T-2 with Officers' Row in the background 2003
[Tin Ceiling] | Intro | Heritage Hall | Carriage Houses | T-1 Proposal | Discussion | Exterior Restorations | Tile Roofs |

Heritage Hall — Tin Ceiling Tiles Restoration Project at NRHC

Preserving [the new] Heritage Hall's Antique Ceiling: Lightweight Historical Mysteries, But Heavy Duty Restoration Challenges…

The nicely-embossed tin-paneled, 18 foot-high ceiling of Fort Missoula's former gymnasium in the old Post Headquarter building had clearly suffered more damaging impacts from long-ago, indoor basketball and volleyball games than had the room's well-preserved wood floor and lath and plaster walls.

How to explain this, NRHC's board wondered?

Was there an early, indoor version of these [or other] sports that required wielders of the ball to hit the ceiling? Or was it just the effect of the soldiers' 'uplifted energy' — maybe due to deep inhalation of Rocky Mountain air on luscious, open-window summer nights in Missoula's wilderness-surrounded valley? We may never know for sure, though we're still looking into the Mystery of the Dents…

Meanwhile, NRHC board member Dennis Gordon found a local contractor, Western Sheet Metal Systems, Inc., who guaranteed, at a bid of $9800, to remove hundreds of dents in the tin panels and render the ceiling fully restored to its original, non-dented beauty.


The HVAC is being replaced thanks to a Morris F. and Helen Silver Foundation $20,000 grant.

Lath and plaster walls removed for renovation