The need to categorize a spot on the map "Historic" and therefore off limits to you and me is carried to the extreme. We have a bunch of self described intellectuals dreaming up these laws, who have never gotten their hands dirty, except maybe in an extra credit college Archeology summer course in college, where they spend a month excavating a square meter of dirt, surveyed, strung, mapped in 3-D on their laptops, cataloging every rusty nail, shard of broken glass. They've got their big tents set up, tables for "work stations", laptops galore, a dozen hung over from the night before young students, male and female, shepherded by a couple of hung over professors, all of which are trying to schmooze their way into each other's pants, sprawled in the sun with their barely there summer garb, working with dental picks and tiny brushes, excavating millimeter by millimeter.
When it's all over, they've got a hole in the ground, a few fairly useless artifacts that will be placed in a box, and stuck in a closet somewhere, never to be seen again. But now, this student who picked up 4 semester credits is an "expert", and winds up on the staff of a like minded politician who wonders about and is afraid of these peasants with machines that are hot, sweaty, dirty, digging holes in the ground with a shovel. No laptops, tents, strings, or notepads. They find something and stick in in their pouch, and dig another hole. This must be stopped! They don't know how to do it right! This "History" can't fall into the hands of the uneducated rabble!
I'm on your side, Smokey, but you have to pick the fights you can win.
I bought a house 14 years ago here in SC. A couple of years later, I started an addition to put on a new kitchen, and bedrooms. The town planner showed up and asked if I had filed a request with the local "Historical" board to do the building. I had a permit from the county. I said no, so he issued a cease and desist order, until I had obtained permission from the "Historical" board of the town. I picked up the six pages of instructions. They wanted surveyors, an architect, elevation drawings, showing landscaping, each tree and bush, the roof line of the addition must match the existing one, the interior must match the "character" of the existing structure, and continue the architecture used in the original home. It turns out that the woman we bought the home from, was on the board, and got this childhood home of hers, built in 1939, on the list of historical structures for the town, as an ego boost apparently, because George Washington did NOT sleep there.
After reading this application, I went to the planner's office, told him it was ridiculous, I had my permit, the historical board had no authority, they were a social club, and they could go to hell. He shrugged, smirked, and revoked the cease and desist order.
