It is the oldest building in the city. It dates from the 17th century. The Montmignon tower, in Friville-Escarbotin, in the Somme (80), is nevertheless threatened with demolition. The town hall cannot alone assume the funding necessary to treat the fungus that is eating away at it, dry rot, i.e. 900,000 euros. The Démucher association (a Picard term meaning to rediscover something lost, forgotten) which promotes the heritage of maritime Picardy, is launching an appeal for donations to save the square tower with its half-round tower from demolition.
«We went to see the town hall and offered to make our site available, to launch SOS Montmignon operation for the purpose of collecting pledges“, explains to the Figaro Jean-Mary Thomas, the founder of the Démucher association. The operation was launched on Sunday, September 8.We know that it is not the call for pledges of donations that will fill the 900,000 euros of work but the more pledges there are, the more patrons will be inclined to follow us. The population is playing the game so we are also getting involved, the Heritage Foundation will be able to say to itself“, hopes Jean-Mary Thomas. If there are only 50 promises of donations, the association will not be able to go further and request the support of the Fondation du patrimoine. If there are 1000 or 2000 promises, the association will have more legitimacy to ask for help. For the moment, about ten people have proposed a donation, in the space of two days.
A promise of donations of 10,000 euros from the association
Since Sunday, the association has collected about ten calls for donations. Démucher made a promise of donations of 10,000 euros to encourage others to follow. For the moment these are only promises and not real donations.If other associations follow us, we will come back to the “donation promisers” and ask them to validate their promises at that time.“, specifies the founder of the association. Jean-Mary Thomas gives himself almost a month, until the Heritage Days, the weekend of September 21, before taking stock of the operation and making an update with the town hall. The municipality, for its part, has already set aside 180,000 euros for the demolition and will donate it to the SOS Montmignon operation.
The project?Treat the dry rot, demolish the interior only, redevelop the ground floor to create a cultural space and host a speaker, a storyteller, a musician… and a space that recalls the history of the city. It was proposed to create a tourist information point to inform tourists during the summer season“, Jean-Mary Thomas projects. During the Heritage Days, he plans to set up a marquee in front of the tower to explain its history and what he plans to do.
