WHY IS THERE NO ORGANIZED STATE WIDE PRESERVATION ORGANIZATION IN ARKANSAS?

By Doyle Taylor

WHY IS THERE NO ORGANIZED STATE WIDE PRESERVATION ORGANIZATION IN ARKANSAS.

While there are several scattered local chapters of the SCV, UDC, Civil War Roundtables, Civil War Trails, county, or local historical preservation associations, who are trying in their own small way to preserve some Civil War Sites, there is no general statewide overall organization, as in other states, made up of people with expertise, that can assist and advise these local preservation organizations on how to go about doing the work of preservation, who know what resources are available to aid the preservation of site, or how to use those resources.

Several of us had hoped that the Civil Wars Trails organization would be the vehicle that could do this. But, alas State Government organizations are limited as to the advise and help that they can give, and the regional groups have fallen back into the same local interested persons working on their same projects again, within their own limited means. It is not that there is a lack of interest, or we would have no preservation at all. It is a lack of direction and leadership.

Leadership and purpose which generates visible results, will generates additional interest. It is the failure and hopelessness of the preservationist, who are trying, to get any help or advise at all, that is smothering us. When the diehards lose their interest, you can’t expect the halfhearted to step forward and do the job.

We have people, who are major players in the field of preservation, in this state, Politicians, Professors, Authors, Government agents and employees, Museum Directors, Teachers, and yes even the little people, that are quite interested in everything that goes on in Virginia, Pennsylvania and Georgia, but what about ARKANSAS?

Arkansas has a unique history, but we are caught in the belief that we were only a backwater action, or in the “political correctness” thinking of our day rather that the true research of history itself, or that the war in Arkansas somehow wasn’t noble enough or somehow was dirty, that prevades our thinking to the point that we do nothing.

At present there is a major study, authorized by the United States Senate in November of 2000, and being done by the National Parks Service about the Vicksburg Campaign that can directly effect the preservation efforts of several sites within Arkansas. YET there is not an organization in the State of Arkansas that could, in my opinion, handle the impact of the benefits, to the State of Arkansas, that could come from this study, once it is concluded in November of 2003. Even if we do get any of the 40 or 50 sites in Arkansas, involved in that study, reconized by the National Parks Service. Most people can’t name 10 Civil War sites in Arkansas, let alone that many involved with the Vicksburg Campaign.

It seems in Arkansas everybody is happy paddling their own little dingy, while the ocean going Cruise Ship sinks below the waves.