Passion for Preserving Historic Buildings

Like many other American towns, Kearney NE has lost a lot of historic landmarks in the name of progress. But one Kearney citizen found a way to blend today's needs with the preservation of historic buildings in a way others can emulate.

Walter D Martin, D.M.D, not only turned the old Fort Theater into an up-to-date dentist office--Ft. Theatre Dentistry, but also renovated the old First Baptist church into his living quarters. For some purists, this might seem as bad as total destruction, except Dr. Martin hasn't destroyed the integrity of either historic building.

Originally from California, though he taught orthodontics internationally, Martin moved to Kearney to be near his children by his first marriage. It was a distinct change from California. He said this about the historic background of where he lived in California, "The town I was living in did not exist 25 years before I got there. It was just a piece of dirt."

He learned appreciation for historic buildings from his earliest days and from his time in Europe where he was awed by the magnificent historic architecture. "As a young child, I would find interesting buildings and imagine what it would be like to make them a home. Could be an old railroad station, could be an old church, could be an old fort in someone's backyard. I always imagined everything as a home."

His appreciation for historic buildings grew as he traveled. "When I traveled over to Europe, one of the most amazing things to me was the historic architecture. Some of the stuff, like Notre Dame Cathedral, started over 1000 years ago. In the United States, 300 years ago we were getting tepees to stay up. Yet in Europe, they were building these very magnificent buildings. So as I traveled over to Europe, I loved looking at historic architecture. The amount of handiwork was just beautiful."