If you bought a Town Square Brick in the early 90’s — the city wants to give it back to you

ANCHORAGE, Alaska (KTUU) - More than 30 years ago, thousands of Anchorage residents purchased commemorative bricks to help fund Anchorage’s Town Square Park. Now, with major construction getting underway at the park, the city is removing more than 13,000 bricks and hoping to return them to their original owners or their families.

“People donated their money and there’s memories on these bricks and people want to have that back,” said Nicolette Chimato with Anchorage Parks and Recreation.

Some of the bricks are in poor condition, it’s difficult to read the inscriptions of family names, anniversary dates and businesses, some of which no longer exist. Others are in good shape and could potentially be re-purposed.

The city began digging up bricks Thursday. Chimato said the plan is to palletize bricks and take them to a different location where they will be sorted according to the area of the park they were located. The location and dates for the pick-up have yet to be finalized but are expected to happen in the summer and early fall.

Chimato said it’s important for people to go online now and check to confirm their brick is in the inventory. They can also find a map to show approximately where it was located, as well as answer basic questions about their bricks.

“There’s a form on our website that people can fill out with the bricks that they have, the inscription, anything that will help us know what brick they are looking for,” Chimato said.

In a news release, the department said people who come to pick-up bricks should be prepared to dig in and find them.

“This will be a hands-on, come-find-your-brick experience. Community members who come to claim their brick(s) should be prepared to search through pallets manually. Every effort will be made to palletize the bricks according to their section on current brick maps but brick section integrity cannot be guaranteed. Outside of these efforts, this will not be a pre-sorted or individually packaged retrieval process. Limited Parks and Recreation staff and volunteers will be on-site to assist, but claimants should plan to do some digging.”

Chimato said Parks and Rec is looking for volunteer groups who would like to help sort bricks and assist people with finding them. She urged people to go to the Parks and Rec website for more information.

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