Family lives in, renovates historic post office, courthouse

HAVRE — If nothing else, it's affordable housing. They could fix it up and rent out part of it.

That's what Marc Whitacre and Erica Farmer thought when they purchased a three-story former post office and federal courthouse in downtown Havre, population 9,700, located on the Hi-Line less than 50 miles from the Canadian border.

The two eye doctors and their three children have been living in the basement since 2012, as they worked to repair the 35,000-square-foot building, constructed in 1932 and added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1986.

This summer, they'll move into the former courtroom on the top level. The first and second floors are home to professional office spaces, and the grand mail sorting room and lobby serve as an event center.

Fixing it was an undertaking paid for with private money, some grant assistance and countless hours of personal work.

Altogether, they saved a structure decaying from the inside — burst pipes had sullied the walls, ceilings and floors throughout.

"I basically felt it would’ve been criminal – an act of community neglect – not to buy the building," Whitacre said. "How could you let something like this deteriorate?"

The family's efforts earned them the 2015 Preservation Award for Outstanding Preservation Rehabilitation Project, an honor distributed every other year by the Montana State Historic Preservation Office.

"He's sort of a rare example of someone who has the wherewithal to do a project like this," said Pete Brown, a historic architecture specialist with the office. "Not just the vision, not just the money, not just the patience and the willingness to get dirty. He has all of those things, which is rare."

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The building, which sits on Third Avenue in Havre's historic downtown district, was originally constructed as a two-story post office.

During Prohibition, Whitacre said, this Hi-Line town close to the Canadian border saw such a high volume of bootlegging and related arrests that a third floor was added for a federal courthouse, since it was cheaper than bringing the accused to Great Falls to face justice.

It served as the city's post office until 1995, when a new building was constructed and the U.S. Postal Service gave the building to the city.