Wednesday, February 14, 2007
Museum would be a boon to Lexington
Editorial commentary
Recent contributions
- What Obama didn't say
- How my education and religious training failed me
- Can we be a two-trolley town?
- Striving for civility
- Commentary archive
From the RoundTable blog
Read the latest entries
Brandon Dorsey
Dorsey, a land surveyor in Lexington, is an amateur historian and a member of the Museum of the Confederacy.
Has anyone noticed that downtown Lexington is not bustling with tourist dollars despite all the Rockbridge area has to offer?
According to the Lexington Visitor Center, the city hosts only 40,000 visitors per year. Compare that to the 52,000 visitors that the Museum of the Confederacy receives every year on its own, and it makes the local tourism numbers seem low. How many hotels, restaurants, shops, etc. would love to see the area's tourism more than double.
Despite the potential boon to the local economies, rumors abound that some people associated with Washington and Lee University are actively resisting the potential relocation of the museum from Richmond to Lexington.
The Museum of the Confederacy is a highly rated institution that not only preserves and displays the relics of the South's struggle for independence during the Civil War, it also engages in interpretative programs and sponsors many educational initiatives. Scholars from around the world walk through its doors ever year to do research in the museum's expansive library and records archives.
The museum's board is composed of highly esteemed business people, doctors and scholars. Not many years ago, the museum boasted more than 90,000 visitors a year, but the expansion of the Medical College of Virginia hospital complex nearby has encased the museum, contributing to a loss in visitors. The museum board has decided to relocate, and while Lexington stands to benefit tremendously from this relocation, it is not clear yet if Lexington is the best choice for the museum.
Why would any one or institution oppose the museum coming to Lexington? The disease of political correctness is a real possibility. Rumors are surfacing that some people connected with Washington and Lee University believe that the museum would be detrimental to the school because it would fortify the connections that the university and the area have with the Confederacy, particularly Gen. Robert E. Lee.
The school has for more than a decade worked hard to distance itself from its roots, especially the nostalgia of Lee's Confederate service, believing that Lee's military legacy is detrimental to the recruitment of minorities. The Lee Chapel museum, for example, has systematically seen the removal of nearly all displays concerning Lee's military career
Lee as general is out, and "Lee the educator" is in. It is as if Lee simply appeared in 1866 from thin air to rebuild a devastated Washington College. His past is even maligned by some professors on the campus.
The question is whether any covert opposition from the university will upset the negotiations taking place between the Museum of the Confederacy, the city of Lexington and the Rockbridge County Board of Supervisors. The area has millions in potential tax and business revenues on the line in addition to finding a suitable tenant for the soon-to-be-abandoned Courthouse square buildings. Will the area citizens and businesses get to decide the question, or has some liberal conspiracy doomed the process from the start?
