Wednesday, April 27, 2011

Donations help protect Georgia markers

Georgia’s Civil War signs could use a little love, in the form of donations for needed repairs and replacement.

According to a 2010 assessment of the nearly 1,000 markers, 60 percent need repair or repainting. Another 10 percent need to be replaced and more than 60 percent need new mounting posts.

The Georgia Battlefields Association in its May newsletter details the opportunity for the public to assist the effort.

The cost to repair or repaint a marker is $700-800 (depending on condition), to replace a marker is $2,200, and to replace a post is $300, according to the GBA.

The Georgia Department of Natural Resources maintains the signs, according to Frankie Mewborn, cultural resources manager.

With the recession and government cutbacks, the state is now accepting private donations to help replace and preserve these educational signs.

If you’d like to contribute to historical marker maintenance, even specifying a marker that needs to be replaced or repaired, call Mewborn at 770-389-7271 or email him at frankie.mewborn@dnr.state.ga.us

Listing of all Georgia historical markers (these do not reflect current condition)

2 comments:

  1. From what I understand the markers are not maintained by the DNR, but by the Georgia Historical Society:

    http://www.georgiahistory.com/containers/141

    Or perhaps the Historical Society just provides them (this I know is the case) and the DNR is then respobsible for maintenance.

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  2. I checked the DNR website and it says it maintains them and GHS obtains them. Not exactly sure how it works, Chad, thanks for the link. I recall, when doing an item on an Atlanta Campaign sign that ended up on Memorial Drive, Frankie Mewborn telling me his crew handles the maintenance. And they came out and picked up the wayward marker.

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