Underground Railroad

I live in the town of Merton near Sussex. On the main street in Merton there is a house that was part of the underground rail road and the elementary school would go to the house every year when they were studying the Civil War. I remember being shocked as a little kid to see it first hand and understand what lengths the slaves had to endure in order to make the trip and it was very evident all the risks the owners had to undertake by how hidden the cellar was.

Recently there was an article in the news paper my mother was reading about how a rundown house, which was said to be a safe house to hide slaves, on the corner or Highway 164 and Lisbon Road was going to be demolished because the Wisconsin Department of Transportation deemed the house of no historical value. The reason for demolition of the house was because traffic going into sussex was increasing and they needed to expand the road to accommodate the amount of cars on a daily basis. Immediately two thoughts came to mind. One, being that yes there is a lot more traffic due to the recent development in the area. However, if hours worth of traffic flow is accepted because they wanted to save the veterans cemetery by miller park then why is it not the same case in this situation? The reason why the house in Merton was salvaged was because the new owners of the property did what was necessary for repairments and made a strong case for a house museum deal with the neighboring schools for educational purposes. If the safe house was fixed up and the community was actively involved I believe the preservationists who were trying to save the house would have had more of a chance of saving it. I remember passing the house when my mother told me exact location and I remember it looking like a house that was in a disarray with broken windows, crooked siding, and over grown with weeds. Its sad to see that because of unmotivated owner who lacks pride in his own property a piece of history was demolished. With all the opportunities to gain tax incentives or even loans for historically significant landmarks I find it to be impossible that the owner was not eligible for any of them. I also found extremely ironic that it was the Department of Transportation that deemed the building to have no historic value.

It does seem like it is harder to preserve landmarks then it is to build them now a days. It also got me thinking about the field trips we have in class. If the community is unaware of the landmarks significance then it has a far smaller chance of being preserved. The educational system should find more ways to utilize this landmarks that instead of useless field trips that kids take to a park or imax. Being able to experience a part of history first hand is not only a lot more inspiring to the students but it also allows the children to have a better understanding of the community they live in. As the world becomes more heavily populated more and more landmarks like these will be taken down. It may seem like one little house has not a lot of value in the large scheme of things but when they all start disappearing it's not like we can recreate the past.