Public called to participate in next phase of campaign to meet additional challenge grant from TAWANI Foundation

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The campaign to raise private funds to restore the historic Ceremonial Courtroom in the Kenosha County Courthouse has met its $1.35 million goal, organizers announced today.

The ceremonial courtroom is best known as where Kyle Rittenhouse was acquitted of all charges. Judge Schroeder was the presiding judge for many years. It is now home to Judge Chad Kerkman.

This means the project will receive a $675,000 matching grant from the prestigious Jeffris Family Foundation, which supports historic preservation projects throughout the Midwest.

“Thanks to the community’s generous support, we’ve made the match,” said Mary K. Wagner, a retired judge and the co-chair of the Blue Ribbon Committee that began raising funds for the project in 2021. “With the support of the County Board, we will make this restoration a reality and bring this breathtaking space back to its former splendor.”

Together, the Jeffris grant and the private funds raised from a wide range of individual donors and locally based corporate citizens will continue to support a restoration project years in the making, as the Courthouse building nears its centennial in 2025. Gifts of particular significance came from Uline and another corporate partner that wishes to remain anonymous, Wagner noted.

An effort remains underway to raise additional private contributions toward a $100,000 matching grant that TAWANI Foundation recently committed to the project. Personal contributions of any amount are welcome, Wagner said.

A two-story-tall space located on the building’s second floor, the Ceremonial Courtroom maintains a stately presence, though much of its original ornamentation is now obscured by a drop ceiling that was installed when the building was outfitted with central air conditioning in the 1960s.

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The Ceremonial Courtroom was one of two such gems designed as centerpieces of the neoclassical building located on the Civic Center Square and is included in the National Register of Historic Places; the other such space was destroyed in a 1960s remodeling.

Now concealed above the drop ceiling is a large, inlaid glass skylight, highly detailed ornamental plaster, and a frieze that rings the room with a quote from Abraham Lincoln on “Law”:

“Let every American, every lover of liberty, every well-wisher to his posterity, swear by the blood of the Revolution, never to violate in the least particular, the laws of the country; and never to tolerate their violation by others.”

The skylight and ornamentation were partially damaged by the installation of mechanical equipment nearly 60 years ago, but a micro restoration conducted in 2020 demonstrated the viability of a full-scale restoration.

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“Bringing the room back to its former glory will preserve a historic gem in our community and will provide a grand public gathering space for important events like adoptions and weddings, as well as daily court functions,” said County Executive Samantha Kerkman. “With generous backing from the community thus far, we are close to making this happen, and with further support, we will.”

Based in Janesville, the Jeffris Family Foundation supports the preservation of regionally and nationally important historic buildings and decorative arts projects throughout the Midwest including such prestigious locations as President Warren G. Harding’s Marion, Ohio, home, President William Henry Harrison’s home in Vincennes, Ind., and buildings designed by Frank Lloyd Wright and Louis Sullivan.

Foundation President Thomas M. Jeffris praised the Ceremonial Courtroom project and three of its leading champions throughout a process that began several years ago.

“It was a pleasure dealing with such outstanding people like Jim Kreuser and Samantha Kerkman, and a special thanks to Frank Martinelli,” Jeffris said, referring, respectively, to the former and current county executives and the county’s project manager.

TAWANI Foundation, founded by Colonel (IL) Jennifer N. Pritzker, IL ARNG (Retired), is the philanthropic arm of TAWANI Enterprises, a Chicago-based firm with businesses spanning property management, publishing and education. Col. Pritzker was the developer of the Pritzker Archives and Memorial Park Center and Mission94 Firearms Education Center, recently built in the Kenosha County Village of Somers.

“TAWANI Foundation and I take pride in backing the preservation of the Ceremonial Courtroom in the Kenosha County Courthouse,” said Col. Pritzker. “We are staunch supporters of conservation and exploration, and we hope others will join us in this endeavor through the matching grant.”

Former County Executive John Collins, co-chair of the Blue Ribbon Committee, expressed appreciation to the Jeffris Foundation, TAWANI Foundation, and all of the private donors who have contributed to this community effort.

“The Jeffris Family Foundation appreciates the immense value in this historic restoration project to offer our community an extraordinarily generous challenge grant,” Collins said. “Thanks to the generosity of individuals and businesses in our community, we are on the threshold of moving this project forward. We need those who have not yet contributed to do so. Together, we can restore some of the glory of our century-old Courthouse.”

More information about the project, including images and videos, is available online at https://www.kenoshacounty.org/supportthecourtroom.

Donations are tax deductible and may be made in the form of checks payable to the Kenosha community Foundation, 600 52nd St., Suite 110, Kenosha, WI 53140, or online at the above-mentioned webpage.

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