Cyclorama Building on the move?

23 Tuesday Aug 2011

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Authorities at Gettysburg National Military Park announced that they are exploring the feasibility of relocating Richard Neutra’s Cyclorama Building to a less conspicuous location.   This may be the least bad option given the possibility that the Park Service may never be granted the authority to demolish the site.

Gettysburg Cyclorama Building; photo/Don Wiles

I am always sympathetic to the arguments of architectural historians and preservationists that we are losing too much of our cultural heritage.  Every time I walk through the travesty that is the current Penn Station I rue the loss of the magisterial original.  It is fair to argue, too, that Neutra’s Gettysburg building is now itself part of the history of the evolution of the park, part of the Mission 66 project and designed to reflect the stature of the United States during the Cold War and Space Age.  Still, despite the nostalgia that many feel for the building they visited during their youth, the fact remains that the building never worked.  For one thing the Modernist structure sits incongruously atop Ziegler’s Grove on Cemetery Ridge, the site of some of the hardest fighting on Day 3 of the battle.  It was also structurally unsound, leaking frequently, and responsible for a great deal of the damage the Cyclorama incurred in the decades it was housed in the building.  Besides, there are plenty of representative Neutra buildings still standing.

Neutra’s Miller House, Palm Springs; photo/Ilpo’s Sojourn

Whatever happens, a permanent solution to the Cyclorama Building issue will hopefully be forthcoming in the intermediate future.  Stay tuned.

Summer’s almost gone

20 Saturday Aug 2011

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I am sorry about the paucity of posts recently. The Hayfoot and I are squeezing out a few last days of vacation before the busy fall semester begins. I am typing these words from a coffee shop in Union Station. We came to DC to see the sites and catch up with some friends. DC means more to me with each visit because I learn more with each trip. I am halfway through the Lockwoods’ The Siege of Washington, which chronicles the first twelve days after the fall of Ft. Sumter. The Confederate capture of the federal capital was a closer thing than I realized. DC means a great deal to me personally as well because my mother lived here as a little girl. Today would have been my grandmother’s 100th birthday.

We have a lot to do when we get home. The Hayfoot starts her final semester in grad school next week and I have a number of projects coming due this fall. These are things to look forward to. I will be back next week with more posts.

Bon weekend.

Fredericksburg slavery museum site to be sold

17 Wednesday Aug 2011

Posted by in Museums

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A few weeks back the New York Times reported that former Virginia governor L. Douglas Wilder’s plans for a slavery museum in Frederickisburg were in peril.  Yesterday it was announced that the $7.5 million dollar property is to be sold.  The project is apparently a victim of the recession and the Smithsonian’s National Museum of African American History and Culture that is about to break ground on the Mall near the National Gallery.  It is difficult to see any endeavor such as this fail but given the overlapping scopes of the two museums it was probably inevitable that this would happen.

Moving on

14 Sunday Aug 2011

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Hey everybody, it’s Sunday afternoon.  It is also the last day of my week off.  For years I always visited my father in Arkansas the first week in August.  My father was not much into the Civil War but over the years he took me to Shiloh, Vicksburg, Pea Ridge and elsewhere because he knew how much visiting these places meant to me.  These trips were all the more poignant because my father’s health was in decline for a long period and I knew year-by-year that each visit might be the last.  If he were still alive I would be flying back right now instead of typing these words. Knowing that I will never again have the chance to do so leaves me reflective, but aware too of the need to move forward and enjoy life in the moment.

We decided to have a quiet week.  I took some classes at the Apple store to learn more about my new Air, went to Prospect Park and Green-Wood Cemetery, and broke out a few regiments for some skirmishing on the kitchen table.  I also read Gary Gallagher’s The Union War. Here are a few photos from the last seven days:

Boat in Prospect Park

Picnicking

Major David B. Bridgford, Army of Northern Virginia; Green-Wood Cemetery

Moving ever onward here in Brooklyn…

Deep South baseball

12 Friday Aug 2011

Posted by in Baseball

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African American baseball players who came up in the 1950s and 1960s often discuss their experiences playing minor league ball in the Deep South during this period.  This was an especially combustible time, with the Civil Rights Movement beginning to accelerate and the situation becoming more violent by the day.  Especially vulnerable were black ballplayers, who were joining Major League Baseball in larger numbers in the wake of Jackie’s Robinson’s integration of the Brooklyn Dodgers in 1947.  Minor leaguers always have a tougher lot than those who make it to The Show, but to be playing in front of a segregated crowd during the Civil Rights Era was often literally to put your life at risk.  Roy White went one further; he had to wear the Confederate flag on his uniform.

Culp’s Hill witness tree

10 Wednesday Aug 2011

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Last August the wife and I took a walking tour of the Battle of Brooklyn, which took place just down the street from where we live.  Halfway through the tour our guide made a passing remark explaining the likelihood of there being remnants of the battle, including almost certainly human remains, just a few feet below the sidewalk where we were standing at the moment.  What fascinates me about visiting historical sites is being in the exact place where history happened.  There is a continuity inherent in such an experience which grounds you with the people who came before and adds an immediacy to the past.  The rangers at Mysteries and Conundrums tell us of a recent discovery in a Culp’s Hill witness tree.

(Union breastworks at Culp’s Hill/Library of Congress)

Postcards from the edge

07 Sunday Aug 2011

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(uploaded to Wikimedia Commons by Hugh Manatee)

My friends and family know how much I love to write postcards. When we went to Gettysburg in June I felt like a slacker for sending “only” eleven to various people we know. The thing I love abut postcards is that, with the incorporation of email into our everyday lives in the 1990s, the personal letter has become a thing of the past. I am not saying I want to return to a life before electronic mail, it’s just that I miss the exhilaration of reaching into the mailbox and pulling out a letter from a friend far away. If it contained a few newspaper clippings and a photo or two, even better.  Postcards are an ideal middle-ground. And besides, I feel so bohemian when I’m sitting in a coffee shop far from home writing them out.  I always thought it was just me, but thankfully I am not the only one who sees it this way.

A six month progress report

05 Friday Aug 2011

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Hey everybody, I am writing this on my new MacBook Air from a coffee shop on SOHO.  My best friend and I weathered the rainstorm on Wednesday night and went to the Apple Store across the street from the Plaza Hotel.  I was determined, resolute, adamant when I walked in the door to walk out with an iPad 2 but after some deliberation I decided to go in this direction.  I am happy I did, though an iPad is still in my future. It is all part of my future plans for the blog and my research pursuits.  This morning I had a One to One training session at the Apple SOHO location. Being a Mac novice I thought it would be wise to sign up for the twelve month membership of lessons.  An added benefit of entering the blogosphere is that doing so has forced me to improve my computer and technology skills, which to be honest were starting to lag.

Wednesday was a propitious time to enter the Mac world because it marked the six month anniversary of the Strawfoot.  Entering the blogosphere has been an adjustment but I am glad I did.  It has been a process, especially given my technologically challenged condition.  Still, saying I wasn’t proficient with computers just didn’t seem a good enough excuse.  I remember taking a colleague for coffee in early January where she patiently walked me through the ins-and-outs of blogging.  I had done some preliminary research but was still ignorant of a great deal.  Other colleagues provided helpful input as well.  After deciding to move ahead I chose my focus, opened up an account, and jumped in.  It was all somewhat hush-hush the first few weeks because I wanted to get 20-25 posts under my belt before going “wide” and putting it out there on the Web for all to see.  My mantra with the blog is “all in due time.”  I am committed for the long haul and would rather take my time and do things the right way.  The Air and (eventually) iPad are all part of my longer term plans to incorporate voice, video, and social media to my repertoire.  These are all coming soon.  The past six months have been rewarding in ways I could not have imagined and I am looking forward to what the future brings.  Stay tuned.

Opening the box.  This guy was especially helpful.

Hands-on training, literally

Six months, 131 posts and counting…

Family reunions

03 Wednesday Aug 2011

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I have always been intrigued by stories of slave descendants meeting descendants of slave owners.  Such stories add an immediacy to our nation’s history and serve to remind us that in the grand scheme of things our Civil War was not that long ago. Sometimes, for reasons I do not need to explain, the individuals are actual blood relations.  Sometimes not.  The book on this is of course Edward Ball’s Slaves in the Family, which came out in the late 1990s.  I am surprised by the lack of bitterness and generosity of spirit that usually surrounds such gatherings.  Recently Wayne Hunter showed up at a family reunion in South Carolina.