Council proposes a move

FRANKLIN-Alone, dilapidated, forlorn and often unnoticed, the former Edison schoolhouse that has stood its ground for nearly a century on Evans Street could be moving to a new location. The borough council last week unanimously approved a resolution calling for an investigation into the possibility of relocating the old building, which is known to an older generation as the "Hungarian Church." Although the council resolved to support a study into the feasibility of moving and restoring the building, it did not provide any funding. "What I'm doing is just trying to facilitate everything," explained councilman John Sowden IV, who is known for local historical knowledge and is deemed the "point man" for the project. "The project is going through the Franklin Historical Society." Partially obscured from view behind a larger house, the old schoolhouse/church originally stood in Ogdensburg, near the old Edison iron mines, which were also known as "concentrating works," said local historian Bill Truran who has written a book about the mines. When the mines were closed in 1905, many of the nearby structures, including the church, were sold off, and the building was moved a year later, "by horse and wagon, piece by piece," Sowden explained. Once reassembled in Franklin, the building was used for many years as a church by "the Hungarian component of the mining community," said Truran, who added that the building was in use as late as 1965 by the Franklin Presbyterian Church. "I was one of the youths going over there," he said. Sowden feels the best place to move the church would be to the former Neighborhood House site on Main Street, an area the councilman said was once called Green Spot. Vacant since the "Nabe" was demolished in 1994, the site is directly across Main Street from both the Franklin Historical Society museum and the former New Jersey Zinc Company property that is the designated venue for the town's Gateway Project. "It was never a schoolhouse; it was always a church until its end," Sowden explained of the building. "What a wonderful location it would be. They would see the old neighborhood house site and they would see a nice, quaint-looking church, along with a beautiful walking garden." Because the church was built around 1900, it could be classified as an historic building, although the state's historic preservation department said that may or may not be the case with the church, since it was moved from its previous location in Ogdensburg. Among the state criteria for declaring a site historic is "a resource moved from one location on its original site to another location on the property, during or after its Period of Significance." While that wasn't the case with the old church, the rules aren't necessarily cut in stone, one state historic official said. "There are rules governing historic buildings that have been moved, and different factors affect how the move is treated," explained Robert Craig, the state's prinicipal historic preservation specialist. "It's not so easy as to say that moving a building does not make it historic."