Franklin Heritage, Inc. in the early days: A conversation with Mike and Kathy Lewis, two founding members of FHI

The home of Mike and Kathy Lewis - co-founders of Franklin Heritage, Inc., before renovating it. 

In 1983, Franklin Heritage, Inc. was established by a small group of concerned citizens who felt it was important to preserve the historical character of the City of Franklin, Indiana - especially its tree-lined boulevards, brick streets, and historic architecture. 
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Two founding FHI members, Mike and Kathy Lewis, owned a home on Martin Place. Without much knowledge on restoration but wanted to bring their Victorian home back to life, Mike and Kathy started exchanging information with Chris Hext, Mike Beidler, and others in their neighborhood about how they can make their historic homes shine again. These collaborations led to awareness that Franklin’s old homes and tree lined streets were assets the town needed to preserve.

I sat down with Mike and Kathy to talk about their memories of FHI in the early days of the organization, historic preservation, and their thoughts about what FHI looks like today.

What was kind of your role within FHI? What do you remember about the group?
Mike: I was the board's first secretary, which probably doesn't come as a surprise because I was a reporter. We would meet typically, we would meet at Chris Hext’s house. And I remember that it was a wonderful old Italianate house in the process of being restored. The kitchen was a modern kitchen, however; it had a skylight in it and a gigantic fake carrot hung horizontally over this island. And we met there almost all the time. I remember the carrot quite well.

Michael Beidler owned a house on Martin Place a few houses down from us. We lived at 86 Martin Place. We were all neighbors in need of the same information and learning about how to restore our homes. 

Do you still live in Franklin today? 
Mike: No. We left Franklin in 1986. I became the editor and general manager of the Brown County Democrat. And then journalism and my wife's jobs have taken us all over. We currently live in Camp Hill, Pennsylvania, close to our daughter Rachel. Rachel actually attended preschool and kindergarten and in Franklin.

Kathy: When Rachel was little, she helped us renovate the house in many ways. She helped us even as a toddler! She would get her little red wagon, fill it up with bricks, and take them to the backyard and for us.

The Martin Place home of Mike and Kathy Lewis - co-founders of Franklin Heritage, Inc., after renovating it. 

Do you still have ties in Franklin?

Mike: Yeah, the grand irony is that my sister, Sharon Lemke, in her retirement years moved from Brown County to Franklin and joined Franklin Heritage Inc. She has been a volunteer various times at the Artcraft. A couple of weeks ago, my sister took me to the art craft for my first experience of seeing the Artcraft since we’ve lived in Franklin.

Kathy: We used to go and buy popcorn!

Mike: Yeah, Rachel, my daughter, and I would walk down and grab concessions and walk around downtown and munching on popcorn. 

What are your thoughts on historic preservation today?

Mike: We are absolutely sort of committed to historic preservation. After leaving Brown County, we moved to Bedford, Indiana where we restored a 1920s bungalow back to its original condition. We restored a fountain in the backyard that had apparently been made by a person who worked in the limestone quarries there. It's rewarding to see Franklin, taking advantage of what we had envisioned – that preservation would be a boom to economic development. It would help the county to help the town economically to take advantage of its assets. One of Franklin’s assets are its wonderful old homes.

I don't think any of us in the early ‘80s envision Franklin Heritage becoming what it's become. We were trying to learn about how to restore our own houses and help people appreciate theirs. I remember a project where the group researched how Victorian homes were painted and put on a program called Franklin's Painted Ladies to convince people that they didn't have to paint their houses white. Victorian homes were often very colorful! But I don't think any of us envisioned an organization that would be restoring homes on its own, or that would be operating the Artcraft.

All of us who restore old houses have had the experience that the Artcraft has when it pulls up the carpet to find the tile and other decorative stuff. For example, we spilled some paint stripper on what we thought was the wrought iron surrounding our fireplace in our Franklin home. At first, I didn't think anything about it, but several hours later, I wiped it off to discover a vibrant blue ceramic tile that had been painted black for some ungodly reason. And, and so the Artcraft is like a living example of that. It's amazing.

The Martin Place home of Mike and Kathy Lewis - co-founders of Franklin Heritage, Inc., after renovating it. 

What was the spark behind joining the group and being an advocate for historic preservation back in the ‘80s?
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Mike: I think part of what we were advocating was simply to say this is a gorgeous town. Franklin is a beautiful town. It has tree lined streets and wonderful homes. The courthouse – which was restored not long after we founded Franklin heritage, Inc. – is gorgeous. We should use this to our advantage. It should be celebrated because not every town has it.

It’s fun when my sister takes me through downtown Franklin to see the place just thriving. Downtown works much better than many downtowns that I've been in. And that includes the Artcraft.

Kathy: For me, one of the big things for preservation of these beautiful homes is the structure. I love the structure and the look of these homes. It's not like being in the burbs where every little house looks exactly like the next house. They're very unique. They're substantial. They have stories to tell and being able to bring some of those stories back to life was fun for me as we were doing our own home and as we were watching and helping each other do theirs. Putting those homes that have been cut up into apartments back into one family homes, finding all of the lost stairways and doors, finding those things that had been hidden away, and then bringing those gems to make them sparkle like they were in their original day. So the different architecture and beauty that all of the eclectic homes gave their neighborhoods is really a draw for me. 

Mike: I have to tell you, that era was a lot of fun. Cathy and I were in our early 20s. I think we were probably the younger side of the group, but the others weren't much older. There was just a lot of fun and a sudden mischievousness about it. Mike Beidler’s home on Martin Place has what we referred to as a witch's cap – one of those towers with what looks like a witch's cap for a roof. Mike finally got to the point also where he had been able to restore his house into one family home. The house was chopped up into apartments and he was taking those apartments apart and returning it to its status as a one family home. Mike also had the pickup truck that we all shared to go get supplies. 

One time, when Chris Hext used the truck, he put some cheap plywood kind of sideboards on it. On the sideboards painted, ‘Witch’s Cap Condos – For Rent Now’ and put Mike’s phone number on the sideboards. You know, there was a degree of fun in it all. Chris and Mike were the masters of the fun part. It was a good time of life.

The fireplace mantel during renovations of Mike and Kathy Lewis' Martin Place home.

What was the most rewarding part of restoring your home?
Kathy: Oh, gosh, there were a couple of things. For me, it was finding beauty under the paint of the fireplace. It had a gorgeous oak surround with pillars and a mirror. I had multiple layers of paint on it and getting down to that gorgeous oak was wonderful. We also found gorgeous blue tiles that we thought were just cast iron around the firebox. The tiles had the seasons on them as well. The blue and white title surrounded the hearth as well, but had been covered by brick. 

Being able to bring that fireplace back to its glory was really gratifying. 

From the outside, restoring the front porch to a usable front porch with the railings back on and the port swing out front. We ended up putting four colors on the outside of the house. Aesthetically, looking at the lovely house even though she was smaller than most Queen Anns – she could have been a Queen Princess. But it was wonderful seeing her stand out again and be functional, but pretty at the same time.
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Mike: For me it was the strength of the group. When it came to the fireplace, I went down the street and bragged to Mike about what I had found. He came back to my house and he saw all that blue. Then he saw the brick around the hearth. He looked at me and said “Give me a hammer and a screwdriver.” And I said “No, don't do that.” He said “Well, it's not my house. It's okay.” And that is when he uncovered the blue around the hearth. I had been timid and I wasn't quite ready to do that but he got me out of my comfort zone.

What do you remember most about Franklin and FHI?
Mike: What I remember most was the energy and the fun. We all lived in the same neighborhood. The process of restoring our homes together was like treasure hunting. We seemed to lack the resources we needed to put the things together, certainly in ways that we could afford, we learned as we went. People with more resources could have just hired expert contractors. So it was just a very energetic, wonderful time of life is what I remember. I remember my daughter, four years old at the time, learned a lot more about drywall than any four year old had to learn! 
Franklin Heritage was a real energetic part of that. We thought we were doing something good. But again, no one could have ever foreseen but the organization would have been restoring houses, contributing to the community, or having its own salvage shop. We didn’t want the city to cut down the beautiful trees and we didn't want them to tear down any more houses. None of us could have envisioned what it has turned into today.