Photos by Douglas Levere
Brian Koyn, left, and Raymond Dannenhoffer, PhD ‘87
LANTERN RETURNS HOME A PAIR OF HISTORIC UB LANTERNS IS RESTORED AND REUNITED
A long-lost lantern was finally reunited with its mate when the new building for the Jacobs School of Medicine and Biomedical Sciences opened its doors in December. The two lanterns, which graced the vestibule of the UB Medical School on High Street from 1893 until 1953, took their rightful place together in the lobby of the state-of-the-art medical school building on the Buffalo Niagara Medical Campus. It’s still a mystery how only one of the lanterns made the move to Farber Hall when the medical school moved to the South Campus in 1953. But a bit of happenstance brought the lost lantern back into UB’s fold. Now, after years apart, the pair have assumed their original role. When the 19th-century lanterns illuminated the medical school lobby of yore, they were gaslights. The newly restored pair have been upgraded with modern LED lights that mimic the flicker of gas flames. The one lantern went missing when the medical school relocated to the South Campus. About a decade ago, a tip from now-retired UB employee, Christina Ehret, led to its discovery in a barn in Eden, N.Y. Unaware of its history, the property owners willingly returned it to UB. Raymond Dannenhoffer, PhD ’87, associate dean for support services, assisted by now-retired James Mecca Jr., from UB’s health science fabrication department, coordinated its transfer. Years of exposure to the elements left the formerly missing lantern in disrepair. Using the intact Farber Hall lantern as a template for surface scanning, the restorers—Ewa Stachowiak, PhD, assistant professor in the Department of Pathology and Anatomical Sciences, and Brian Koyn, from UB’s health science fabrication department—painstakingly replaced the missing and decaying pieces of steel with exact plastic replicas created on a 3-D printer in the lab of Jack Tseng, PhD, assistant professor in the Department of Pathology and Anatomical Sciences. The replacement pieces, painted to match the original metalwork, are virtually indistinguishable from the original steel pieces. By Julie Wesolowski; originally published in At Buffalo.