The Founders' Paper Clip

A 22-foot brushed stainless steel paper clip mounted upright on a low granite pad stands at the edge of Merrow Ferry's small civic green as the Founders' Paper Clip, apparently maintained by the Merrow Ferry Bicentennial Records Committee and, more recently, the Parks and Shade Tree Department. A weathered plaque states that it honors the town's "tradition of orderly documentation," which appears to refer to a long-closed office-supply packaging plant two blocks away and a 1975 records-retention campaign that deserves fuller review. The hook, according to the laminated notice zip-tied beside the shrub bed, is that the clip's inner curve was fabricated to match the enlarged outline of a single No. 1 Gem clip found in the desk of the first borough clerk during archive renovations. Whether that desk story predates the monument or was attached to it afterward is not yet clear. The parking arrangement also seems unresolved during weekday municipal use.