Ann Marie French's story the other day about the decaying exterior of President Ulysses S. Grant's cottage in the Saratoga County town of Wilton, where he completed his memoirs during the last weeks of his life, is an example of what's wrong with New York state.
For years devoted "Friends of Ulysses S. Grant Cottage" have volunteered to maintain this bit of national history. The friends are in charge of a visitors' center, while the state has let the exterior of the cottage itself, which contains the 18th president's belongings, fall into disrepair.
As Lance Ingmire, the president of the Friends of Ulysses S. Grant Cottage and a familiar name to anyone following Civil War encampments, told Ann Marie French, “We cannot let our historic sites fall apart just because of mismanagement of money at the state level.”
Check out www.grantcottage.org.