Study: Fort Monroe would need money to be national park

Study: Fort Monroe would need money to be national park
Kate Wiltrout
The Virginian-Pilot
June 4, 2008

A National Park Service study concludes that Fort Monroe might deserve a place in the federal park system after the Army leaves – but suggests waiting until the future of the historic post is clearer before doing more analysis.

The park service conducted a “reconnaissance survey” of the 570-acre waterfront base at the request of U.S. Rep. Thelma Drake. [[Actually, Rep. Drake was acting at the request of the commonwealth, thanks to the 2007 state Fort Monroe law.]] Her district includes the post at the southern tip of Hampton. [[For three and a half of its four centuries as a strategically vital place, Old Point Comfort -- the location of Fort Monroe -- was not part of Hampton or even adjacent to Hampton. Hampton grew in the mid-twentieth century. This point matters because so many people, including many unskeptical journalists, are sympathetic to the idea that somehow Hampton, by rights, should own post-Army Fort Monroe -- even though it's a national treasure and a National Historic Landmark belonging to all of us. Note that the Virginian-Pilot still subordinates Fort Monroe news under the inappropriate categories "Hampton" and "military."]]

The study examined Fort Monroe’s national significance, as well as its suitability, feasibility and need for park service management. It was made public Tuesday.

The report says that Fort Monroe has significant historic value, but given the park service’s budget constraints, it would not be feasible for the service to operate the site without strong financial support. [[Well, yes, but that's what Citizens for a Fort Monroe National Park has been saying from the beginning. Only a revenue-generating, innovatively structured, self-sustaining national park will work -- something akin to the Presidio of San Francisco. It is important to make clear that nobody was ever asking for a traditional national park. This is a key point, but even in mid-2008, it's still not clearly heard.]]

“It’s a magnificent resource and it’s historically important. We certainly would encourage sensitive use of it,” said Terry Moore, a Philadelphia-based park service planning chief and one of the study’s authors. “Let’s see what comes out of the planning process. It may just come out and be wonderful and we’ll say 'You don’t need us.’ Or there could be a role in a partnership.”

The findings come at a critical time for the Fort Monroe Federal Area Development Authority, an 18-member board of state and local representatives tasked with drafting a re-use plan. [[That almost makes it sound like the panel is actually representative of its actual owners. In fact the panel includes seven citizen representatives -- but by law all must be from Hampton, and all serve at the pleasure of the Hampton City Council, thereby subjecting a national treasure to the vagaries of one city's parochial politics.]]

The board will vote later this month on the plan. [[True, but please note: The plan is only a bureaucratic placeholder. We still have a long way to go on planning the next four centuries of this four-century-old landmark.]]

The federal government decided in 2005 to shutter Fort Monroe in order to save money. In 2011, its 3,400 military and civilian employees will relocate to Fort Eustis in Newport News or Fort Knox, Ky. The Army will leave behind more than 150 buildings and historic structures – including the nation’s only moated stone fort.

A young Robert E. Lee helped oversee construction of the fortress in the 1830s, and Confederate President Jefferson Davis was held there after his capture in the waning days of the Civil War.

The J-shaped peninsula was one of the first places in the colonies where African slaves were unloaded from ships. [[Actually, the Africans who came in 1619 to Jamestown -- in a ship that stopped at Old Point Comfort but did not offload them there -- were not legally enslaved. That came later.]] And the post is where, even before the Emancipation Proclamation, a commanding Union general decreed that runaway slaves were contraband of war – a decision that permitted slaves to stay at the fort. [[That kind of telling of the "Contraband" story scants the bravery, initiative, dignity, and war contributions of the Americans who escaped to Fort Monroe and who gave the place its central meaning not just in American history but in the history of liberty itself. Those formerly enslaved Americans started a cascade of self-emancipation all across the South, contributing to the South's demise by helping the Union and even by fighting for the Union. This cascade helped push hesitant politicians and a hesitant President Lincoln into a situation requiring the Emancipation Proclamation. Thanks to them, the proclamation was far more than merely something that white politicians deigned belatedly to confer on helpless victims.]]

The study highlighted Fort Monroe’s historic value – pointing out that Harriet Tubman served as matron at a hospital the Union Army set up in 1865 to care for the “contraband slaves.” [[Actually, the study too takes an unintentionally condescending and dismissive approach to the enterprising Americans who gave us the Contraband story.]]

“Fort Monroe is a local and national treasure, and we should all work together to see that it is preserved for generations to come,” Drake said in a statement.

Bill Armbruster, executive director of the development authority, said he envisions the park service being involved in Fort Monroe, even if the transformed post doesn’t bear a park service label.

“I’m optimistic, even though they have deferred further study, that we share the same goals, and the park service will be able to have a role,” Armbruster said.

Moore, the Philadelphia-based planning chief, said in an interview that it’s important to wait and see what Armbruster’s group decides before recommending that Congress order a special resource study.

“If the fort had a viable visitor use component, not unlike what we would do at a national park, and if the resources are protected, then we always have to ask ourselves, 'What additional benefit do we bring?’ ” he said.

The study’s conclusion was a disappointment for members of Citizens for a Fort Monroe National Park. [[Yes, but let's be clear about why. The study is a disappointment because it shows yet again that Virginia's leaders still need to stand up and lead. The National Park Service can't take the lead on this complex challenge and opportunity. It's a political problem. It requires political action and will that National Park Service bureaucrats cannot supply.]]

The group formed in 2006 after becoming alarmed that developers could seek the waterfront property . The group argues that Fort Monroe’s historic value is too great to cede to local or state control.

“We had hoped for a more clear-cut answer, a better answer,” said H.O. Malone, a retired Army historian who heads the group. “We think it doesn’t exclude a special resource study. It only postpones asking for that until the re-use plan is done.”

Malone hopes the authority and Gov. Timothy M. Kaine push the congressional delegation to authorize such a study.

The organization commonly cites the Presidio in San Francisco as a potential model. The Army left the Presidio in 1994; it is jointly operated by the park service and a non profit trust.

The park service currently manages 391 sites designated by Congress – 58 of them national parks like the Grand Canyon, 100 national historical parks or historic sites such as Jamestown, and 74 as national monuments.

The remaining sites have varying labels, including battlefields, military parks, national seashores and national preserves.

Kate Wiltrout, (757) 446-2629, kate.wiltrout@pilotonline.com