This may surprise everyone, but today’s Roundup is the final one for 2011 because of the end of year posts we have planned the next two weeks.  A lot of the news I saw this week were local press releases on the projects receiving Community Heritage grants – which we covered with MDAH’s release – so this week’s is short.  Don’t forget that you still have a few days to cast your vote for the Jackson area places nominated for the 101 Places list.

Monmouth Exterior View (2009). Photo courtesy of MDAH, taken by Jennifer Baughn.

Not so good news out of Natchez this week where a headline in the Democrat read “Attractions declare bankruptcy.”  The attractions in question are Monmouth Plantation and King’s Tavern.  Both remain open, but according to the article the owners of Monmouth had to declare bankruptcy to avoid foreclosure.  Bankruptcy filing for the King’s Tavern owners was advised in order to remain open.  The general bad economy, combined with a hit the tourist town took in May with all the reports of the river flooding (despite that it was the Louisiana side of the river that took the brunt of it) were both cited as reasons leading to the bankruptcy filings.

The rest of the news is better.  Down in Hattiesburg, the American continued their “then and now” look at buildings in the Hub City with a short piece on Bennett Auditorium and the Aubrey Keith Lucas Administration Buildings on the USM campus.  As we noted with last week’s mention of this series, they once again cited MDAH’s online database as the source for date information on the buildings.

Finally, I saw a couple of stories about non-Community Heritage grant awards this week as well.  In Tupelo, two stories (one print and one television) reported that the city was going to get financial help from MDAH to relocate the Spain House – a requirement to save it from demolition.  The city had applied for Community Heritage funds – but the funding awarded was from the Mississippi Landmark Grant fund instead.  I’m sure those in Tupelo pushing to save the landmark are just excited to have the help – regardless of the details of where the funds come from.

MDAH also awarded a Mississippi Landmark Grant to reconstruct the Log Cabin in Philadelphia that was damaged in the April storms.  The brief story on the 1933 building is the the Neshoba Democrat.

Any preservation news from the next couple of weeks will be in our first roundup of 2012.  Happy Holidays MissPres!

Categories: Cool Old Places, Grants, Hattiesburg, Historic Preservation, Jackson, MS Dept. of Archives and History, Natchez, News Roundups, Philadelphia, Tupelo