(1) Trash to Riches - Winchester Star

  (2) Historic Society Wants Hidden Contraband Cemetery as Public Park - Newport News Daily Press

  (3) Casino Announces New Partners, Opposition Asks LeVan to Reconsider - Gettysburg Times

  (4) Civil War Battlefields Need Clean Up Help - Associated Press

  (5) Editorial: A Chance to Serve and Preserve - Chattanooga Times Free Press

  (6) An Uphill Battle to Save Camp Finegan - Florida Times-Union

  (7) Woman Works to Preserve Middletown Valley - Frederick News Post

  (8) Funds Secured for Restoration of Civil War General's Home - Decatur Daily

  (9) Battlefield Preservation Charges Ahead - Chattanooga Times Free Press

(10) Trees Planted to Mark Route of Knoxville's Defining Civil War Battle - Knoxville News Sentinel

(11) Resaca Rebirth - Chattanooga Times Free Press

(12) Protecting Civil War Sites Is an Ongoing Battle - Petersburg Progress-Index

(13) Historic Preservation and Economic Development Do Battle - Harrisburg Patriot

--(1)  Trash to Riches -----------------------------------------------------

Trash to Riches
By Cynthia Cather Burton
3/31/2010
Winchester Star (VA)
http://www.winchesterstar.com/

Traipsing through the brambles at Star Fort Tuesday morning, Elizabeth Stern, policy and communications director for the Shenandoah Valley Battlefields Foundation, offered this assessment:
"It's a bit of a hidden gem, isn't it?"
Though covered by a tangle of brush and trees and scarred in some spots by all-terrain vehicle tracks, the steep earthen walls of the star-shaped Civil War fortification - built in 1862 by a Confederate regiment from Alabama - are still visible.
The eight-acre site on a high ridge off North Frederick Pike (U.S. 522) just north of Winchester was covered in trash when the New Market-based foundation was deeded the property in 2007.
Except for a few tires, most of the debris has been cleared away.
Next month, the foundation will begin thinning the dense overgrowth to better reveal and preserve Star Fort's historic landscape. The goal, Stern said, is to have the landmark accessible to the public for the Civil War's 150th anniversary observations, which will start in 2011 and continue through 2015.
The work will be conducted so the earth is disturbed as little as possible, according to Chase Milner, the foundation's program manager for resource protection.
Mulch for pathways will be made on-site from felled trees and limbs.
Markers telling Star Fort's story will be the only structures erected.
The aim is to complete the rehabilitation correctly "so that Star Fort is here for generations to come," Stern said.
The foundation, which manages the Shenandoah Valley Battlefields National Historic District created by Congress in 1996, is striving to make Star Fort a place of "passive recreation" for the public, said Stern.
The goal is to provide visitors with insight into a unique slice of American history and leave them saying, "'Wow, this is so cool,'" Stern said enthusiastically. "If we do that, we will have done our job."
Residents in the adjacent Star Fort subdivision, who pay an annual $60 fee for Star Fort's upkeep, will have access to the park-like setting once it is ready.
"If I lived in this neighborhood, I would be over here all the time," Stern said.
At least one of the approximately 140 homeowners seemed pleased with the plan.
"If we can use it, so much the better," said D.S. "Skip" Braden, who received a letter this week from the foundation about its plans to begin cutting vegetation at the Star Fort site.
Last year, Braden and other Star Fort homeowners voiced concerns when the Frederick County government took over their dormant homeowners' association and began collecting the annual Star Fort maintenance fee mandated in the subdivision's 1994 master development plan.
Until then, the fee had been collected haphazardly. Some homeowners knew about the fee, some didn't.
When the county officials took over the collection, the Star Fort account had $5,296, according to Wayne Corbett in the county treasurer's office. Since then, the collection has totaled $19,540, about $17,276 of which was dispersed this month to the foundation.
"There's still an awful lot of confusion about how this thing was put together," Braden said.
The fee is set at $60 a year through 2014. After that, it could be increased to as much as $240.
"If we can have some assurance that the rate won't increase, I don't think people will have any problem," Braden said.

A management and interpretation plan prepared for the county government by a consultant in 2000, but not implemented, estimated a cost of about $373,000 to rehabilitate Star Fort.
In addition, annual maintenance funds would be needed.
Money for the project won't come just from the homeowners, said Stern. Federal dollars and private donations will be pursued as well. She added that Star Fort's rehabilitation will take years to complete and that neighbors will be consulted throughout the process.
One part of the management plan calls for the creation of a pull-off parking area along a residential street.
"No one wants this to be Gettysburg," Stern said. "We need to strike the right balance. People live here, work here, and children play here."
The success of Star Fort will depend on "community engagement," Milner said.
David Ruth, superintendent of the Richmond National Battlefield Park, who is advising the foundation on Star Fort's preservation, first heard about Star Fort as a teen-age Civil War enthusiast growing up in Pennsylvania.
He saw the site for the first time in January.
"This is one of the best-preserved earthen forts in the country," he said. "It's one of a handful."

During the Civil War, Winchester was ringed by earthen forts.
Star Fort was originally called Fort Alabama, but it was renamed Star Fort after being captured by Union troops. The fort, like the city, changed hands numerous times during the war.
Star Fort figured prominently in two battles: Second Winchester (June 13-15, 1863), won by the Confederates, and Third Winchester (Sept. 19, 1864), when Union calvary drove the Rebels from their final defensive position near Star Fort. The charge was so large - thousands of Union soldiers on horseback - that the earth rumbled.
"Imagine trying to defend the fort with that coming at you," said Ruth, who believes Star Fort will become "a key Civil War feature for the Winchester area."
Unlike a battlefield, "a fort is something you immediately connect to," he said.
The interior of Star Fort covers about three acres and includes the remnants of a bomb-proof area where soldiers huddled when under attack.
According to Stern, the star-shaped design was easier to defend than other shapes.
The exterior of the fort is surrounded by trenches. Panoramic views from the fort take in views such as Harpers Ferry, about 25 miles to the northeast.
Though Star Fort is difficult to capture in photographs, "It's really quite remarkable to get in the center of this fort and actually see the walls," Stern said.
Star Fort is one of about 17 Civil War attractions in the Winchester area, she said. Others include museums, battlefields, and historic homes.
The rehabilitation of the unique Star Fort site "will help create a more cohesive picture of Winchester during the war," Stern said. "Star Fort will be one of the many reasons people come to experience Winchester's story."

Return to Top

--(2)  Historic Society Wants Hidden Contraband Cemetery as Public Park --------------------------------------------------

Historic Society Wants Hidden Contraband Cemetery as Public Park
By David Macaulay
3/31/2010
Newport News Daily Press (VA)
http://www.dailypress.com/news/hampton/dp-local_contraband_0331mar31,0,3083939.story

The lonely tombstone of U.S. Colored Cavalryman Nelson Ballard stands near a parking lot at Sentara CarePlex and is often missed by passers-by.
But according to the Contraband Historical Society, the tombstone is part of a cemetery site for slaves that marks an important chapter in the history of Hampton and the United States.
The society is stepping up its efforts to secure a cemetery on the grounds of Sentara CarePlex hospital as a public memorial to the slaves who supported the Union Army's victory in the Civil War.
The society believes the graves of more than 50 slaves or freed slaves are on the site of the former Downey Farm that dates back to 1636.
Elois Morgan, the program director of the Contraband Historical Society, said the society is looking to renew efforts to secure the cemetery as a park this year as Hampton celebrates its 400th anniversary year.
The society's president, Gerri Hollins, led efforts to prevent the site from being built on in years past, Morgan said. Hollins' proposals went as far as wanting to invite President Barack Obama to an unveiling of the Nelson Ballard Memorial Park this year.
"This site is historically significant to the Contraband Historical Society, the city of Hampton and the nation because it is symbolic of the black contribution toward the preservation of the Union and the shaping of America," Morgan said.
"It is part of the chronicle that is uniquely Hampton history and yet American history, and sadly this history has been swept under the rug like so much of the preponderance of black history," she said.
The society says Sentara promised to donate about 10 acres of land in the past but negotiations have since broken down.
On Tuesday, hospital administrator Debra Flores issued a statement saying Sentara has held discussions with the Historical Contraband Society in the past.
"During that time, Sentara expressed a willingness to consider a small monument marker for the Contraband slave burial site located upon its hospital campus in Hampton," she said in the statement. "The proposed site is wetlands, which poses some limitations to the kind of development that can take place on that site."
Morgan said the cemetery could be a "significant visitor draw" in Hampton and Sentara could capitalize on the site by donating the land and calling it Sentara Nelson Ballard Park.
Phil Adderley, vice president of the society, recounts a recent meeting with Flores. He said Flores floated the idea of bequeathing a 20-foot area around Ballard's headstone.
Hollins said Tuesday the Contraband Historical Society was seeking a larger tract of land than that.
But the hospital is waiting for communication from the historical society, Flores said. "When SCH leadership last spoke to representatives of the society in 2009, representatives from the society were going to talk with the city of Hampton about access to the site. To date, we have not heard anything further on this issue," the statement said.
Hampton Mayor Molly Joseph Ward, who visited the site two years ago, on Tuesday stressed the importance of the city's contraband heritage.
"It's important not just to Hampton but to the state of Virginia and the country," she said. "There are all sort of educational opportunities we should explore together," she said.
The society say the site comprises only a part of the Downey Farm.
Kenneth Quinn, a local historian and amateur archaeologist, heard about the grave site more than 70 years ago. Quinn, who died in 2007, did extensive research on both Ballard and on the farm that had slave quarters on it.
After the Civil War, 303 slaves were receiving rations on the 830-acre Downey Farm, according to Quinn's research.And the society points to a report from a team of archaeologists from the College of William and Mary as further proof of what lies underground. The team, hired by Sentara, found 55 impressions of graves and suspected more were present on the site.
Flores, the CarePlex administrator, said "Sentara remains willing and available to discuss reasonable options for marking this memorial site."

Return to Top

--(3)  Casino Announces New Partners, Opposition Asks LeVan to Reconsider -------------------------------------------------

Casino Announces New Partnership, Opposition Asks LeVan to Reconsider
By Scot Andrew Pitzer
3/30/2010
Gettysburg Times (PA)
http://www.gettysburgtimes.com/articles/2010/03/30/news/local/doc4bb259959cfd9272897897.txt

The proposed Mason Dixon Resort & Casino in Cumberland Township formed new community partnerships Tuesday, while the group that opposes the gaming plan encouraged investors to "reconsider" the project.
No Casino Gettysburg Chairwoman Susan Star Paddock issued a press release, asking Gettysburg businessman and casino applicant David LeVan to refrain from filing a gaming application by the state's mandated April 7 deadline.
Paddock claims to have garnered signatures from "140 Adams County residents" that oppose the casino, requesting LeVan - in a letter - to display "civic responsibility" and set aside his gaming proposal. LeVan has partnered with former state lawmaker Joseph Lashinger in an effort to convert the Cumberland Township-based Eisenhower Inn along Business 15, south of Gettysburg, into an exclusive slots resort.
LeVan announced a partnership Tuesday, with The Links at Gettysburg golf course and Ski Liberty Mountain Resort, in what's dubbed the "Mason Dixon Pass" program, aimed to promote area tourism opportunities.
But Paddock noted the "community divisiveness" that LeVan's plan has produced, since his Eisenhower Inn project surfaced in mid-November.
According to Paddock, her letter asks LeVan to "please weigh the unintended consequences of reigniting this controversial issue, and the harm that will come to our community if you proceed with your proposal."
LeVan's project is opposed by preservation groups, such as the Civil War Preservation Trust, which formed a coalition in January with the National Parks Conservation Association, the National Trust for Historic Preservation and Preservation Pennsylvania in opposing the project.
"Locating and marketing a gambling facility at Gettysburg unavoidably conflicts with the essential meaning of this place in American history," James Lighthizer, president of the Civil War Preservation Trust, said previously.
However, a recent survey by nationally-recognized pollster Dr. G. Terry Madonna revealed that, out of 600 Adams County residents polled, more than 60 percent support LeVan's project.
Pa. Governor Edward G. Rendell has stated that he finds the Mason Dixon project "less objectionable" than LeVan's 2005-06 proposal, which failed in Straban Township because of "overwhelming" opposition and revenue-generating issues. Rendell has noted that the Eisenhower Inn project is located closer to Maryland and farther away from the historic Civil War town than the Crossroads project, proposed at the intersection of Routes 15 & 30, east of Gettysburg. Also, Gettysburg Battlefield Supt. Bob Kirby has said that the project is not expected to have an impact on the park's resources, even though the hotel is located just one half-mile from the park's boundaries.
LeVan and Lashinger have formed community partnerships in the last week, most recently with The Links at Gettysburg golf course and Ski Liberty Mountain Resort in Carroll Valley. Investors unveiled the "Mason Dixon Pass" program Tuesday, which aims to "actively promote other area tourist destinations to guests of the resort," according to spokesman David La Torre. The program's "inaugural members" are Ski Liberty Mountain Resort and The Links at Gettysburg.
One week ago, Mason Dixon Resort teamed with Gettysburg Tours Inc. and President Kenneth J. Rohrbaugh to provide hotel and casino guests tours of the 6,000-acre battlefield. LeVan and La Torre have called Gettysburg Tours Inc. "one of the premier heritage tourism agencies" in the country.

Return to Top

--(4)  Civil War Battlefields Need Clean Up Help -----------------------------------------------------

Civil War Battlefields Need Clean Up Help
Associated Press (NAT)
3/29/2010
Associated Press (NAT)
http://www.wusa9.com/news/local/story.aspx?storyid=99240&catid=187

Preservationists are seeking volunteers armed with trash bags and rakes for a spring cleaning of Civil War sites, from battlefields to cemeteries.
The clean up is scheduled for April 10 at approximately 100 historic sites in 23 states. The event is called Park Day and it's recognized by the U.S. Interior Department as a "Take Pride in America" event.
LEND A HAND: Learn which sites need your help at www.civilwar.org/parkday. is the 14th edition of the volunteer roundup organized by the Civil War Preservation Trust. In exchange for routine repairs and maintenance, volunteers are rewarded with T-shirts and can listen to historians discuss significant milestones in the Civil War.
This
Among the sites to be cleaned up include the Wilderness Battlefield in Virginia, Antietam in Maryland and Wilson's Creek in Missouri.

Return to Top

--(5)  Editorial: A Chance to Serve and Preserve -----------------------------------------------------

Editorial: A Chance to Serve and Preserve
Chattanooga Times Free Press
3/29/2010
Chattanooga Times Free Press (TN)
http://www.tfponline.com/news/2010/mar/29/a-chance-to-serve-and-preserve/?opiniontimes

Chattanooga and the surrounding are blessed with a large number of battlefields, parks and other sites connected with the Civil War. All are rightly regarded as treasures that commemorate events that took place there. Unfortunately, the sites tied to that important period in U.S. history are visited by increasing numbers of people at a time when government money to maintain and protect them is in short supply. The result is a fiscal nightmare that strains maintenance budgets and makes long-range planning nearly impossible.
There's no easy remedy to the problem. One way individuals and organizations can help ameliorate the situation though is Park Day, a nationwide effort celebrated on April 10 and designed to clean and restore Civil War sites. The event, created by the Civil War Preservation Trust, underwritten by History, formerly the History Channel, and recognized as a "Take Pride in America" event by the U.S. Department of the Interior, allows area residents to assist in the maintenance and preservation of places important to local, regional and national history.
The premise is simple - and effective. Volunteers meet at designated places to undertake chores that public funding no longer supports. That includes raking leaves, picking up trash, restoring and building trails and assisting with routine repairs. It is a family-friendly event that will help extend the useful life of places with ties to the past for future generations.
Event organizers say additional venues likely will be added before April 10, but so far Park Day participants in the area can volunteer at the Chickamauga and Chattanooga National Military Park in Fort Oglethorpe, at Prater's Mill near Dalton, at the Dalton Confederate Cemetery and at the Old Western and Atlantic Railroad and Cisby Austin House in Tunnel Hill, Ga. Times and rain dates are available by calling the office at each site.
Park Day can't solve the problem of failing infrastructure - only consistent, long-term funding can help do that - but it does provide a bit of relief. That is welcome, as is the opportunity for individuals to celebrate and help preserve the service and sacrifice of those who lived before them.

Return to Top

--(6)  An Uphill Battle to Save Camp Finegan -----------------------------------------------------

An Uphill Battle to Save Camp Finegan
By Jeremy Cox
2/28/2010
Florida Times-Union (FL)
http://jacksonville.com/community/westside/2010-03-28/story/uphill-battle-save-civil-war-site-camp-finegan

On a weedy, wooded lot west of Jacksonville, history is disappearing.
Most of Camp Finegan, one of Florida's largest Civil War camps and the longest-occupied site in Northeast Florida, has been swallowed by time and development. All that remains, according to a regiment of steel-willed preservationists, is a small but historically significant plot in residential Marietta.
They want to save the 6-acre parcel, and its owner, who's asking $600,000, is sympathetic to their cause. But the property's groundwater is contaminated by a wood-preserving chemical, according to a recent environmental survey. That discovery defeated the city's plans to buy the land, casting the plot's future into doubt.
Now, preservationists face the same question the camp's occupants encountered more than 146 years ago: retreat or fight on?
Like all battle regiments, the preservationists have a leader, and his name is Fred Singletary. If there were any letup in his will to carry on, it doesn't show.
Singletary, a long-time community activist known to many as the "Mayor of Marietta," is pressing ahead with plans to plant a pair of historical markers on a sliver of property to be donated by the owner. And coming next month, Civil War re-enactors will gather at the site for a weekend-long "living history" program.
Re-enactments are old hat at more established Civil War sites like the Olustee Battlefield, east of Lake City, and Camp Milton, a city-owned site six miles west of Finegan. Although they are given to wearing old hats, participants from April 16-18 will convene for just the second time at Camp Finegan; the first was last October.
Singletary, a 62-year-old who looks about a decade younger despite his graying mustache, said he hopes the events help reacquaint the community with the history in its midst and attract corporate sponsors for its preservation.
"Everything else is pretty well-developed, and this is where the officers were in the main body of the camp," he said last week, standing on the shoulder of Hammond Boulevard, the road that passes in front of the tree-draped property.
As Larry Rosenblatt, a fellow Civil War buff and one of Singletary's foot soldiers, tells it, "We're very, very lucky that this isn't a gas station or something else here."
Flanked by railroad tracks to the north and neighborhoods to the south, Camp Finegan passes for just another fenced-in lot on first inspection. Look deeper - as Singletary and other amateur historians have done - and you'll find the evidence that they say distinguishes the property from its suburban surroundings.
Thirty years ago, when Singletary started his pursuit of Camp Finegan, it was believed to have been centered at Joseph Stillwell Middle School, based on a historian's report in the early 1960s. To be sure, the camp encompassed hundreds of acres of the area now bisected by Interstates 10 and 295, and Singletary believes Stillwell was part of it. But he wasn't convinced it was anything more than the camp's geographic heart.
First, a quick history lesson: Famed Confederate military engineer Pierre Gustave Toutant Beauregard oversaw the camp's construction in 1862. Named for Gen. Joseph Finegan, who would go on to lead an overmatched Confederate force to victory at Olustee, the camp was used as the base of operations for the Confederacy in Northeast Florida.
As soon as it became clear that rumors of Florida's sympathies for the North were greatly exaggerated, the Union forces attempted a new tack in Northeast Florida. With the fall of Vicksburg ending the South's beef supply from Texas, the North resolved to cut off Florida from the rest of the South.
If successful, the North could have shortened the war by a year, said Al Kyle of the Capt. Winston Stephens Camp of the Sons of Confederate Veterans. Finegan and a handful of other Confederate encampments were all that stood between the North and a swifter victory.
Standing in front of the site, looking east and west, Singletary noticed several years ago that the terrain falls away slightly in both directions. That was a clue: Old accounts say that Finegan was situated at the highest point along the railroad tracks west of Jacksonville.
Several accounts put Finegan's location eight miles west of the federally controlled downtown Jacksonville and four miles east of what is now the Whitehouse area. What's more, those accounts mention a railroad spur - another clue - that enabled the camp to load cannons onto railcars and deploy them into Jacksonville to take potshots at passing ships.
With the owner's permission, Singletary and others searched the property and found hand-hewn railroad cross ties, the kind that stopped being made around 1900.
They also discovered a small man-made hill hidden among a tangle of brush, which they believe once served as a ramp to mount the cannons on a train. The North quickly duplicated the feat, leading to the first-ever recorded train-on-train cannon duel. That historical encounter ended when the Union train accidentally fired on itself.
In February 1864, Union forces led by Col. Guy Henry overwhelmed Finegan and its force of about 450 soldiers. Now in Union hands, its name was changed to Camp Shaw, and the camp was used to enlist and train former slaves. Among the African-American forces stationed at the camp was the 54th Massachusetts, the subject of the 1989 movie "Glory."
After the war, with the exception of a few artifacts buried here and there, the camp vanished. Today, its exact location is a matter of debate.
Larry Skinner of the Museum of Southern History in Jacksonville suggests that Stillwell is a more logical location. But, he added, he has no problem with Singletary's preservation's efforts.
"I can't say there wasn't something there. If they want to preserve it, that's fine, I'm not against it. But Hammond Boulevard is too far away," he said.
Neither controversy nor the land's $600,000 price tag cloud Singletary's visions for the property. He sees a place for the community to gather, and for educational displays and battle re-enactments.
Anything but a gas station.

Return to Top

--(7)  Woman Works to Preserve Middletown Valley -----------------------------------------------------

Woman Works to Preserve Middletown Valley
By Karen Gardner
3/25/2010
Frederick News Post (MD)
http://www.fredericknewspost.com/sections/news/display.htm?storyID=102862

Elizabeth Bauer lives in the shadow of South Mountain. She can see the area where the Battle of South Mountain was fought and the rolling farmland that has characterized the area for generations.
She is taking on the fight to preserve the mostly rural area. Bauer is the new president of Citizens for the Preservation of Middletown Valley, an organization formed two years ago to oppose plans to build a gas transmission compressor station in the area.
In January 2009, Dominion Transmission bought an old stone farmhouse known as Fox's Tavern and 135 surrounding acres. Two months later, the Civil War Preservation Trust included the tavern as one of the nation's 10 most endangered Civil War sites.
Preservation Maryland and Maryland Life magazine recently named Fox's Tavern one of the 11 most endangered historic sites in Maryland.
It's one of many privately owned sites historians and land preservationists consider threatened. Dominion's purchase of the land spurred the national historic preservation group to add the area to its endangered list.
Bauer, her husband and two sons have all been active in Civil War living history. Her husband, Claude, and younger son, Brendan, 21, have participated in battle re-enactments. Her son Cameron, 25, joined the rest of his family to serve as extras in the Civil War movie "Gods and Generals."
Dominion plans to build a compression pump for its natural gas transmission line on the property, which is zoned agricultural. The pump is not likely to be built soon, but company representatives said it is part of long-range plans. The pipe moves natural gas from underground sources to markets in the mid-Atlantic region.
The preservation group wants Dominion to reconsider building a compressor station on land zoned agricultural. The group said the noise generated by a compressor makes it more suitable for an industrially zoned area.
"The Dominion issue is going to loom over us until 2015," Bauer said.
In the meantime, she hopes to get the group active in other land preservation and zoning issues in Frederick County. The group supports Frederick County's new comprehensive plan, which has tightened development possibilities around the county.
The group hopes to reach out to preservation-minded people throughout the county, she said.
She also plans to look into the process used to extract natural gas from underground stores and research the ramifications for those whose properties are above the gas supply.
"We have not been assertive in our approach," she said. "I want to get the hackles up. If you can get anger, you can get interest. It's amazing the number of people who know nothing about this."
Bauer is hoping to build the group's membership. It is applying for nonprofit status and Bauer is considering mass mailings to increase visibility and financial contributions.
"I don't think the community realizes it's the board that keeps us going financially," she said.
Rich Maranto served as the organization's first president. Maranto, Bauer and Randy Buxbaum started the group in November 2007 and were the first board members. Buxbaum remains the group's treasurer.
Bauer, 54, works in human resources for an intelligence firm. Most of her work is done from her home. She volunteered for many years with the Arthritis Foundation when the organization had a Frederick County office. She suffers from rheumatoid arthritis, which limits her living history acting to warm-weather events.
She plays a civilian, and this summer will probably adopt the persona of a cook or seamstress.
Her interests and experience with arthritis combines with her volunteer work. At work, she sees herself as an advocate for her employees.
"When I retire, I want to become a health care advocate for seniors," she said. "People do not want to challenge their doctor's opinion, and they don't understand the long-term effects.
"I'm a very caring person, but I'm also a force to be reckoned with. Not in a rude way, but I can be forceful."

Return to Top

--(8)  Funds Secured for Restoration of Civil War General's Home -----------------------------------------------------

Funds Secured for Restoration of Civil War General's Home
By Deangelo McDaniel
3/24/2010
Decatur Daily (AL)
http://www.montgomeryadvertiser.com/article/20100324/NEWS02/3240352/1007/news01/Funds-secured-for-restoration-of-Civil-War-general-s-home

After years of lobbying and plan?ning, the Alabama Historical Commission finally has enough money to restore Gen. Joseph Wheeler's home.
And if everything goes as planned, it's possible the nearly 6,000-square-foot home will reopen to the pub?lic some time in late 2011.
"We're in the final design phase now, and we're adver?tising for construction bids," said Mark Driscoll, the com?mission's director of historic sites.
The money the state is us?ing to restore the home totals a little more than $2.1 mil?lion and is coming from four sources: $469,899 in conser?vation bonds; $400,000 in edu?cation bonds; $200,000 from the Friends of General Joe Wheeler Foundation; and $710,000 in commission mon?ey.
Driscoll said there is an al?lowance in the bid package that includes returning the more than 30,000 pieces in the Wheeler Home collection to the site.
Those items have been at an undisclosed location since restoration started.
Driscoll said the state will be able to pin down a more definitive date for reopening the home after bids are opened in four to six weeks.
The state was able to save a significant amount of money by using labor through Ala?bama Correctional Indus?tries.
A 1976 act created ACI, and part of its mission is to "pro?vide meaningful work and vocational training pro?grams for inmates."
Driscoll said ACI is certi?fied to deal with lead paint removal. Inmates have been at the site for about a month scraping paint off the home's exterior and replacing de?teriorated boards.
"We're so excited to have enough money to finally get the home restored," Pond Spring site director Melissa Beasley said. "Right now, we're concentrating on the main house."
On April 10, Beasley is in?viting volunteers to Pond Spring to help clean the grounds.
The event is part of the Civil War Preservation Trust drive to help clean and restore the nation's battle?fields, cemeteries and shrines.
Union and Confederate troops fought on the grounds during the Civil War. In June 1864 Confederate Col. Josiah Patterson, of Morgan County, used Pond Spring as his headquarters.
Pond Spring is on Alaba?ma 20 between Courtland and Hillsboro.
The state has owned the site since 1993.
Because of safety con?cerns, the state closed the home about four years ago, but it allows scheduled tours of the grounds.
The home, where Wheeler raised his family, was built after the war and showed sig?nificant deterioration after the state acquired the site.
The house, which is sur?rounded by boxwoods, and the grounds have a human history that dates to before Alabama gained statehood.
John P. Hickman, the plantation's first owner, came to Pond Spring in 1818 with 11 family members and 56 slaves.
Before selling the 1,760-acre plantation to Col. Ben Sherrod in 1827, Hick?man constructed a two-story log house. Sherrod turned the two-story dogtrot cabin into a Federal-style house with porches on the first and second levels.
With the exception of the already restored slave quar?ters, the Sherrod House is the oldest structure on the site.
Sherrod's grandson inher?ited the estate and married Daniella Jones, who lived on the nearby Caledonia Planta?tion.
The newlyweds lived at Pond Spring.
After her husband's death in 1861, Daniella moved back to her parents' plantation, where she met Wheeler in October 1863.
Wheeler and Daniella married in 1866 and lived in New Orleans before the couple moved back and constructed the "Big House" at Pond Spring.
Wheeler, who was a gener?al in the Confederate Army and for the U.S. Army during the Spanish-American War, died Jan. 25, 1906.
He also was a congressman for the district that included Pond Spring. Wheeler is buried in Arlington National Cemetery.

Return to Top

--(9)  Battlefield Preservation Charges Ahead -----------------------------------------------------

Battlefield Preservation Charges Ahead
By Andy Johns
3/24/2010
Chattanooga Times Free Press (TN)
http://www.tfponline.com/news/2010/mar/24/battlefield-preservation-charges-ahead/

Almost 150 years later, there's still plenty of fighting going on over Civil War battlefields.
A 20-year battle to preserve the Resaca Battlefield in Gordon County, Ga., and another effort to save land where re-enactors gather in Bridgeport, Ala., underscore the challenges preservation groups face even as they come up on the heralded 150th anniversary events.
"It's not something to get into if you're depressed easily," said Charlie Crawford, president of the Georgia Battlefields Association.
In Bridgeport, the Tennessee Valley Authority wants to buy a family farm where a re-enactment has been held for 16 years. In Resaca, plans to turn the battlefield into a state historic site have stalled and nearly fell through, although the plans are back on track.
Because many Civil War battles happened near key transportation hubs or important geographic features, many battlefields are "under siege from development," said Mary Koik, a spokeswoman for the Civil War Preservation Trust.
"Those places are still in demand today just as they were in the 1860s," she said.
At the same time, however, local governments and preservation groups are trying to build and promote their resources in time to draw tourists for 150th anniversary events.
Mary Ann Peckham, executive director of the Tennessee Civil War Preservation Association, said there is "growing interest in battlefield preservation."
"I think that's only going to increase," she said.
Ms. Koik agreed.
"That period is just really on people's minds right now," she said.
The 150th anniversary is different from those in the past because ties to the past rapidly are disappearing.
"There's no substitute for actually going out and walking the ground where history happened," Ms. Koik said. "If we don't (preserve) it now, our children and our grandchildren for that 200th anniversary aren't going to have the same opportunity."

Return to Top

--(10)  Trees Planted to Mark Route of Knoxville's Defining Civil War Battle -----------------------------------------------------

Trees Planted to Mark Route of Knoxville's Defining Civil War Battle
By Matt Lakin
3/23/2010
Knoxville News Sentinel (TN)
http://www.knoxnews.com/news/2010/mar/23/trees-planted-route-knoxville-civil-war-battle/

The men in blue and gray are long gone, but city Public Service Department crews spent Tuesday posting sentinels in green along the route to Knoxville's defining Civil War battle.
The 38 trees - a dozen magnolias and 26 crepe myrtles - will stand at attention along the north end of 17th Street, which leads to the University of Tennessee campus and the Fort Sanders community, site of the battle that cracked the Confederate siege of Knoxville in November 1863. City officials and history buffs expect growing ranks of visitors as the war's 150th anniversary approaches.
The trees planted Tuesday join about 40 others planted along 17th Street, said David Brace, the city's deputy director of public service. The street tops the hill where Union forces held off Gen. James Longstreet's failed effort to recapture the city Nov. 27, 1863.
Terry Faulkner, a member of the city's Tree Board, led the push for the planting with help from such groups as the Knoxville Civil War Roundtable and the East Tennessee Civil War Alliance, which are working to secure a spot for Fort Sanders on the state's Civil War Trail. The Tennessee Department of Transportation covered the cost of the trees.
Little of the battlefield remains, but preservationists hope to develop a walking tour of the area, starting at the Redeemer Church on Highland Avenue. Two monuments stand to the men who fought there - one to Confederate soldiers at 17th and Laurel Avenue and another to Union troops of the 79th New York Highlanders at the corner of 16th Street and Clinch Avenue.

Return to Top

--(11)  Resaca Rebirth -----------------------------------------------------

Resaca Rebirth
By Andy Johns
3/23/2010
Chattanooga Times Free Press (TN)
http://www.tfponline.com/news/2010/mar/23/resaca-rebirth/

A few weeks ago, Ken Padgett was ready to sound the bugle and retreat from Resaca Battlefield.
After 20 years of fighting, he thought he'd lost the effort to create a park at the site, where about 150,000 Union and Confederate troops waged war in 1864.
"We thought everyone was going to walk away," Mr. Padgett said, standing where the entrance to the park would be off Resaca-LaFayette Road near the Interstate 75 interchange. "We feel if that were to happen, (the park) was never going to happen."
But a letter drafted by the Gordon County Commission and sent to the state Department of Natural Resources has breathed new life into the project.
Last Tuesday, the Gordon County Commission agreed to ask the state to get started on the 540-acre site with plans to expand it when state revenues pick up.
Under the proposal, the Department of Natural Resources would use allotted funds to build a road, parking area and interpretive trails at the site, according to Gordon County Commission Chairman Alvin Long.
The county would be responsible for maintaining the property, and an area for a visitors' center would be left clear so the state could build it when funds become available, Mr. Long said.
Kim Hatcher, a spokeswoman for Georgia State Parks, said building the road, trails, outdoor exhibits and restrooms is possible, but nothing has been agreed upon.
"We look forward to continuing this discussion with Gordon County," Ms. Hatcher said in an e-mail Wednesday.
Mr. Padgett and other local residents began raising the flag for their cause in the early 1990s, and the site progressed as far as a groundbreaking, an announcement from the governor and a $5 million bond issue.
Mr. Long said the state originally allotted $5 million for the park but diverted funds to another project. State officials have said that $3.7 million always was the amount slated for the park.
About $400,000 has been spent on surveying, and about $3.2 million now is left, according to the state.
In December, after the state said it couldn't handle the project in the current budget crisis, the county voted to take over the site as a county park.
But soon afterward, local leaders said $3.2 million is not enough for the project. They worried that if the county couldn't build it at that price, the state might reallocate the funds elsewhere.
On top of that, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers required the county to reapply for permits to build in a flood plain, which the state already had granted. Getting new permits would have delayed the project at least six months, and officials want the park open for the 150th anniversary of the Civil War beginning in 2011.
"We've really been let down," Mr. Long said. "It's the best and only option we have right now."
Mr. Long said he hopes the road and trails could be finished by the end of the year. There's no definite time frame for the visitor center.
The Department of Natural Resources "is skeletonized right now," Mr. Padgett said. "At least we have this."

Return to Top

--(12)  Protecting Civil War Sites Is an Ongoing Battle -----------------------------------------------------

Protecting Civil War Sites Is an Ongoing Battle
By Michael Buettner
3/21/2010
Petersburg Progress-Index (VA)
http://progress-index.com/news/protecting-local-civil-war-sites-is-an-ongoing-battle-1.693912

When Abraham Lincoln and Ulysses S. Grant met at City Point in early 1865 to discuss the strategy for following up the impending Union victory in the Petersburg campaign, they couldn't have known that another battle would be fought more than a century later to preserve some of the ground where that victory was won.
Much of the battlefield where Union and Confederate soldiers contended during the nearly 10-month siege of Petersburg has been lost already to development and neglect, and more of it remains endangered by the same enemies. Even the location of the historic meeting of Lincoln and Grant was in danger not long ago of crumbling into the Appomattox River.
But those who have been fighting to protect the area's Civil War heritage have won some important victories of their own in recent years. Now they are pushing ahead with a grand strategy to expand the size of the area under protection and to restore and refurbish many of the sites already preserved.
Leading the battle for the past decade was the National Park Service's Bob Kirby, who served from 2000 until last month as superintendent of the Petersburg National Battlefield before leaving to take the top job at the Gettysburg National Military Park.
In an interview before his departure for Pennsylvania, Kirby retold some war stories of his own about his battles against time, Mother Nature and tight government budgets on behalf of history lovers.
For example, he said, the bluff over the Appomattox where City Point sits had been eroding for years. "We were going to let it sit, but then Hurricane Isabel came along" in 2003 and accelerated the erosion dramatically, he said. "We got emergency funding and put in a 750-foot retaining wall," a $1.3 million project.
On top of the bluff, the former Eppes plantation house known as Appomattox Manor was also in perilous condition, Kirby said. "If we had gotten a good shake or a good strong wind, the whole building would have fallen into the basement," he said. The Park Service spent another nearly three-quarters of a million dollars restoring and stabilizing the building.
Other major projects have included modernizing and upgrading the Visitor Center at the park's main Eastern Front entrance on Route 36; removing trees and otherwise stabilizing the earthworks throughout the park; repaving and rerouting the tour road through the Eastern Front section; and numerous small improvements including replacing worn carpets, restoring numerous historic and operational buildings and even replacing portable toilets with permanent facilities.
But even while fighting these defensive actions, the park has moved forward aggressively with expanded programs and facilities.
Probably the biggest advance on that front was the opening last year of a new Visitor Contact Station at the Five Forks battlefield in Dinwiddie County, a more than $3 million project.
"When I got here, the concept on the table was to put a trailer out there," Kirby recalled. "This was a national landmark property, and we had only porta-potties. The public had to cross a major highway (on foot) to get there."
What the public got instead of a trailer and portable toilets was a 2,374-square-foot state-of-the-art building with glass walls providing panoramic views of the property, along with a 25-car parking lot and overflow event parking for 100 vehicles. The project also included a 1,673-square-foot maintenance building as well as new access roads, walkways, signs and landscaping.
In conjunction with the opening of the new visitor center, the park service also added eight miles of trails through the park to help connect its scattered points of interest and also to offer more recreational opportunities to park visitors.
That interest in recreational uses illustrates another kind of expansion that has been going on at the battlefield that may not be as obvious as the new buildings and restorations: a wider range of programs to increase the park's usefulness as an educational and recreational resource.
"For a long time, this was an old-fashioned Civil War battlefield that talked about dead white men, weapons, logistics, tactics," Kirby commented.
Those things remain part of the park's mission, of course. But today, visitors can also learn much more about, for example, the roles of African Americans and women during the war, as well as non-military topics including the ecology of the creeks and swamps that flow through the battlefields. Trails have been added and expanded throughout the park's units and have proven popular with runners, bicyclists and equestrians both local and visiting.
Much remains, however, to fulfill the Park Service's General Master Plan.
A new front opened in that battle last year, when the U.S. House of Representatives passed a bill introduced by Rep. J. Randy Forbes (R-4th) to authorize the Park Service to go forward with plans to acquire more than 7,200 acres adjacent to its current holdings. The bill is currently awaiting committee action in the Senate.
The pending legislation does not provide any funds to buy the land and also does not authorize any taking by eminent domain. The bill authorizes acquisitions "from willing sellers only by donation, purchase with donated or appropriated funds, exchange or transfer."
The parcels are mostly less than 100 acres in size, but three - near the Five Forks, Hatcher's Run and White Oak Road battlefields - are more than 1,000 acres each.
Kirby noted that large segments of the target property already have been acquired by nonprofit groups. For example, the Civil War Preservation Trust has acquired about 2,000 acres in Dinwiddie County, the Conservation Fund also has bought some of the property, and the Isaak Walton League has obtained conservation easements on some of the land.
Another goal dear to Kirby's heart is to bring the former South Side Depot in Petersburg under the Park Service's umbrella as a history center and visitor contact station in the city's historic area. Talks and public meetings on the subject of the old railroad station have been going on for some time, but no final arrangement has been worked out.
"That's probably the one I have the greatest regret about not seeing through," Kirby said. "It's emblematic of the entire campaign. ... The railroads were a big key to the whole campaign. We really don't have a place to tell that story."

Return to Top

--(13)  Historic Preservation and Economic Development Do Battle -----------------------------------------------------

Historic Preservation and Economic Development Do Battle
By Donald Gilliland
3/15/2010
Harrisburg Patriot (PA)
http://www.pennlive.com/midstate/index.ssf/2010/03/with_gettysburg_casino_plan_pe.html

Battle lines are being drawn again in Gettysburg. It's economic development vs. historic preservation as philanthropist and former Conrail CEO David LeVan again tries to win a license for a casino on the outskirts of town.
A casino proposal four years ago was unsuccessful, in part because of heavy community opposition.
LeVan said he will submit a new proposal to the Pennsylvania Gaming Control Board by April 7. His new slots and table games parlor would be much smaller than his proposal in 2006. It would be in an existing building and would be farther from town and closer to the Maryland border, where many prospective casino patrons live.
With pro-casino and no-casino camps disputing the most basic claims of the other, an undercurrent of division snakes through this historic area, which depends on more than a million visitors a year to its Civil War battlefield but which also has seen unemployment more than double in the last five years.
Yet public opinion was only part of the reason the 2006 proposal failed. The Gaming Control Board's decision was not an up-or-down vote on the suitability of the Gettysburg project, but rather a more complicated selection of the "best projects" among five proposals from around the state competing for two licenses. The same is true this time, with at least four proposals competing for a single license.
This time, LeVan would refurbish the Eisenhower Hotel and Conference Center, about a mile's drive south of the Gettysburg National Military Park.
The project would bring much-needed jobs to Adams County, LeVan said, and, if other casinos in Pennsylvania are a guide, provide millions to local government. That has prompted some who opposed the 2006 plan to change their minds this time.
It's not enough, or necessarily true, said Susan Star Paddock, 65, a social worker who four years ago collected more than 65,000 signatures in opposition to the first plan as the leader of the group No Casino Gettysburg. "We don't think it's economic development," Paddock said. Any jobs created will be offset by jobs lost as businesses close because residents would be gambling their money instead of spending it elsewhere, she said.
Paddock also said a casino would repel the people the area relies upon for its livelihood: heritage tourists. She cited studies that indicate heritage tourists abhor commercialization of historical sites.
A consortium of preservation groups including the Civil War Preservation Trust and the National Parks Conservation Association has opposed the new plan, writing in a Jan. 26 letter to LeVan that "a gambling facility at Gettysburg unavoidably conflicts with the essential meaning of this place in American history."
However, the crowds of visitors to the battlefield have been dwindling steadily for nearly a decade. "We need to diversify tourism," said Jeff Kline, 38, an Iraq war veteran and a spokesman for Pro Casino Adams County. "Folks here are in desperate need to see some change. People need jobs. Too many businesses have closed. ... Too many attractions have closed. ... We can't keep going the way we are."
Preservation is a red herring, said Kline, who noted that the Eisenhower Hotel does not sit on historically significant ground. As for heritage tourists, he said that a majority of them are already offended by Gettysburg and its souvenir shops and restaurants. "Heritage tourists only stay on the battlefield; they don't want to spend time in stores and restaurants," Kline said. "They want it to look like 1863."
Business owners are split on the idea of a casino.
Barbara Shultz, 43, who runs the Aces High hobby shop and bed-and-breakfast with her husband, Steve, said, "Other casinos advertise heavily in this area. I know they're going to be advertising Gettysburg and casino in the same sentence in a 50-mile radius."
Shultz said she has two teenage girls and "I tell them their reputation is so important."
"That's how I feel about our community," she said. "We have to watch our reputation."
Tommy Gilbert, 62, who runs a hobby shop on the other side of town, said entrepreneurs first made Gettysburg a successful tourist destination with a privately owned visitor center, wax museum and amusement park. "They created a fanfare of things for tourists to enjoy in Gettysburg, but those things have slowly eroded away," he said.
A casino would help "bring revenue back in, which we desperately need, and maybe some tax relief," Gilbert said.
"We all want to preserve our battlefield," said Gilbert, who noted that his great-great-grandfather was a drummer boy for Adams County Company K. "Not everybody's a heritage tourist; we have families that come here," and they want other things to do, he said. "People that want to go to the battlefield will. There's only one Gettysburg."
A Hanover Evening Sun poll of Adams County residents in January found more than 42 percent in favor of the casino, with 35 percent opposed and 22 percent saying they had no opinion.
Gettysburg's status as a Civil War shrine means opinions from elsewhere cannot be ignored.
This month, a group of re-enactors sitting at a table outside O'Rorkes Eatery and Spirits on Steinwehr Avenue had divergent views.
Samuel Martin, 56, of Shippensburg, said gambling holds no appeal for him, and a casino would have no impact on his activities at Gettysburg. His wife, Lisa, 48, noted a casino "might bring jobs in."
Sean Lynch, of Alexandria, Va., said, "I grew up in Atlantic City. I know what kind of crime and trash that came with it. It would be the same here."
Across the street, Pat Phillips, 64, of Greenbelt, Md., sat on a bench checking messages on her cell phone. Phillips said she has been coming to Gettysburg for 20 years. She said that she's a gambler but that she would not go to a casino in Gettysburg. "I love Gettysburg," Phillips said. "I think this town really should stay historical."
On the battlefield, opinions among tourists were sharper.
"Absolutely not! No!" shouted Kathy Tull, 54, of Marcus Hook, Delaware County, as she looked out over the field where Pickett made his charge. "This is sacred ground. ... I don't care if it's going to be near the park or not."
Tom Beck, 66, a city planner from Forest Grove, Ore., said, "This is a sacred place. I find casinos low-life, demeaning and commercial."
"Desecration is a strong word," said Ben Richardson, 20, of Havre de Grace, Md. "But history and gambling don't really mix. ... They shouldn't, at least."
Paddock, the leader of No Casino Gettysburg, takes strength from that sentiment and from past success as she musters for a new fight.
"We will not stand for it!" she said with fervor. "We will do everything in our power to ensure there will never be a casino in Gettysburg or close to it."
By law, the Gaming Control Board is required to consider a variety of factors, with some emphasis on job creation and which project is likely to generate the most money for the state. The battle for the one "resort" casino license available might have less to do with public opinion and more to do with numbers.
LeVan said he expects the Gaming Control Board to see "the best numbers of any applicant" in Gettysburg. The Eisenhower Hotel, which has seen business drop by half over the last decade and had an average occupancy rate of 34 percent last year, will compete with posh resorts that draw more than 250,000 visitors a year, including Nemacolin Woodlands Resort in Fayette County, whose patrons come primarily from the same Baltimore-Washington market Gettysburg is aiming for.
Many Gettysburg businesses are wary of enlisting too deeply in the coming fight.
Even such a die-hard as Gilbert said, "No matter what happens, we still have to get up in the morning and say, 'Good morning, neighbor.'"

Return to Top