mpls_neonguy

I tried to contact the Historical society to see if it would be possible to appear before them and present the "neon side" of the facts. They never responded to my calls or voice mails. I even stated that the whole country is watching this story. I assume it's too late for any rebuttals. They've given it the go ahead.

Lawrence Sign is in St Paul, MN. They pushed hard for this project to be approved. It is allegedly a $200,000.00 job. The IRONY is they had to get approval from the Minnesota State Historical Preservation Society to do this and they are'nt "preserving" the neon. The approval was based on the lie told to them regarding the cost of operation and they went along with it because Lawrence is, afterall, their "expert source" for information. They had a specific agenda, sell a big money job any way possible. The structure repairs are necessary, changing the neon is not. I'm just surprised that the Preservation Society would allow a new technology to replace a perfectly fine technology "from that era in sign history". It's not their money being used to pay the electric bill so how can they allow the removal of the very focal point of that sign to be changed to something NOT historical. You dont look at a sign like that and say , WOW, look at the sheetmetal or paint or anything about the structure of the sign, you say WOW because of the neon. Cost of operation, even with a B---S---, inflated cost reported to them, should not be a reason to remove the most historically signifcant part of any historical sign.