George Dvorak, a volunteer at Fort Verde State Historic Park, recently received the 2023 Governor’s Heritage Preservation Award for his dedicated work and preservation skills.
Dvorak has volunteered more than 5,300 hours at the park since 2009, making a significant difference to the park’s condition and the surrounding Camp Verde community.
“As park manager at Fort Verde, I’ve had the pleasure of working with volunteers George [and Carole] Dvorak since 2009,” park manager Sheila Stubler said. “The amount of projects George has completed at Fort Verde shows the depth of passion he has for historic preservation, as he takes pride in his craftsmanship and has exemplary leadership skills. Just about everywhere you look, there are signs of George’s handiwork and memories from volunteers that worked alongside George. Congratulations to George on winning the well-deserved preservation award.”
Dvorak has a background as a mechanical engineer and started volunteering at the fort after he was inspired by his wife, Carole, who is also a volunteer. His first project was making new doors to replace damaged ones in the same style as the historic buildings.
“We’re doing it as it was done back in the old days,” said Dvorak. “We’re not doing it the modern way, it’s got to stay historic.”
Dvorak said that there are so many things he’s worked on at the park that he can hardly remember them all. He has rebuilt dormers on the commander’s building, repaired shutters, stucco and adobe walls, reconstructed fences and done paint jobs. He joked that the boss said to turn him loose on everything.
When he first started volunteering, the 2008 Great Recession was still affecting communities, and the fort only had two staff members and no rangers. He helped out by taking care of outside activities for events, and later helped train rangers on the do’s and don’ts of historic buildings.
Dvorak also put together a map of the whole fort using his knowledge of AutoCAD, since at the time, only one such map existed in the archives.
He recalled one instance when a visiting couple began chatting with him. They told him that they had visited the fort many years ago and that it was in pretty bad shape. They recognized a huge difference on their second visit and thanked Dvorak for his work in bringing the park back to life.
With the exception of a few buildings in Prescott, the park has some of the oldest buildings in northern Arizona. Carole Dvorak remarked on how the structures are very old and are original, and said that preserving them was important.
George Dvorak added that the buildings were not made to last; they were built for the Indian Wars and that was it. Since there were no solid foundations for the buildings, which were constructed on a single layer of rocks, things are constantly shifting.
Dvorak said that he had wanted to start with the exterior of the park before the interior. He helped to restore the large wooden sign, which is the first thing people see and what would attract them into the park.
The Arizona Preservation Foundation and State Historic Preservation Office have partnered to present the Governor’s Heritage Honor Preservation Awards since 1982. The awards recognize people, organizations and projects that have demonstrated outstanding achievements in preserving Arizona’s historic and prehistoric resources.
Dvorak said that receiving the award was a total shock. He had been given many awards over the years, but he didn’t realize the scope of this award until he received it at the ceremony.
“I was just sitting there amazed and I didn’t know how to take it or what to say,” Dvorak said. He said that he was the only individual to have received the award, not a group or project, but that he would not have done so without the help of his fellow volunteers and rangers.
