$18K grant received to replace, restore historic gas station windows

Thanks to Rachel Schneider, members of the Phillips County Historical Society and an $18,000 grant, the historic Reimer-Smith oil station south of Phillips County Museum will be getting some restoration and replacement work done on its windows and window frames.

The station’s original location was 205 N. Baxter Ave. It was moved to its current location Oct. 23, 1998, and was placed on the National Register of Historic Places by the U.S. Department of the Interior on April 21, 2000.

Schneider, assistant curator at the museum, said the station’s windows have their original wooden frames, but they’ve started to rot over time. This allows more wind and dust into the building, possibly reducing the historical integrity of the building itself and the items inside.

She applied for and received the Colorado Sustaining the Humanities through the American Rescue Plan grant after getting an email at the museum last summer from Colorado Humanities raising awareness about the grants.

The funds are provided by Colorado Humanities and the National Endowment for the Humanities as part of the American Rescue Plan to support the response and recovery of the cultural sector from the impacts of COVID-19.

“The max was $20,000, so we were pretty close,” Schneider said.

The full article is available in our e-Edition. Click here to subscribe.