It’s not that I don’t keep an eye out for the Bennington Battle Monument when I find myself taking the 279 bypass. And yes, “the 306 foot commemorative shaft” has been a feature of the local landscape for 134 years, and we do love us a long-established structure no matter its innate attractiveness or real-world feasibility. And yes, it does commemorate Vermont’s Revolutionary War-adjacent moment of relevance… although I do have to wonder if the second most phallic public structure in the world* (unofficial status) isn’t just a little bit triggering for some passers-by.

*See below.

But the news that the Monument was made of the wrong kind of stone, leaving its signature tumescence in need of restoration to the tune of at least $40 million? (The story appeared on VTDigger over the weekend, more than a month after it was initially reported by the Vermont Daily Chronicle.) It makes me conclude that we shouldn’t bother saving this Gilded Age tribute to toxic masculinity. I say tear the bloody thing down. Find another way to memorialize the battle if you must. Don’t waste tens of millions of dollars on an edifice that manages to combine ugliness with impracticality.

What could be more impractical than a massive outdoor monument constructed of highly absorbent limestone? In a state known for its granite and marble quarries, no less? The result: the ponderous pecker is sodden with an estimated 66,000 gallons of water. Given that fact, I suppose it’s surprising that it hasn’t already drooped over like a “Before” image in a Cialis ad.

Those in favor of preservation cite, among other things, some tourism statistics meant to clothe the waterlogged weenie in a tissue of economic importance. Jason Duggan, the state’s director of historic preservation, says the monument is the state’s most frequented historic site with 40,000 visitors a year that generate $275,000 in revenue for the state.

That sounds impressive but it amounts to only 110 visitors per day, and the financial benefit equals less than nine dollars per visitor. I think we’ll live. Also, I suspect that “most frequented historic site” is a carefully crafted descriptor meant to exclude the serious competition. Does the category include the Statehouse? The Shelburne Museum? The ECHO Center? Dog Mountain? Ben & Jerry’s or Vermont Teddy Bear? Of course it doesn’t.

Whatever drawing power it possesses is due to sheer visibility, not intrinsic merit or public interest in the Battle of Bennington. People drive by, say “What the heck is that?” and make a stop. Some likely do so at the urging of Beavises and Buttheads in the back of the car. Or in the driver’s seat.

My attitude toward the state’s biggest Johnson (Ed: citation needed) is echoed by none other than Lyman Orton of the Vermont Country Store family and owner of “the largest private collection of historical paintings, prints, and drawings of places and people of Vermont.” I mean, this guy loves him some Vermont traditions, and he believes the Wet Willy needs to go:

Speaking with VTDigger, Orton reminisced about his childhood visiting the monument and the thrill of reaching the overlook with his father, who served as chairman of the Vermont Historic Sites Commission at that time. Orton said he also remembered his father grumbling about the problems with the monument’s stone absorbing water and causing continual need for repairs back in the 1950s.

Orton said he sees history repeating itself and is worried that future generations will be saddled with the monument’s continued maintenance costs due to the ill-chosen stone.

Orton has suggested replacing the dampish dick with some kind of holographic representation, an idea that was discussed after New Hampshire’s Old Man of the Mountain collapsed in 2003. The notion never gained traction over there. And you know, the Granite State’s tourism industry is doing just fine, thanks very much.

Another preservation official has said removing the saturated stiffy would cost $20 million, which I guess is supposed to make us think a $40 million restoration is… a bargain? Well, pish tosh, says I. To blazes with a careful removal. Let’s just blow it up. A scarred landscape dotted with ruined stones would be a far better homage to the realities of war than a football field-sized John Thomas. A well-publicized demolition would doubtless draw a bigger crowd in one day than the monument does in a generation. And the state could make a fortune selling bits and pieces of the sopping schmeckel.

Vermont is far too fond of familiar features no matter their inherent value, or lack thereof. Think of the perpetual hand-wringing over Burlington’s Memorial Auditorium or the shuttered Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception, an upside-down ship’s hull occupying a square block of prime real estate. Or a few years back, Montpelier’s debate over replacing the Taylor Street Bridge: They ultimately decided to restore the span instead of replacing it, despite the fact that it wasn’t at all attractive and was uncomfortably narrow for normal traffic — when a mass transit center was in the works right next to the bridge site, meaning that full-sized buses would have to navigate it or detour around it.

Point being, we take our architectural heritage much too seriously. There’s a lot that’s worth preserving, of course. But there are limits, and $40 million to save the Big Bennington is beyond the bounds of reason.

One more thing. Remember when I said the monument is “the second most phallic public structure in the world”? Well, here’s the first.

Heavens to Betsy. Not only is it an uncomfortably close representation of an erect penis, it’s an uncircumcised one. That’s a water tower in downtown Ypsilanti, Michigan, hard by* the campus of Eastern Michigan University, that was once labeled “the most phallic building in the world.” It was built, so says Wikipedia, in the year 1890 — just one year before the dedication of Vermont’s own monument to unconstrained manhood. I’d say something about the repressive tendencies of the Victorian era, but these two structures speak for themselves.

*See what I did there?