> This List is not a blog, as you  say, however, it does seem to me that 
> certain aspects of current events do pertain to Virginia history and 
> therefore qualify for inclusion and submission to this List ...

It seems to me that something else merits mentioning here: the threat of 
inappropriate development at Fort Monroe, as warned against by both the 
Civil War Preservation Trust and APVA Preservation Virginia. This national 
historic landmark occupies the 570-acre sand-spit peninsula just east of the 
Hampton end of the Hampton Roads Bridge Tunnel. That land is Old Point 
Comfort, where the 1619 ship importing Africans stopped en route to 
Jamestown. The Army leaves in 2011.

If it is true that professional historians and nonacademics alike are still 
coming to grips with the Civil War, and if it is also true that -- as Robert 
F. Engs of Penn says -- Fort Monroe is not just _a_ place where slavery 
began to die, but is _the_ place where slavery began to die, then I'd hope 
to see some discussion in this forum about Fort Monroe's future.

My preservation group, Citizens for a Fort Monroe National Park, advocates 
an innovatively structured, self-sustaining grand public place at Fort 
Monroe. Unfortunately, narrow parochial interests have predominated so far, 
countenanced and indeed supported by almost all of Virginia's political and 
journalistic leaders, even despite the CWPT and APVA alarms. These interests 
seek to privatize land that has been publicly owned since the days of 
Jamestown.

The irony is that even if you care not about multiple dimensions of 
enrichment, but only about financial enrichment for Hampton, the 
self-sustaining national park approach actually yields more than does the 
parochial approach.

Yes, some of what I'm saying is not directly about history, and yes, some of 
what I'm saying is most decidedly political. Nevertheless everything that my 
CFMNP.org colleagues and I have been doing with our evenings, weekends, and 
vacation days for the last two years has engaged the most profound 
historic-preservation question facing Virginia at this moment. See for 
yourself: watch the Norfolk PBS affiliate's masterpiece 27-minute 
documentary, available easily and freely online via a link near the top on 
the right at WHRO.org. No one who cares about Virginia history, or American 
history, or the history of freedom itself, can help but be moved by this 
film.

I'm grateful for this chance to comment -- and for any forgiveness I may 
need, and might get, if the comment is somehow indeed too political.

Steven T. Corneliussen
Poquoson, Virginia

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