The city hall bell. Save it!

[PQZ]

Thanks! both for the pics & the compliment on my posterior!

The best thing I ever heard about City Hall is that the warped floors led to the common question as to "what was more crooked, the hallways of City Hall or the politicians who walk them?"

I find it interesting that City Hall was torn down by a suburban company [[Union Wrecking of Farmington,) used for suburban interest [[pier in St. Clair Shores) & like many other great Detroit buildings would be replaced by essentially an ugly parking lot.

Huh?

Kennedy Square was not a parking lot, nor is One Kennedy.

[jtf1972]

Huh?

Kennedy Square was not a parking lot, nor is One Kennedy.

A part of Kennedy Square was the underground parking garage, which was cited as "progress."

[buildingsofdetroit]

Of course there is the danger the six year old will just grow up to be an adult that plays with blocks.

Haaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahahahahahhaha! That made my day!

[PQZ]

A part of Kennedy Square was the underground parking garage, which was cited as "progress."

Right right right right.....my bad.

A civic plaza with fountains that becomes the site of historic speeches and gatherings that happens to have a parking deck underneath it. You can see how at first I did not equate that with "an ugly parking lot". Thanks for setting me straight.

[gnome]

You mean the outdoor urinal that once had a reflecting pool that leaked all over the cars below?

[PlymouthRes]

PQZ-

You seem like a pretty well informed person in regard to the preservation attempts made in the City. Although I don't know much about you, aside from your comments on the other preservation themed threads that you've opined on, I can at least say I got a kick out of your pissing conest with Fnemceck [[sp?)!

In any event, yes, we have tried a plethora of methods to raise money for Fort Wayne and the restoration work that we do there. We operate on $20,000 [[2008) to $30, 000 [[2009) per year, ALL of it raised by the events we hold there and the stuff we sell at the store we try to maintain. 100% of the proceeds go to the many projects that we have been able to accomplish, but the amount is paltry compared to the task at hand. The City has actually helped out too, but they are limited on funding and do all they can just to pay the bills for us.

Although our organization has contributed over 8,600 volunteer hours in the last three years, we really need people who say they are interested in helping preserve this vital part of our history to come out in DROVES when we hold events as we make most of our money from tours, sales of books, shirts and hats and tours.

You would know about the shirts and hats if you attended one of our many events.

By the way, all of our merchandise is available on our website at: www.historicfortwaynecoalition.com.

This years Christmas at the Fort event is a prime example of one of the success of our events. Last year we barely broke even, but this year we DOUBLED our attendance and TRIPLED our profit! A big shout out here to Lamar billboards for their donation of several billboards throughout the City. We couldn't have gotten the word out any other way, and they DONATED the space to our organization! At least THEY seem to understand the budget constraints of some 501[[c) 3 organizations as they don't do this for just anyone!

We are getting better, but we are only 205 people strong and the responsibilities that we already have at the Fort are a bit "overwhelming". Aside from the 43 structures on the extant grounds, we have total responsibility for the upkeep of the Barracks Building and entire interior of the star fort. The bell comes way down on the list to be "saved", with all the structures literally falling down from within. I would be glad to donate some of my time for the construction of a cradle, as I have had plans drawn up for over two years just waiting for someone to take on the task, but I really have my hands full running the projects that we have going on right now, which in my opinion trump the bell for now.

My whole point in posting at all was to perhaps goad someone into taking on the responsibility of forming a group to "save" the thing. It is a piece of our history and deserves a proper cleaning and stabilization to ensure it doesn't literally get eaten alive by the fallout from Zug Island! It could use a proper cradle and a roof overhead to keep the acid rain off. Aside from that, with the thickness of the material and sure weight alone, it should last a couple hundred years beyond today.

Who's stepping up?

[PQZ]

My whole point in posting at all was to perhaps goad someone into taking on the responsibility of forming a group to "save" the thing.

.....

Who's stepping up?

PlymouthRes:

Congratulations on the excellent work and effort on shoestring budgets.

Your efforts are to be applauded and should serve as a template for those that wish to gain credibility as "preservationists".

There needs to be a lot more prodding and goading in to real action and real responsibility - which is the aim of my posts about the preservation community in general. The real action and real responsibility is shockingly absent amongst the most vocal.

The question now is whether some of those same folks will answer your challenge - or will they go on organizing bubble blowing rallies?

Good luck on your efforts - and even better luck on expanding the fundraising.

And BTW - Its also refreshing to see a recognition that the City is facing dire budget issues and simply cannot attend to every specific request but muddles through as best it can in a very bad situation.

[Whitehouse]

.

Who's stepping up?

Should I, as a foreighner with a soft spot for Detroit, write te mayor a letter? Since I was the starter of this mess.... ,

[Whitehouse]

As KC and the Sunshineband said.

That's the way [[ahuh, ahuh) I like it!!

A whole project dedicated to saving the bell. I'm amazed this link wasn't posted before. Look at this artist rendering of the newly restored clock tower of City hall!


And look at the man figure below, that's how tall it was!

Interesting qoute:

It [[City Hall) was demolished in 1961 to make way for Campus Matius Park.

So that was the short lived name before it became Kennedy.

[Whitehouse]

indeed I was using the lliberty bell as an example of how the bell could be displayed. Here in the Netherlands the changing of the year is used to play some michief. There are some famous examples of that. I will post some picturea the coming weekend. One time a full size [[decomissioned) lifeboat was kidnapped with a truck. So with the right equipment it's no problem.

A kidnap of te bell [[or belnap...) Maybe you should try that. As I said I was going to post some pictures of what happens here every changing of the year. It is custom to do some kind of mischief and bring some local issues of the past year to the fore front with a wink. Provided that the items stolen were not damaged police are mostly not involved with the theft. And usually the return of some items is a news worthy occassion as well.

Here's one of the most ambitions quests ever undertaken. It still staggers the mind on how they did it but it happened.
Here's a picture gallery of the kidnap of Lifeboat Neeltje Jacoba.


Another great caper was the kidnap of a wax figure of Michail Gorbatshov from the Amsterdam branch of Madame Tussaud's museum. in 1991.

A mug with a diameter of 6,5 meters was stolen from the coffee company Douwe Egberts. It turned up in a small Frisian village.


Another great kidnap of the same group that "stole" the lifeboat was the hijack of a monorail train. And no, that was not a model, it was a full size train section!! It stayed in the city of Drachten for months. This particular craft reached a speed of 412,6 km/h in 1987. This is section two of the train. After about 8 years it was dismantled and brought back to Germany. It now resides on a hall next to another Transrapid train, which crashed. A particularly sad event which cost the lives of 23 passengers.

Alas, this section fell victim to the grafitti artists. It was later moved to it's place of origin. Section one of this train is displayed in the German Transport museum in Bonn.

So why this information? I hope this is an idea to bring the bell home for a couple of days. Park it at Campus Martius and give people information bout that bell. Most of the people you will encounter might not even have heard of the excistence of the bell. You could even make it a fundraiser. Ring the bell for a a couple of dollars.

Feedback?

[WaCoTS]

i ditto PlymouthRes' requests for more volunteers.
we all have complaints about the way things are done, or the way they turn out, but few of us actually take the next step to try and do something about it

here is the bell when it was sitting closer to the enlisted barracks, circa 2005[[?)