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The national landmark pushes to meet a fundraising goal.(Nathaniel Langley)<\/p>\nROCKFORD, Ill. (WIFR) – Samantha Hochmann taps her shoe against a limestone slab behind Tinker Swiss Cottage. The national landmark overlooks Kent Creek near downtown Rockford.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis is one of my favorite places in the entire state of Illinois,\u201d she exclaimed. As the executive director for the Tinker Swiss Cottage Museum, Hochmann considers it her mission to protect local history.<\/p>\n
\u201cI want you to feel like this is part of your history too, not just Rockford\u2019s history, but part of our community.\u201d<\/p>\n
According to the museum\u2019s website, Robert Hall Tinker constructed the Swiss-inspired home in 1865 atop a limestone bluff just across from Rockford\u2019s founding location. <\/p>\n
\u201cLimestone, which we\u2019re set on, is already a soft rock,\u201d conceded Hochmann. She claimed decades of weather\u2019s wear and tear eroded the \u201csoft rock,\u201d visible along the cottage\u2019s west side.<\/p>\n
The national landmark pushes to meet a fundraising goal.(Nathaniel Langley)<\/p>\n
Tunnels beneath Tinker help groundwater flow and keep the basement dry. But the director says erosion started with a leaky pipe in the basement \u2014 a system installed in the early 1900s.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt has drastically accelerated the deterioration,\u201d contended Hochmann.<\/p>\n
Caution tape closes off the cottage\u2019s west side stairs as well as a gap in the metal fence. When the executive director grabs the fence, the force is enough to wiggle it back and forth.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis fencing is not even really… it\u2019s not great,\u201d she conceded. \u201cWhat we need to do: we need to detach the porch, which the erosion\u2019s already starting to do for us, unfortunately, but we need to remove the porch, we need to move the grindstone table out of the way, we need to dig up the blacktop area as well as the crumbling limestone.\u201d<\/p>\n
Tinker Swiss sets a goal of raising $600,000 to cover the \u201clarge project.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s a lot of money to do, but you also have to include in the fact that there\u2019s a very big safety situation that needs to take place with this,\u201d explained Hochmann.<\/p>\n
The executive director said the first fundraising solution would be federal grants, which she calls competitive. The second option is reaching out to legislators for funding from the state.<\/p>\n
The cottage also dips into its dollars in the capital improvement project funding that it receives from the Rockford Park District. Those funds arrive from the museum tax levy, which is split across six different organizations.<\/p>\n
\u201cAnd all of our organizations have more needs than we have funding for,\u201d said Hochmann. She added local donors and businesses are stepping in with contributions.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s been a really nice thing to see that people remember that we\u2019re here.\u201d<\/p>\n
With a restored bluff, Hochmann believes Tinker Swiss will stand for generations to come.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou can\u2019t really continue building up a community if you don\u2019t know where the community\u2019s already been.\u201d<\/p>\n
If the fundraising goal is reached, the executive director expects construction to start as early as 2027. Anyone wishing to help can donate on Tinker\u2019s website.<\/p>\n
Copyright 2026 WIFR. All rights reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"ROCKFORD, Ill. (WIFR) – Samantha Hochmann taps her shoe against a limestone slab behind Tinker Swiss Cottage. The…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":50973,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[4],"tags":[1042,1040,29165,29163,29162,29164,29166,41,17,29161],"class_list":["post-50972","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-switzerland","tag-breaking-news","tag-breaking-news-video","tag-live-speeches","tag-live-updates","tag-live-video","tag-press-conference","tag-real-time-coverage","tag-swiss","tag-switzerland","tag-video-updates"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@ch\/116423896809169756","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/50972","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=50972"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/50972\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/50973"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=50972"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=50972"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=50972"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}