Keepsake

Photo by David Davis

I had wanted to return to Cass County Mo for years to capture the countryside and a few historical landmarks, and last year we are able to make that happen. This is the image of the Cass County Courthouse in Harrisonville Mo, organized in 1835. Soldiers quartered their horses in the old original courthouse during the Civil War, as it was later declared unfit for occupancy. The building was repaired somewhat for business at the time and it was later rebuilt in 1897 paid by a citizen tax of $45,000.00.

Today there is a new modern courthouse just on the outskirts of town. My hope is the county will preserve this beautiful building for future generations. The downtown square of Harrisonville is beautiful. I can remember as a child we couldn’t find a place to park on the square from all the business that was happening. Today the square is much like a museum of a town with just few businesses operating.

I’ve wrote about small town America and how we need to nourish a culture of creativity and to do this we can revitalize our original downtown areas. This image exemplifies that notion. Harrisonville has done a superb job of keeping all the old bricked streets and buildings in great shape. There are artistic painted images on some of the outer brick walls of the buildings with historical facts. My feelings when making this image was to convey the beauty of preservation. The joy of what a 177 year old town has accomplished with maintaining their history.

Art plays such a big part of our heritage and we as photographers have a responsibility to our future generations to capture images like this for keepsake.

David is a NC based photographer. To see his online gallery click here.

Resources:

www.casscounty.com