We at the Morrison County Historical Society have long held a holistic view of preservation. Historic preservation as a field has been primarily concerned with saving old, magnificent buildings and structures. Locally, this includes structures like the Historic Morrison County Courthouse, the Cass Gilbert Depot, the Buckman Hotel, Camp Ripley’s granite wall, and the Bowlus Firehall. Every community has examples of the “low-hanging fruit” of structures that beg to be preserved. They are the Notre Dame cathedrals … you know ‘em when you see ‘em.
What doesn’t typically make a priority list of structures to be saved are Plain Jane utility structures like pole sheds, simple family homes and business buildings, or concrete culverts. Our belief at MCHS is that these are worthy of preservation not merely for their associated history, but because precious resources were used to construct them.
This is where we launch into true holism because structures created from earth’s resources link preservation directly to the environment. We do a disservice to the earth when we waste resources by wantonly knocking down structures, including the Plain Jane ones, and burying their components in landfills. We need to think bigger in the historic preservation field. We need to bridge the gap between historic preservation and environmental preservation. After all, if we don’t preserve the environment, human beings won’t be left to enjoy those pretty and Plain Jane structures.
~ Mary Warner, Executive Director
This article originally appeared in the Morrison County Historical Society newsletter, Vol. 32, No. 2, 2019.
