Trucks carried commodities away from the old Milligan elevator for the last time last week.
Landus Cooperative is in the process of giving the elevator to the Greene County Fair Association as a location for Greene County’s Freedom Rock. The elevator had most recently been used as storage for specialty soybeans.
The last of the beans were taken out last week and the transfer of ownership is now awaiting only legal paperwork, according to Landus Coop spokesperson Alicia Heun.
Landus’s donation of the site decreases by half the funding needed for the Freedom Rock project. A committee composed of veterans and representatives of the Greene County Fair Association and the Greene County supervisors last spring estimated the cost to be $50-$60,000. That included lighting, landscaping, parking and driveways at a proposed site on the east side of the fairgrounds.
The donation of the elevator eliminates many of those costs, as parking will be available at the old Milwaukee depot. Estimated cost is now $20-$30,000.
Fundraising is underway. Donations can be taken to any office of Peoples Trust & Savings Bank. The Freedom Rock is on the schedule of artist Bubba Sorensen next spring. The committee hopes to dedicate it next Memorial Day.
