County courthouse stained glass dome to be restored

UPPER SANDUSKY — The main stained glass dome in the Wyandot County Courthouse is scheduled for renovations to begin in fall 2021. The Wyandot County commissioners have accepted a quote of $48,850 for the work from Bigelow Glass of Findlay. "We're pretty excited about getting this fixed," said commissioner Steve Seitz in a telephone interview. "It's been an issue ever since I've been here." Work will involve repairing damage to some of the pieces of glass and re-leading the panels. Dirt and grime also cover the back of the glass, said Seitz. "It looks beautiful, but there's a lot of problems with it, concerns with safety with the glass falling out," he said. Much of the dust and debris came from a major renovation project that was completed in November 2015 and involved work on the dome, clock tower and roof of the 1899 courthouse. "All that construction, it made a lot of extra dust up in the attic. There was like a quarter inch of dust all over the backside of the stained glass," said commissioner Bill Clinger. "And we just had the idea, well, we'll just go up there and dust it off, clean it off." But employees at Bigelow Glass warned them not to touch the glass since it's so fragile. "The leading that's in between the panes of glass, it deteriorates over time," said Clinger. "And like if you were standing up in the attic and looking at that dome, you can kind of see like a sag or a belly in those domes where it started to settle down a bit." There is also damage to some of the glass pieces. In the late 1990s or early 2000s, a janitor working up in the attic above the dome dropped a wrench that broke out the glass in one spot. "It just looks kind of white like there's no glass," said Seitz. "We're pretty tickled to get this fixed." The main dome is one of three stained glass windows in the courthouse. A 14-foot round stained glass dome in the courthouse's third-floor courtroom was restored last year by Bigelow Glass. The courtroom was used for scenes in the 1994 film "The Shawshank Redemption." A third, smaller rectangular window is located at the top of the first floor stairway. Andrea Knight, glass artist for Bigelow Glass, said in an email that the process for removing the stained glass panels will involve building scaffolding around and up to the dome in the attic, then taking the panels out through the attic. A protective barrier will be constructed from the underside to prevent debris from falling into the courthouse while they are removing the panels, she said. Once the dome is removed and back at the shop, the panels can be evaluated and the process of color matching starts, she said. If all of the colored glass is readily available from manufacturers, primarily Kokomo Opalescent in Indiana and Wismach Glass in West Virginia, the process of re-leading the panels can begin, she said. If colors are needed to be produced, the timeline can grow, said Knight. "Sometimes we wait more than six months for the correct colored glass to be produced," she said. Restoration is expected to take six months to a year to complete, she said, adding that the work is tedious and very detail-oriented. "We take pride in making sure we are returning the work of art to its original state, or as close as possible with today's available materials," she said. Knight said Bigelow Glass also has another dome scheduled for restoration in Upper Sandusky at John Stewart United Methodist Church. The courthouse and the adjacent jail, built in 1888, are listed on the National Register of Historic Places. Wolf: 419-427-8419 jeanniewolf@thecourier.com