disposable buildings

I was surprised last month to see the old Bonanza building being torn down, taken away to be buried, never to be seen again. When we first arrived in town 18 years ago, it was the one place we could afford to take our crew of children. With children eating free on Tuesday nights, when accompanied by an adult, we could feast for few dollars.
However with time changing economics and eating interests in the area, Bonanza closed after 25 years. The restaurant is no more and now the building isn’t either: One more disposable building to be tossed aside after a couple decades of use. That reminds me of a comment made by a woman who visited Europe.
She was impressed with the century-old cottages, castles and churches. On her return home she wondered aloud why America has so few buildings that old. A friend reminded her of that question as they watched a decades old building being torn down to make room for a new building. It is hard to have buildings of age and history, if they are replaced rather than repaired.
Disposable buildings are simply part of fast-paced mindset.
I understand the philosophy of “it will cost more to fix it than to build a new one. “It’s all a matter of economics. Until we stop to ask, “Will the structure be built with the same types of materials?” Older buildings are more likely to have been constructed from durable materials which are considered too expensive to use these days.
I’ve seen and lived with the difference.
When my husband and I bought our first house, it was a century old “fixer-upper.” The doors were solid oak, with old-fashioned heavy locks on them. The beams, uncovered during the remodeling phase, were rough hewn, real 2-by-4 s. The long, old-fashioned bath tub had a slanted end where an adult could literally lay back and soak comfortably.
By comparison our brand new ranch home had hollow doors, an uncomfortable fiber-glass tub, malnourished 2-by-4 beams and central air, insulation and double-paned windows.
Our first home lacked insulation, had an ancient furnace, single-paned windows and a sagging floor from a cut beam. We loved and hated the place over the next 10 years of tearing out the decaying plaster and replacing it with dry wall. We used the existing wood lathing to reinforce the fragile sheet rock panels: It was much sturdier than having only paneling over undersized 2-by-4s in our modern home.
When we bought the fixer-upper, the neighborhood consensus was that it did not warrant the hours of work and materials needed to fix it up. When we put it up for sale 10 years later the first couple to view the house immediately bought it at our price.
It has been sold a couple times since then. Each subsequent owner made their own improvements and raised the price, but no one said, “this pace is too far gone to put in the time and effort to get it into a marketable condition.”
Because we endured a century home is now a respectable part of the old neighborhood. It continues to provide generations of young couples an affordable, durable, non-disposable first home.