November 3, 2014
Fill ‘er up!
If you’re like me, you hate missing something “interesting.” So, for those of you who don’t subscribe to the Bottineau Courant or the Metigoshe Mirror — here’s an “interesting” ad that we are running in this week’s edition of our local newspapers.
OK. Now, we know it’s the HOLIDAY Craft Fair, but let’s not split hairs. Instead, let’s fill Clint’s pickle jar with coins to help restore the Stone Bank. Please drop by and help us fill the jar! If you can’t make it to Bottineau, you can send us some “coin” by PayPal!
Let’s make this double fun! We’ll also collect your guesses about how much change is donated on Nov. 8. When the coins are counted, the guess closest to the total will win a new Stone Bank T-shirt.
Stop and see us at the Craft Fair. We would love to talk about the progress we’re making on the project.
Thanks to our friend MaryB who created this ad for us! Mary totally rocks!
As always, thanks for reading the Stone Bank blog!
July 31, 2014
Volunteers! We love ’em
There she sits! The Stone Bank is looking a bit more chic after a long overdue touchup of the paint on her window frames. And we owe it all to volunteers. A group of Fulbright scholars spent a couple days in June, rolled up their sleeves and made it happen.
Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Volunteers scraped, sanded and painted the Stone Bank’s windows. She is looking good and ready for more restorative work!
Want more? Of course, you do. Who doesn’t want to see the Stone Bank looking chipper?
So let’s keep it going. Our project has been awarded a $20,000 grant from the Historical Society of ND to continue work to restore the bank building. But we need to match the grant with local contributions of cash or labor.
If we can raise the money — we can raise the back section of the bank and get the building back into use.
So, we need your support. Your donation will go directly into rebuilding costs. Other than insurance and our P.O. Box rental, our overhead is almost ZERO. Oh, speaking of the P.O. Box — It is P.O. Box 272, Bottineau, ND 58318. Send a check or make a donation with PayPal.
This summer, the plan is to get the plumbing roughed in and the floor joists installed. From there we will rebuild the walls and add the roof. It is all possible, if we have the money to pay the contractors. Can you help? Great.
We appreciate it.
The Stone Bank’s front window with a fresh coat of paint on the wooden window frame.
June 8, 2014
Sun. Stone. Scrape. Paint
You are looking at a group of ROCKSTARS!
Geared up and ready to work. Our Fulbright volunteers got down to business on Sunday.
Our Fulbright volunteers showed up, gloved up and got to work on the windows at the Stone Bank today! (They hail from a number of countries including Germany, Cuba, India and Senegal.
Twelve pairs of hands — and four local volunteers have given a big boost to this project, which is being operated on a shoestring.
You may not be near enough to grab a paint scraper or a can a paint, but you can show the Stone Bank some love with a donation.
We have a lot of work to do in 2014 that must be done by “paid” contractors. So, please: Dedicate a Stone. Make a $15 donation, and we will thank you with one of our Stone Bank T-shirts. Or just send a donation.
Every dollar goes into restoring this delightful and irreplaceable stone building.
As always. Thanks for reading the Stone Bank blog.
January 19, 2014
Old and Still Very Useful
Oh, how it makes the Stone Bank blogger happy to see a great old building with a new lease on life.
Right there on Main Street in Red Wing, Minn., is a Caribou Coffee in a red brick railway station from 1906. Not too crazy about the interior, but it’s just great to see this building standing, sturdy and useful. Hurrah.
Don’t you love a timeline? Here are the details:
Love it!
We want the same for our Stone Bank. Sturdy and useful and IN USE for the next 100 years or more.
For comparison’s sake: Bottineau County Bank (what we now call the Stone Bank) was founded in 1887. The Stone Bank was built in the last six months in 1900 — and replaced an earlier wood-frame building. It was Bottineau’s first bank, which failed in 1923. The building had many uses over the years and most recently was a lawyer’s office. We know that our restoration project will give it a new life in the next couple of years.
Do you have a favorite restored building in your home town or someplace you have visited? What was it built for and how is it now used? Send a photo and we will post it.
Thanks for reading the Stone Bank blog. Comments and contributions always welcome.
December 31, 2013
You Rocked the Support!
Happy. Happy. New Year!
It has been a really busy year at the Stone Bank — and it has been a year where we have made important progress — and have done a LOT of heavy lifting.
- Our stone mason finished dismantling the back section of the bank in the spring of 2013.
- We did some problem-solving around the issue of putting in a new foundation during the summer months, which included shoring up the foundation of the neighboring building and dealing with a wet spot.
- Wonderful Monte Mikkelsen and his crew from Mikkelsen Aggregates donated time and equipment to excavate the pit for the new foundation.
- Footings were poured and the new foundation began to rise in the fall, where none had existed before.
- By late in the fall, the foundation was up to grade and we are in a great position to finish raising the back section in 2014.
We couldn’t have done it without support from the Historical Society of ND and donations from Otter Tail Power, the Bottineau County Board, Preservation ND, Turtle Mountain Communications, St. Michel Furniture, the State Bank of Bottineau and dozens of individuals who made donations, dedicated a stone, bought T-shirts and volunteered their time to help move the project forward. Thank you!
But — we need to ask again. Can you write another check? We plan to make big progress in 2014. For starters, we will complete rebuilding the back 20 feet of the building and put the roof on. Then we need to get the old bank ready for its new life with plumbing and heating and renovating the interior!
Early in 2014, we are going to begin the process of finding a tenant or tenants for this swell building. Any ideas? We would love to hear them.
We are so excited for the Stone Bank’s potential to be a historic anchor for Bottineau’s Main Street. But we can’t get it done without community support. Remember, Touchstones, Inc., is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit, so your donation is tax deductible.
So end 2013 with a glad tidings of support for the Stone Bank. This project is preserving a piece of Bottineau history — and helping the building play a role in Bottineau’s future.
Our fundraising goal for 2014 is $50,000. Every dollar helps.
Let’s keep it going! The hardest part is behind us and the fun part is here.
Our mailing address is: Touchstones, Inc., 524 Main Street, P.O. Box 272, Bottineau, ND 58318
Or you can make a donation online using PayPal or Razoo. Links are on the right column of this page.
Happy New Year and thanks for reading the Stone Bank blog.
November 30, 2013
NaBloPoMo Finale (whew)
The moment you’ve all been waiting for … our last post for National Blog Posting Month 2013.
Admiring a gorgeous sunset near Bottineau, N.D., is a nice way to close NaBloPoMo.
Before we close out the month, we’d like to thank everyone who shared this journey, commented and sent photos. Your input made it a lot more fun to come up with 30 daily posts. Don’t be shy — we are always open to ideas, photos and commentary for months without a theme.
We also need to thank a few more wonderful Stone Bank friends — who are there when we need them. They have championed our project, worked for little or no pay and have been total rock stars!
Of course, there are countless others who have stepped up, donated and said a kind word. It’s good to pause and remember that this really is a community project — and we are grateful for every kindness and courtesy. We truly wouldn’t have made this happen without you.
But we are not done. So, stay tuned. Dedicate a stone. Buy a T-shirt. Wish us well.
We wanted to end #NaBloPoMo with a bang. So, here it is.
What can you say? Our Stone Bank friends and volunteers are dynamite.
Thanks for your support.
November 28, 2013
Time to give thanks for the Stone Bank’s bedrock
We interrupt this series of daily missives by Stone Bank blogger Sharon Kessler to bring you a Thanksgiving message — by her husband and guest Stone Bank blogger Mike Dorsher. …
The Stone Bank Project is thankful for — and indebted to — many people. You can see some of them in the slide show below, but they also include many unseen supporters who have made financial donations from near and afar. They even include everyone who has read this blog, given it a “Like,” left a Comment or just contributed good wishes and karma to our quest.
But there are two people, in particular, without whom this project would now be a pile of rubble. Rather than a piece of history being preserved, the Stone Bank would now be a relic of history were it not for these two people.
One them is Joe Whetter, whom we usually simply refer to as our “stone mason,” but he is much, much more. Joe is the brawn and brains of the Stone Bank restoration that you see today. He has put his blood, sweat and gears into disassembling the back 20 feet of this structure, stone-by-stone, and now rebuilding it, block-by-block — plus an 8-foot addition for handicap accessibility. With a small crew of helpers under his direction, Joe has hand-carried some of the bank’s 400-pound boulders in the bitter cold and snow, he has poured pilings and cut sidewalk in the rain, and he has hand-shoveled mud in the heat of summer — all for sporadic pay of his heavily discounted bills. I don’t know what is more amazing — to see this grandchild-raising ex-Marine who’s pushing 60 engage in hard labor like a ball-and-chain prisoner or that such a man resides within the same town as the Stone Bank, that he and my wife were Bottineau High School classmates — and that they’re still talking to each other.
We owe a great, BIG thanks to Joe today. But even Joe would readily acknowledge that there would be no Stone Bank Project today without my wife, Sharon Kessler. She walked past the Stone Bank every day on her way to and from Bottineau High School, and she never forgot it, even after going off to UND and living with me in Bismarck, Madison, Washington, DC, Wisconsin, England and the Twin Cities. When Karen Larson told her the back of the Stone Bank was crumbling and the City Council was about to condemn and raze it, they formed a nonprofit, Touchstones, Inc., to raise funds and save it. In the 2 1/2 years since then, Sharon has poured hundreds of hours and thousands of dollars into the Stone Bank Project — in addition to her full-time (plus some) job in the Twin Cities at Minnesota Philanthropy Partners. None of Joe’s work on the site would have been possible without her grant writing, fundraising, organizing — and blog posting.
So today, as we all give thanks for our family, friends and fortunes small and large, those of us who are friends of the Stone Bank Project should pause and give thanks to Joe and Sharon, too. That process started a couple months ago when Cenex recognized Sharon with a $50 gift card from its “Tanks of Thanks” program. I will close this guest post by letting you read the Cenex-edited version of what I wrote then (click on the image to see it full size). Tomorrow, Sharon will be back here with the penultimate installment of National Blog Posting Month.
November 27, 2013
Rockin’ the Neighborhood
The Stone Bank has some very near relatives that live in the neighborhood — two stone structures of roughly the same vintage are only a steps away.
Blog reader Dave D., of Sioux Falls, S.D., shared three photos with us that he took in 2003.
It looks as if there was some curb and gutter work going on at the time, but Dave’s photos also show how these fine stone buildings have stood the test of time.
Many people in Bottineau still call this the Saunders house, after the family that lived in it for about 50 years. Originally known as the McIntosh house, and built in 1895, it is five years older than the Stone Bank. If you walked past that pine tree at the right, you would soon find yourself standing outside the Stone Bank, about a block away.
This stone storage garage is in the alley behind the old Ace Hardware Store. It’s still there and in use. If you walk up the alley to the left, you will find the Stone Bank.
This photo of the Stone Bank was taken in 2003. In those days it had a couple of volunteer trees out back and new sidewalk going in.
These three stone buildings are totally rockin’ the neighborhood. Thanks to Dave, who grew up in Mohall, N.D., for sharing these photos. We hope the next time he passes through Bottineau that he stops to see us at the Stone Bank.
It’s Day 27 of NaBloPoMo — thanks for stopping by.
November 26, 2013
The Bank Will Rise Again
Sometimes it occurs to me that people might have trouble “giving” to a bank. So let’s be clear. The Stone Bank Project is about a building not a-hem bankers. (Not that all bankers are bad — but, well, you know.)
So here are a couple new photos showing the new foundation of the Stone Bank rising, where none was before.
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- The back 20 feet of the Stone Bank will now rest on this new foundation. Pretty, even in the snow.
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- When we started, the back 20 feet of the building was sitting on shallow footings in this crawl space — and it was sinking.
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- Back view of the Stone Bank with new sidewalk panels and new foundation. The original stone facade will be reattached.
The floor level of the bank building is about 3.5 feet above grade. That’s why we are adding a handicap entrance at grade in the rebuilt structure. When complete, the building will look almost exactly like it did before we started, but it will be updated to accommodate everyone. It’s rather exciting, and I think those long-ago builders would appreciate our efforts to make this building flexible and useful for generations to come.
If you appreciate our work to restore this wonderful building, feel free to make a donation. We need to pay our contractors, the insurance and snow removal. And more snow removal. And then some more. Last winter, we paid nearly $1,100 in snow removal alone.
Don’t forget, Dec. 3 is Giving Tuesday.
November 25, 2013
A Slow-Motion Time-Lapse Review
OK. At Day 25 of National Blog Posting Month, let’s take stock.
We are here for the Stone Bank. Some of you may be new to our project and this blog. So, let’s review.
In 2011, we bought the Stone Bank, which was on the verge of being condemned, formed a nonprofit (Touchstones, Inc.) and started hashing out a plan to save this historic building made of hand-hewn stones in 1900. It has been a challenge and a joy and we are chugging ahead. In 2012, we dismantled 20 feet of the back of the building, which had settled over too shallow footings. We are now in the process of rebuilding the back of the building. Here’s a slide show of some stage of our progress.
The weather has turned to winter ahead of schedule in Bottineau, so we are going to button up the project and the site for the winter and finish the rebuild in the spring.
Some people say this is taking too long — but, remember, we are moving tons of stone on a shoestring. (A great trick!) With donations and some more grants, we are going to get the back of this building up and the roof on in early 2014. Please remember the Stone Bank project in your year-end giving — we will put your trust and your donation to great use.
(There are handy links to Razoo and PayPal on this page.)
Thanks for reading the Stone Bank blog!
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