Monthly Archives: June 2011

Honoring their Sacrifice

07 Tuesday Jun 2011

Posted by in Uncategorized

≈ Comments Off on Honoring their Sacrifice

The other day I finally made it to the “Honoring Their Sacrifice” exhibit at Brooklyn’s Green-Wood Cemetery.

One of the most distinctive items was this Confederate field piece.  It is easily recognizable as such because of the short barrel.  Because raw materials were at a premium in the South during the war the Confederate States of America scrimped by making field pieces with shorter tubes.

There was also this Union piece.  Charles Wainwright, an artillerist in the Army of the Potomac, is interred at Green-Wood.  Wainwright was a favorite of General Henry Jackson Hunt, the dean of Civil War artillery, and served the Union cause throughout the conflict.  He was also the author of A Diary of Battle: The Personal Journals of Colonel Charles S. Wainwright, 1861–1865, one of the best personal accounts of the war.

Trivia question:  What is the only regiment to have three monuments at Gettysburg?

Answer:  The 14th Brooklyn.

Their regimental commander, Colonel Fowler, too is buried in Green-Wood.

Here is yours truly in front of the 14th monument at the railroad cut in Gettysburg.

These headstones will eventually be placed on the grounds, just like the thousands already laid during the cemetery’s ongoing project.

Those of the Prentiss brothers are just two of them.

Clifton Kennedy Prentiss, USA

William S. Prentiss, CSA

The soldiers and sailors monument has also been restored and is another “must see.”

If you intend to go, you had better act fast.  The exhibit ends this Sunday, June 12th.


June 6, 1944

06 Monday Jun 2011

Posted by in Dwight D. Eisenhower, WW2

≈ Comments Off on June 6, 1944

I could not let the 67th anniversary of D-Day go unnoticed.  When I was younger this was a much bigger deal than it is today.  It is only a bit of a stretch to say that I have measured the events of my life according to the anniversaries of the Normandy invasion.  In June 1984 I was still in high school, getting ready to start my senior year at the end of the summer.  Ten years later I had graduated from college, but was unsettled and still trying to figure out what I wanted to do with my life.  By 2004 I had gone to graduate school and moved to New York City.  Now I am married and in full middle age.

The arc of D-Day presidential ceremonies, or lack thereof, paints a fascinating portrait of the postwar decades.  In 1954 President Eisenhower, the Supreme Allied Commander of the invasion a decade earlier, skipped France altogether and instead vacationed at Camp David.  His only public comment was a small proclamation about the Grand Alliance.  For the 20th anniversary Ike did record a television special with Walter Cronkite entitled D-Day Plus Twenty Years: Eisenhower Returns to Normandy.  The footage of the journalist and the retired president was filmed in August 1963 and is quite moving.  On June 6, 1964 Johnson, who had taken office only seven months earlier after the Kennedy assassination, was in New York City speaking to the Ladies Garment Workers Union.  In the waning days of Vietnam and the Nixon Administration in 1974 Americans were too tired and cynical to care about World War 2.  Reagan’s address in 1984 remains the most memorable of the anniversaries.  At Pointe du Hoc he addressed a sizable audience of veterans still young enough to travel but old enough to appreciate their own mortality.  President Clinton’s address on the beaches of Normandy during the 50th anniversary symbolized the passing of the baton from the Greatest Generation to the Baby Boomers.  In 2004 current events overshadowed the 60th anniversary and the ceremony painfully underscored tensions in the trans-Atlantic alliance.

Today only one person mentioned it to me.  Alas we have reached the tipping point where most of the veterans have either passed on or are too aged and infirm to participate in the observance.  In other words it has become part of history.  Makes me feel old and a little sad.

Baseball and the Civil War

05 Sunday Jun 2011

Posted by in Baseball

≈ Comments Off on Baseball and the Civil War

Baseball was still very much a developing sport when the war divided the nation. It was decidedly more popular in the Northern states, and many Southerners learned about the game watching Union soldiers play in Confederate POW camps. Soon both sides got into the game.

“It was played on both sides,” Fort Sumter historian Richard Hatcher said. “It wasn’t the game it is today in popularity, but it was one of many things soldiers did during long periods of inactivity.”

Enjoy your Sunday.

Museum Resource Center

04 Saturday Jun 2011

Posted by in Museums, National Park Service

≈ Comments Off on Museum Resource Center

When I was in Washington DC last week I was wondering to myself what happens to all the items left at the Vietnam Veterans Memorial.

The storage of museum materials is fascinating and has a history all its own.  One of my favorite things at the Brooklyn Museum, New-York Historical Society, and Metropolitan Museum of Art is the visible storage space where one can see items not currently on display in the collections.

Visitor Center, RIP?

03 Friday Jun 2011

Posted by in National Park Service

≈ Comments Off on Visitor Center, RIP?

I don’t see the visitor centers at our National Parks going anywhere anytime soon, but I can imagine fewer VCs being constructed and existing ones having shorter hours in the decades to come.  Increasingly, visitors are finding information (including ticket information) online before even setting out for their destination.  I myself spent the past few days searching Park websites to find the logistical details for our upcoming trip to Pennsylvania and Maryland, including the full complement of interpretive programming at Gettysburg for the summer season.  Social media have already changed the way the Park Service interacts with the public.  This trend will certainly continue and probably accelerate.

Digital technology increases the options of the consumer and puts the power in the hands of the customer, which are always good things.  My experience as a volunteer in the Interpretation Division at Ellis Island has taught me, however, that people still want that human interaction.  According to Laura Petersen:

. . . people still seek out rangers at parks they do not regularly visit. After pre-trip planning information was posted online for Yellowstone National Park, rangers expected a drop in visitor center activity, said Diane Chalfant, the agency’s deputy associate director of interpretation and education. “But what actually happened is the visitors came in more informed and curious because they had more in-depth questions to ask,” said Chalfant, who was Yellowstone’s chief of interpretation for 10 years.

The role of ranger is changing from providing basic facts and directions to discussing more detailed elements of the park. It means they have to know their subject matter in and out, Chalfant said.

Whatever does happen, it is safe to say that the NPS will look different even five short years from now when it celebrates its centennial.

The Smithsonian’s Bigger Picture

03 Friday Jun 2011

Posted by in Museums

≈ Comments Off on The Smithsonian’s Bigger Picture

Hey everybody, as I mentioned the other day I spent Memorial Day weekend in our nation’s capital.  Although my mother was born in Washington DC and lived there for several years as a young girl, I myself had never visited the city until just a few years ago.  My favorite thing to do is visit the Smithsonian.  The Hayfoot and I have had this on the heavy rotation since I returned last Sunday.  One thing  was surprised to learn when I visited for the first time a few years ago was that the Smithsonian Institution is not one site, but a system of museums and research institutions dedicated to preserving and disseminating our nation’s scientific, historical, and cultural heritage.  Visiting Washington over Memorial Day weekend has whetted my appetite to learn more about the Smithsonian and its history.  Earlier today I inter-library loaned some titles on the history of Mr. Smithson’s museum.

Ambrotype of Abraham Lincoln by William Judkins Thomson (1858); Smithsonian Institution’s National Portrait Gallery, Washington DC

The Smithsonian also has a blog presence and is posting frequently about the Civil War, particularly on how the war affected the organization for good and ill.  The museum was founded in 1846, just fifteen years prior to the start of the conflict, and as you can imagine was vulnerable on a number of different levels.  According to a recent post:

As the war erupted in April 1861, the Board of Regents experienced a major upheaval, with more members leaving the Board over the course of the year. Several were expelled for their loyalty to the Confederacy, including Lucius Jeremiah Gartrell, a US Representative from Georgia, and James Murray Mason, a US Senator from Virginia. In June, the board lost another strong supporter when Senator Stephen A. Douglas of Illinois died. Douglas had been appointed to the board in 1854 and had been an advocate for the Institution in the Congress...

…As the war wore on, yet another member was expelled for “giving aid and comfort to the enemies of the Government.” Other strong supporters were also lost, including Jefferson Davis, president of the Confederacy, who had been a Smithsonian regent from 1847 to 1851, and was a close friend of [Smithsonian] Secretary Henry.

I can’t wait to go back next month.  Until then, here is the next best thing.

Billy Martin, Civil War historian

02 Thursday Jun 2011

Posted by in Baseball

≈ Comments Off on Billy Martin, Civil War historian

From the “Who knew?” department:

Shortly before his untimely death on Christmas day 1989, Billy Martin had met videographer Tom Molito to discuss making a video detailing Martin’s managerial strategies.

Billy was dressed in his usual cowboy outfit, which might have been incongruous for anyone at a business meeting in New York City, but for Billy, it seemed perfectly natural.

Tom and Billy agreed that the video would emphasize his New York Yankees years as well as the strike-shortened 1981 season when Martin led the Oakland A’s to a division title.

As Billy gulped his drink, the topic switched from managing baseball games to managing the Union Forces at Gettysburg. Billy really was a student of the Civil War and he became quite animated discussing the Confederacy’s tactical errors that cost them victory.

I remember seeing the advertisements for the Martin documentary mentioned in the article when I visited Yankee Stadium for the first time in 1990.  The Bronx was truly a zoo that season.  It was the year George Steinbrenner fired manager Bucky Dent, Commissioner Fay Vincent banned the Boss from day-to-day team operations for spying on Dave Winfield, and the Yanks finished with the worst record in the American League.  Good times.