A renewed appreciation for history revitalized downtown Silver City as the Big Ditch, once used for most of the 20th century as a dump and sewer and even proposed in the 1970s to be filled with culverts and paved over for parking spaces, came to be embraced along with neighboring historic structures as an opportunity to renew the town's heritage. Galvanized in part by the recent demolition of the historic railway depot, a local preservation movement was born, and today Big Ditch Park, the Silver City MainStreet Project, and other ventures honor the community's character and colorful history. Elizabeth Warren also shaped Silver City through both business and public works: after she and Orange Scott Warren moved there in 1882 and he started an insurance business, she helped friends from her sewing circle create the county's first hospital in 1883, then after being widowed in 1885 with three children took over the insurance business, later expanded into real estate, and in the early 1900s oversaw the construction of sidewalks, buildings, and flood control structures that are still in use.