Board of Directors

Mike Jackson, FAIA, President: Mike is a preservation architect in Springfield, IL. He was the Deputy State Historic Preservation Officer (SHPO) in Illinois from 2009 to 2013. He was the Chief Architect for the Illinois SHPO from 1983 to 2009 and was actively involved in the review of thousands of Illinois historic properties undergoing renovation. He is an active member of the Association for Preservation Technology (APT) and Co-Chair of the Codes and Standards Technical Committee. He also directs the APT Building Technology Heritage Library, a free online archive of pre-1964 architectural trade catalogs, builder’s guides, technical manuals, house plan catalogs, and building codes. He is active in the national movement for downtown revitalization through an economics and design training program called Upstairs Downtown. He holds a Bachelor of Architecture degree from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and a Masters in Historic Preservation from Columbia University in New York.

Eric Sandweiss, Vice President, is Miller Professor of History, and Adjunct Professor of Folklore and Ethnomusicology, at Indiana University (IU). Prior to his arrival at IU, he was Director of Research at the Missouri Historical Society. He has been a Fulbright Scholar in Ireland the UK, as well as a Smithsonian Fellow of Museum Practice. His books include The Day in Its Color: Charles Cushman’s Photographic Journey through a Vanishing America; St. Louis: The Evolution of an American Urban Landscape; and an edited volume, St. Louis in the Century of Henry Shaw: The View Beyond the Garden Wall. At IU, he has edited the quarterly Indiana Magazine of History, served on the steering committee of the Environmental Resilience Institute, and been the founding director of IU’s Curatorship M.A. program. He teaches courses on urban history, cultural landscapes, and museum theory and practice.

Mary M. “Mimi” Stiritz, Secretary: Mimi is an accomplished architectural historian whose work includes deep study of the architecture of St. Louis, surveys, and National Register of Historic Places nominations across the entire state of Missouri, and a strong interest in the French colonial history of the St. Louis region. In all Ms. Stiritz has written National Register nominations that include thousands of buildings in 37 districts as well as 66 individual sites. She authored the book, St. Louis: Historic Churches and Synagogues (1995), and has authored essays in exhibition catalogs for St. Louis University and the Sheldon Art Galleries in St. Louis. Over the years she has published several articles for the Society of Architectural Historians as well as the Missouri Historical Society. Mimi currently serves as Chair of the St. Louis County (Missouri) Historic Buildings Commission, as a member of the Missouri Advisory Council on Historic Preservation, and as a board member for Les Amis.

Jason Deem, Treasurer: Jason is the owner of South Side Spaces, a development company specializing in historic renovations in St. Louis. He has taken an active role in helping to revitalize the Cherokee Business District through preservation, economic development, and special events. He served as president of the Cherokee Station Special Taxing District for six years before helping transition the organization to a Community Improvement District where he currently serves as a board member. Jason has been recognized for his work in preservation and placemaking by The James Marston Fitch Charitable Foundation, The Missouri Alliance for Historic Preservation, Landmarks Association of St. Louis, and The Community Builders Network of Metro St. Louis.

Ralph C. Shive, CFA, was born and raised in Belleville, Illinois and is grandson of Raymond Oakley Shive, founder of Sterling Steel Castings, and son of William J. Shive. Ralph graduated from Southern Methodist University in 1975 with a BBA, concentration in Finance. He earned the Chartered Financial Analyst designation and spent 40 years executing financial management for clients starting in Dallas, Texas. He was Chief Investment Officer of 1st Source Investment Advisors, a subsidiary of 1st Source bank based in South Bend Indiana (SRCE). He finished his career in 2016 as portfolio manager for Wasatch Investment Advisors, Large Cap Value Fund. Ralph and his wife Linda live in South Bend concentrating on community service.

Staff

Michael R. Allen, Executive Director (michael@nationalbuildingarts.org): Michael is an architectural historian whose areas of interest include historic preservation practices, modernism in American and European architecture, and the political economy of the built environment. Since 2009, Allen has been Director of the Preservation Research Office, a consultancy that has worked across ten US states on projects of all scales. In academia, he is a Senior Lecturer in Architecture, Landscape Architecture and Urban Design at the Sam Fox School of Design and Visual Arts, as well as a Lecturer in American Culture Studies (AMCS), at Washington University in St. Louis. Allen’s scholarly and critical articles have appeared in a wide range of scholarly and popular sources, including Buildings and Landscapes, CityLab, Disegno, and Studies in the History of Gardens and Designed Landscapes. He has contributed chapters to Bending the Future: 50 Ideas About the Next 50 Years of Historic Preservation, Midwest Architecture Journeys, and Buildings of Missouri. In 2018, the National Trust for Historic Preservation named him to its “40 Under 40” list honoring young preservationists whose work is expanding the concept and practice of historic preservation in the United States. Allen is a member of the Advisor Leadership Team for the National Trust for Historic Preservation. Currently he is a Ph.D. candidate in Cultural Heritage at the Ironbridge Institute for Cultural Heritage at the University of Birmingham, England. He holds a B.A. in Literature and History from The Union Institute.

Emery Cox, Archives and Collections Manager (emery@nationalbuildingarts.org): Emery worked in public libraries for almost 20 years and has been with the National Building Arts Center for over 5 years, having started full-time in December 2021. As Archives and Collections Manager, he oversees hundreds of thousands of printed materials, assists researchers, and works with the diverse artifact collections on campus. Besides his work in the library, archives, and museum world, Emery has also studied physics, mathematics, chemistry, computer science, linguistics, archaeology, and political science and is always excited for the chance to use these skills in unexpected ways at NBAC.

Founder

Larry Giles (1947–2021).

Available Positions

Volunteer positions are available.