyiko.
Then a woman telephoned asking them to move her refrigerator.
``I don't think so,'' Jimmie Matyiko laughs.
But there is one job they're itching for: the Hatteras Light.
``It's another move-it-or-lose-it-situation,'' says Jimmie Matyiko eagerly. ``I saw something on television about the children in Carolina collecting money for sandbags.
``Those sandbags aren't going to do them much good if they get a really big hurricane. During Felix the water was all around the base.
``As soon as those underlying timbers become exposed it's going to go fast.''
There are no plans to move the Hatteras light. But the Matyiko brothers are hoping.
``We'd all get together for that one,'' Jimmie Matyiko says. ``It would be a great place for a family reunion.'' ILLUSTRATION: Photo
BILL TIERNAN/Staff
John, left, and Jim Matyiko are two of the brothers who run a
house-moving business that transported a lighthouse last year.
Graphic
TONIGHT ON TBS
Witness the Matyiko brothers' ``moving experience'' tonight at 9
p.m. on TBS when National Geographic's Explorer documents their move
of the Southeast Lighthouse on Block Island, R.I., in a segment
entitled ``Lighthouse To Go.''
by CNB