Where's my brick? Appleton's 'Every Soldier's Square' fundraiser continues but stands well short of its goal
The Civil War Memorial is a prominent feature of Soldiers Square in downtown Appleton. (Photo: Dan Powers/USA TODAY NETWORK-Wisconsin)
Question: In the spring of 2019, there was a campaign to raise money to improve Soldiers Square in downtown Appleton. You could purchase a brick and have a veteran's name engraved on the brick. I made a donation and haven’t heard anything further about the project. Was this all a scam?
Answer: The "Every Soldier's Square" fundraising campaign continues to this day, but it hasn't progressed as fast as organizers would like.
Two nonprofit organizations, Hearthstone Historic House Museum and Sculpture Valley, started the campaign to revitalize Soldiers Square and to raise money for the John H. Bradley Department of Veterans Affairs Outpatient Clinic and for the preservation of Appleton's history and its monuments.
For $40, a person could have a historic brick paver engraved in honor of a U.S. veteran, and the engraved bricks would be used in the hardscape when Soldiers Square is redeveloped.
The campaign set a goal of engraving at least 2,500 bricks. That would yield $100,000. To date, about 400 bricks have been ordered.
"The project is not going away," said Alex Schultz, executive director of Sculpture Valley and an Appleton alderman. "Years have passed — it's a challenge — but that's the way everything goes in this city. You've got to be extremely patient."
RELATED: Fundraiser launches to revitalize Soldiers Square in Appleton
Alex Schultz (Photo: Courtesy of Alex Schultz)
When the campaign was launched in 2019, Appleton planned to build a new public library in place of the Soldiers Square parking ramp, providing an opportunity to redevelop Soldiers Square as well. That plan since has been abandoned. The city will renovate or reconstruct the library in place of the existing library at 225 N. Oneida St.
"We slowed down considerably pushing the project until some of these other downtown dominos fell," Schultz said. "All of this has shifted over time."
YMCA of the Fox Cities will raze and replace the Soldiers Square parking ramp this summer. Schultz said that could provide another opportunity to redevelop Soldiers Square. "We're very early in that conversation," he said.
The "Every Soldier's Square" website says no bricks will be engraved until the 2,500 minimum is met. "If our goal is not met, you will be notified and your donation will be refunded," the website says.
The website doesn't provide a time frame for meeting the goal, but Schultz mentioned five years.
The placement of the bricks also depends on city approval.
"Our goal is to put these in Soldiers Square, but there's a caveat," Schultz said. "If that doesn't happen, we will find another place to put them."
The nine-pound bricks date from 1890 to 1930. They were salvaged in 2018 from the driveway around Hearthstone and are in storage.
The bricks originally lined the electric trolley tracks on College Avenue before they were paved over. During a street reconstruction project in the 1960s, the bricks were excavated and dumped in the Fox River.
Schultz said some of the bricks were diverted to a ravine near Hearthstone by Harold Mares, who owned the house at the time.
"Basically, he bartered a couple cases of beer to have the dump truck guys come over to his place and dump them down the ravine," Schultz said. "Then over the course of the next three years his kids were tasked with going into the ravine and bringing up the bricks and paving the driveway. That's how the Hearthstone ended up with a paver driveway from College Avenue."
Watchdog Q&A
Post-Crescent reporter Duke Behnke answers your questions about local government. Send questions to dbehnke@gannett.com or call him at 920-993-7176.