When I search the web for Civil War related items, I often come across small town papers whose “news” isn’t really newsworthy. This piece stood out, though, for the wonderful sentiments behind it, and because of the email from the Whitman Archive researcher that inspired yesterday’s post.
We’re in an economy troubled enough that museums are strapped, historical sites are threatened by development, and bankrupt states can’t find the funds for Sesquicentennial celebrations. Yet there are plenty of people out there who continue to do their utmost to usher others into a love of history, through their passion and effort and sheer goodheartedness. It’s worth sacrificing a blog post to tip our digital cap to the docents, curators, reenactors, interpreters, researchers and historians who keep our understanding of and interest in the war fresh and alive.
Get out there and check out the Museum of Culpeper History’s new exhibit, and when you do, be sure to thank the many volunteers that made it possible.
Architectural conservator Chris Mills deserves our thanks and a pat on the back for his painstaking work uncovering Civil War-era signatures, drawings and scribbling in and around Brandy Station’s Graffiti House.
Mills has been working 10 hours a day to find and protect clues into some of the Civil War’s most recognizable characters, such as J.E.B Stuart.
It’s obviously a labor of love for Mills, as trying to preserve ancient graffiti can’t be easy. Historians like Mills and countless others involved with the Museum of Culpeper History provide a valuable public service, and they all deserve our grattitude.
(I can’t resist a poke at the paper’s typo of “grattitude”. To paraphrase Sherman, historical glory is to be thanked for our field of service, and to have the acknowledgement spelled wrong in the newspapers.)
http://www2.starexponent.com/news/2012/feb/05/our-view-thank-those-preserve-history-ar-1664547/