There’s some good news for the Heurich House, a beautiful victorian mansion in DC that is facing auction if the nonprofit foundation that runs the house can’t come up with $250,000. Since I wrote about the home’s plight in January the group has raised $70,000 towards their goal and won pledges for more funds and support to come.
Also, today DCist reports the bank is giving the organization a 30-day extension to raise the remaining $180,000. I’ve already given $10 and considering another donation, but if you needed convincing there’s nothing better than a recent blog post by Mike Grass who makes the excellent argument the house is worth saving not only because it would be expensive and difficult to recover it’s current state if the home’s contents are cleared out, but also because it is a unique symbol of the non-federal side of DC. I think he’s absolutely right: the house faces peril partly because it was built by a brewer, and “not a naval hero, not a granddaughter of Martha Washington, not even a Gilded Age mining millionaire turned politician …” And it is precisely for that reason, in addition to its beauty, that it deserves preservation.
For more information see brewmasterscastle.com.