Anna Rusk
Historic Indian Agency House, Portage, WI
It's been an exciting week at the Indian Agency House! Last Saturday was Flag Day, which meant that the place was overrun by Colonial Dames and local visitors who came to hear a talk about the history of the passenger pigeon. I was inside manning the gift shop, so I didn't see much of the goings-on, but I'm told it was quite a dramatic performance!
The last few days have been filled with meetings and other non-reading things, which has been nice. On Monday evening I accompanied my boss to the Portage Historical Society board meeting, at which I got a glimpse of how these things run - slowly, it seems, but it was interesting nonetheless. Tuesday was field trip day, down to the library at the University of Wisconsin at Madison. We were using their grant library to look for foundation money, since one of my potential projects is writing a grant letter or two. After a yummy lunch on State Street, it was back to Portage for a meeting about this weekend's event - a "Gals and Dolls" frontier living program. We're making corn husk dolls and churning butter with attendees, then having a tea party! Who knew the perks were so great at this place?!?!
The last item on the day's agenda was the Historic Preservation Commission meeting. The HPC is a branch of local government responsible for educating the city about its historic districts and the best practices associated with historic buildings. This was even more eye-opening than the Historical Society board meeting, since it's an official governmental organization. One of the major projects they're working on is changing a local ordinance regarding historic homes - they want to get buildings placed on the municipal register of historic places, and to be able to more effectively educate people about what they can and can't do to a house once it's on the register. This is really contentious in Portage, since people are afraid that if they live in a historic district, the government is going to tell them what to do. The Commission is trying to get the point across that you can voluntarily put your house on the register, and then the HPC can recommend that you not change it too much, but there's little regulation that would actually take place. It was fascinating to see how local government works, and the processes for getting even little things accomplished! Changing this ordinance seems to be about a balance between optimism and realism, as well as communicating effectively to the general public - not something that's easily done. One cool thing that came out of the meeting was the decision to put the Historic Indian Agency House on the register; it would be the first structure on the local register, so they're hoping the publicity will be good for the museum as well as the HPC.
The last meeting of the week was with a designer at a local greenhouse. The museum has had a plan in the works for an orchard/garden on the property, but it's been slow-going and has changed quite a bit over two years. Today we saw the finalized plans and got an idea of the time frame (and cost) for actually planting the trees and doing the landscaping. This has been a busy few days, but it's been really great to see all the various things that the director does. I like the idea of having a bunch of things going on at once - it keeps things interesting, even if it is a bit crazy!
No comments:
Post a Comment