Future of former LHU president’s house to be determined

LOCK HAVEN, PA – The W. Water Street home of past Lock Haven University presidents has been vacant since the local school became part of the new Commonwealth University and its future is to be determined.

A spokesperson at CU-Lock Haven, in response to a request from The Record, said the university “is in the process of conducting a space utilization study to identify campus needs and the president’s residence is included in that survey to see how and if that space will be utilized in the future.”

The stately former presidents’ home was constructed in 1909 and is known as the C.R. Armstrong House. It is in the Colonial Revival Style. According to the book, Historic Lock Haven, an Architectural Survey, C. R. Armstrong was president of the Lock Haven Trust Company and his father, Lewis Armstrong, was one of the founders of Lock Haven’s long-gone papermill. The book says of C. R., “Mr. Armstrong was the single most important leader in a city that had, by the beginning of the century, become essentially a ‘one mill town.’”

The local school spokesperson also confirmed information in a Record story earlier this week, concerning the demolition of McIntyre and High Halls on the hill overlooking the school’s main campus. She said a study was conducted to see if renovation or repurposing were options for those buildings, “but both options were not feasible for the university.”

Those two dorms were recently fenced off and preliminary site preparation has begun, the work noted by signage on site, carried out through the state General Services Department. That posting says the work is being carried out as “Demolition of Underutilized and Obsolete Buildings” at Commonwealth University. The nearby and vacant North Hall remains standing.

All three dorms have been vacant for some years as the local school has seen new housing added along N. Fairview Street.