Bio Sketch

My highest work in life has been helping raise my children: Rachel, Megan, Joseph, and Bridie.
Godsil Family Photos

NEW: Article about Godsil

In the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel’s January 19, 2006 “Snapshots” column, by Crocker Stephenson.

Godsil Interviewed by Julia Kolker Fall, 2007 at the Riverwest Co-op Cafe

• Board Member Growing Power http://growingpower.org
• I was profoundly influenced by Al Montesi and George Wendel at St. Louis University during the 1960s and by 4 years at a Jesuit High School called St Louis U High. See http://www.sluh.org/alumni2.cfm.
• I am an old war-horse from the Civil Rights and Anti-War Movements of the 1960s through until today.
• Marched with Dr. King in the Chicago Open Housing Marches, Gage Park, SCLC Summer 1966. See

http://milwaukeerenaissance.com/CulturalProjects/FortiethAnniversaryOfChicagoFreedomMovement

• Roofed a Habitat home on Walnut St. with President Jimmy Carter and Habitat for Humanity.
• President of St. Louis University’s Great Issue Series, 1966, and brought Dick Gregory, Eugene Mc Carthy, Saul Alinksy, Dorothy Day, W.H. Auden, Saul Bellow and more to campus.
• Fulbright Fellow in Tunisia, 1972, where I studied “symbolic violence and the manipulation of culture by the state.”
• Doctoral candidate at U.W.M. during the 1970s and again during the 1990s, and published a manuscript “From Party Nations to Class Coalitions: Wisconsin Ethnic Conflict and Cooperation 1850–1940.”
• One of the founders of Eastside Housing Action Committee(ESHAC) and Chairman of the Board, 1978–1980.
• Founder and President of Community Roofing & Restoration, since 1975. See CommunityRoofingAndRestoration and http://communityroofing.com.
• One of the founders of the Milwaukee Preservation Alliance(MPA) and Urban Anthropology’s “Backstreet Tours of Ethnic Milwaukee.”
• One of the founders of the Bay View Neighborhood Association
• Very active in forging an alliance between the NAACP, the Save the Soldiers Home Movement, Bucketworks, and Timbuktu
• FamilyStories
• Poetry
• History of Name “Godsil”
• The War at Home Bio Sketches

Endorsements of Public Interest Efforts

Jim Godsil is an important community activist. He’s Jane Jacob’s most ardent disciple in Milwaukee. He has had a big impact in Milwaukee. His mentor Ted Seaver helped kill 4 Spadina type Freeway projects in Milwaukee.

John Norquist— former Mayor of Milwaukee and President of the Congress for the New Urbanism

Jim Godsil is a Milwaukee treasure. He has worked tirelessly to preserve Milwaukee’s heritage. He has taken the lead in uniting diverse neighborhood groups through e-mail, picnics and simple, individual face-to-face contacts.

Jim has promoted historic home bed and breakfast tourism in the city; fought for an aesthetically valuable design for a planned Harley Davidson museum; contributed greatly to the fight against unneeded, unwanted and obscenely obscene freeway expansion in the area; and is helping lead the effort to preserve the historic structures in a Civil War era veterans hospital.

He is an intelligent, committed advocate of urbanism, diversity and creativity.

Milwaukee’s life is richer because Jim Godsil is in it.

Sincerely,

Gretchen Schuldt,
Editor, www.storyhill.net

I am happy to endorse James Godsil’s efforts to foster historic tourism in Milwaukee. His dissertation manuscript on “Ethnic Identities and Class Coalitions in Wisconsin, 1850–1920″ is ample evidence of his intellectual grasp of the possibilities of inspiring visitors with Milwaukee’s rich ethnic past yet embodied in its architecture and its neighborhoods. His 30 year day-to-day efforts as the owner of a company that specializes in the restoration of historic buildings and homes and his voluntary work on behalf of the social enterprises of our historic working class neighborhoods nicely complements his intellectual background.

Julia Taylor
Executive Director
Greater Milwaukee Committee

In the short few months that I’ve had to get to know Jim Godsil, I’ve found him to be an absolutely tireless advocate for the Milwaukee Preservation Alliance, the restoration of historic homes, and heritage tourism designed to realize a connection between job growth and historic preservation in Milwaukee. His ability to make connections where they did not previously exist amazes me and I’m happy to be part of his network of people who care about Milwaukee’s future.

Michael Strigel
Executive Director
Wisconsin Academy of Sciences, Arts and Letters
Madison, WI
www.wisconsinacademy.org

James Godsil, a co-founder of the Milwaukee Preservation Alliance, is now focusing his efforts on galvanizing support for preservation of the Veteran’s Administration all denominational Soldiers’ Chapel. His interests extend beyond preservation and include promotion of our ethnic diversity, cultural heritage and architectural history as the back bone of economic development that promotes our rich history for present and future generations.

Annemarie Sawkins, Ph.D, Associate Curator, Haggerty Museum of Art

That’s a fine mission and you’re a worthy emissary.

Stephen Filmanowicz
Communications Director
Congress for the New Urbanism
Chicago, IL

City of Milwaukee
Department of City Development
Housing Authority
Redevelopment Authority
City Plan Commission
Historic Preservation Commission

To Whom It May Concern,
June 16, 2004

This letter will serve to introduce Jim Godsil of Milwaukee, Wisconsin.

The Historic Preservation staff at the Department of City Development is familiar with and appreciative of Mr. Godsil’s roles as community organizer, preservation advocate,and roofing craftsman. About 18 months ago, he founded the Milwaukee Preservation Alliance, an advocacy group that has brought significant attention to preservation issues in Milwaukee. He has organized citizens to appear at public hearings on behalf of preservation, and keeps many in the community updated on the issues through frequent e-mails and public events.

Mr. Godsil is a skilled roofer. In this role he has done sensitive construction work on scores of architecturally and historically significant buildings in Milwaukee. His interest in mentoring younger workers has resulted in others making the decision to direct significant talents to the building arts.

Mr. Godsil is truly one of Milwaukee’s most visible preservation practitioners.

Sincerely,

Martha L. Brown
Acting Commissioner

To whom it may concern:

For the last several years I have watched and supported the efforts of Jim Godsil to find and nurture the often-natural connections among those interested in promoting urban centers as vibrant working environments as well as those seeing our cities as repositories of cultural, architectural, and social history. Jim’s background in the trade’s with “hands on” experience restoring the structural and aesthetic integrity of Milwaukee’s historical homes and buildings is nicely balanced by his lifelong understanding of the role of compromise and collaboration in bringing social support to all members of a community. Perhaps most importantly, Jim is tireless and persistent in strengthening these “natural connections” among those of disparate factions, ideologies, and yes, classes.

Bruce Jacobs
President and CEO
Grede Foundries, Inc.
bjacobs@grede.com
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Roof System Restoration Trouble Shooting, Mediation, and Sustainable Development Support