Walt Whitman House
Preservation Online: Poetic Injustice
Visitors to the Walt Whitman House in Camden, N.J., often have the place to themselves. Curator Leo Blake is the sole employee of the six-room house, doing the lonely job of giving a few tours each week. Last summer, strapped for funds, he decided to paint the house's exterior himself. "I wasn't told to do it," Blake says, "but this building doesn't take care of itself."