What has prompted this post was a link in one of my Google Alerts that led me to the following statement on The Gettysburg Daily, a website that seems to be more obsessed with Gettysburg than we are with, lets say, Eliot Noyes. This is a site that complains about which trees are removed and has 34 pictures taken walking around the Virginia Monument;
The white structure above the Comfort Inn [in the photograph] is the old Cyclorama building, which we hope is torn down soon.
From The Gettysburg Daily (http://www.gettysburgdaily.com)
So the argument is that the Gettysburg Battlefield needs to be restored to the way it was July 1-3 1863 which means that the Cyclorama Center, designed by Richard Neutra, has to go. One has to ask why?
Why spend the money?
Why destroy a historical structure?
It seems like selective restoration. One would assume, as I have stated before in a semi-joking manner, that if the goal is to restore the battlefield to it's 1863 glory so that people can get a sense of what it was like, then we need to add other items to the "to do" list.
- The removal of all above the ground monuments. This would include the Virginia, Tennessee and other monuments that dot the battlefield either where charges happened or certain people fell.
- The removal of the Comfort Inn (there was no comfort then and I think that it is a slap in the face to those who fell).
- The removal of all motorized transport from the battlefield, this includes maintenance vehicles, security etc.
- The removal of all modern conveniences from the park. No Flush Toilets, running water other than streams.
- The removal of all paved roads and walking paths.
I know it seems that I am being sarcastic and condescending but I assure you that I am not. I am just trying to point out that it is no longer 1863 and things are different. When the Center was built it was built in a spot near to where President Lincoln gave his Gettysburg Address.
From Richard Neutra's own words (as sent to me by his son Dion).
We should invite every year one of the great statesmen of
the Nations. It may be even a "Cold War" enemy nation to
speak before thirty thousand people about: 'What Shall
Not Perish From the Earth.' This will be a series of
speeches throughout the centuries. It may be Nehru, it may
be Chou en Lai or Doctor Heuss of West Germany.
We have not money enough to seat so many people in
American Seating Company's plush chairs, but they can
stand in a lovely landscaped natural gathering ground like
the forecourts of the Temple Ise in Japan. They can stand
for one minute, forty seconds. They can hear a message
in thirteen sentences about the ideals of mankind which
must endure. Mankind is the greater union which must be
preserved over the sovereignty of any political area in
India, Maine or Virginia. None of them must be allowed
to become cause for mankind to perish from the earth.
Mankind rules. The Greater Union becomes significant on
a shrunken globe. The same issue is still with us and will
probably be with us for generations to come, but Lincoln
was not a victor-speech maker. He was a prophet and his
grand text still resounds.
The point is this, in a place so marked by historical conflict, can we not find room to save another piece of history?
