Peter and Mary Louise Hanson; They looked to the past & future
Sometimes a married couple becomes well known because one of them is an important person in the life of a town. But in the case of Peter and Mary Louise Hanson, both made significant contributions. Not the least of which is the preservation of their home in the University Neighborhood Historic District of Laramie.
They married in 1951 and moved to Laramie in 1958. Peter Raymond Hanson (1926-1991) was born in North Platte, Nebraska. He met Rawlins resident Mary Louise Kastner (1928-2004) when he was working for Hitchcock and Hitchcock Architects of Laramie—he was site superintendent for a large building project that the firm had designed in Rawlins.
Mary Louise Hanson, Activist
Mary Louise graduated from UW in 1951 with B.S in history. This was despite a steep decline in household fortunes when her father, a banker in Walsenburg, CO, lost everything in the Great Depression and was hospitalized. Her mother moved back with her children to her hometown of Rawlins; other relatives there were supportive.
After marriage, Mary Louise earned an M.S. from UW in history. In 1964, she began a career with the Wyoming Department of Vocational Rehabilitation. That led to her being hired as the Executive Director for the newly organized Laramie Senior Center (LSC) Board of Directors. The group had ambitions to develop an actual center somewhere.
Mary Louise shepherded the LSC in 1973 into a former auto dealership at 311 Canby St. in a steel building that is still standing. The former auto showroom carpets were permanently stained with oil, and it had other challenges, but it was a place senior citizens could gather—once-a-week meals became their first service.
Advocate for seniors
From that beginning on Canby St., over the next 18 years Mary Louise saw the LSC move into expanded quarters at 103 Ivinson Ave. and to offer many more services. Laramie’s first “Meals on Wheels” was incorporated under her leadership. The LSC expanded into the adjacent Phillips Hotel on First St., which had been rented at first, then was purchased.
Mary Louise was also instrumental in developing the Louisa Swain House (now Laramie Square Apartments) and Regency Retirement Residence of Laramie. These continue to offer different types of housing arrangements for senior citizens (and others with special needs), and were the first of their kind in Laramie.
Building effective teamwork was a hallmark of Mary Louise Hanson’s leadership style and that of the others like Margaret Sharp and Catherine Mealy who shared her vision for services to Laramie senior citizens. “She was such a good leader, always ahead but not distant, so that we worked as a family,” recalled Barbara Morandi Zemeckis who was an LSC employee starting in 1979.
Mary Louise stepped down as LSC Executive Director in 1991 though she continued her volunteer work with many local and state non-profit organizations. She lived to see the LSC further expand to the building it now occupies at 1560 North 3rd St., thanks to funding provided by Harold Eppson in 1994, and under the direction of Lynne Simpson who succeeded Mary Louise a LSC Executive Director.
Peter Hanson, Architect
Peter graduated from Cheyenne High School in 1944 and immediately joined the Navy. After service in WWII, he attended UW and graduated with a degree in Civil Engineering, with a concentration in architecture. He joined the American Association of Architects (AIA) and worked for private architectural firms in New Orleans and Laramie. Throughout his career, most of his projects were commercial or school buildings.
He continued working for the Hitchcock brothers in Laramie until 1958; then he had an independent practice in Laramie before beginning a nearly 25-year career at his alma mater in 1962. He taught architectural history to scores of UW engineering students and served as secretary-treasurer of the Wyoming Chapter of AIA. He also advised the Wyoming State Historic Preservation Office on several projects with that agency.
He was an early advocate of the use of solar energy in building design. His civic activities included a 10-year stint as a member of the Laramie Planning Commission.
Architectural practice
Even while Peter Hanson was teaching at UW, he would occasionally take commissions for architectural projects. One of his first was a residential design for UW professor Edwin Flittie, at 220 Corthell Road. That house is now a UW guesthouse.
Among his other Laramie building designs are the professional (originally medical) building at 10th and Sheridan St. and St. Andrews Lutheran student center on Grand Ave. As Mary Louise’s involvement with the LSC developed, he worked with her to redesign spaces for that organization. When the LSC moved into the buildings at the corner of Ivinson and First St., he volunteered much time for the remodeling work done under his direction. A portion of that is now Anong’s Restaurant.
Meldrum House
One of the Hansons’ favorite projects was maintaining their historic home in Laramie, the Meldrum House at 703 Ivinson Ave. It was a Victorian home, built in 1883. Its initial owner, John Meldrum, a wagon-builder and Civil War veteran, came to Laramie in 1870. He had a meat market and then became the Clerk of Albany County District Court, and later, appointed Secretary of Wyoming Territory.
It’s not clear why Meldrum, who seems to have been a life-long bachelor, decided to build or buy such a large two-story house in Laramie. Much of his time was spent in Cheyenne and in Yellowstone Park.
Meldrum was very temporarily acting as Governor of Wyoming Territory when the actual governor, Francis E. Warren, was away (in Washington D.C.] when Wyoming officially became a state in 1890. Later Meldrum became the first U.S. Commissioner in Yellowstone Park, sort of a judge who heard all cases of civil or criminal misdeeds that occurred in the park, a tenure that lasted from 1894 to 1934.
The house had already been remodeled when the Hansons bought it in 1958. Laramie’s most prolific architect, Wilbur Hitchcock, had removed most of the decorative Victorian features around 1925 and added Tudor Revival trim to match the Hitchcock-designed Trinity Lutheran Church on the lot behind it facing 7th St. The Meldrum house became the parsonage for the Lutheran pastor and family.
Peter Hanson suspected the home’s location was once an informal burial ground in Laramie’s early days, before Greenhill Cemetery existed. His daughter, Janell recalls that her dad told the children to “stay out of the basement because there might be bodies down there.” In fact, Janell suspects he was more anxious to keep the children away from his architectural drawings. But later a tombstone was found buried in the yard, supporting the scanty evidence that there was an early burial ground somewhere around this spot.
Legacy for Laramie
In speaking about both Peter and Mary Louise Hanson, their friend Dorothy Hitchcock recalled: “They had an uphill climb to convince some of the local powers-that-be that the [103 Ivinson Ave.] building could be transformed into something beautiful and elegant. As it seemed to me, the general feeling in Laramie at the time was that the old and indigent didn’t need beauty and elegance in their lives. So I give much credit to the two of them for fostering this idea that the elderly were valuable and were due the best.”
By Judy Knight
Source: Janell Hanson
Caption: Peter and Mary Louise Hanson, Laramie c. 1975
Source: Judy Knight photo
Caption: Meldrum House at 703 Ivinson Ave, built in 1883, home of the Hanson family.