Sunday, February 12, 2012 The Monroe Sunday News ● monroenews.com COMMENT 5C

COMMUNITY CURRENTS ▼

“Monroe has a story to tell about a small-town youth who went on to become an international sensa- tion during his lifetime and a legend thereafter. It’s all right here. We just need to capitalize on it.” Museum would tell entire Custer story

BY STEVE ALEXANDER machine, the Corliss Engine, onroe, situated in the and was amazed at the new Msoutheast corner of invention created by his friend, the Great Lakes State, Alexander Graham Bell. recently became a unit of the In New York City he dined at National Park Service and Delmonico’s with John Jacob truly is a gateway to history. Astor, James Gordon Bennett We now have a chance to ex- and P.T. Barnum; viewed works pand that signifi cantly through of art by Albert Bierstadt and Monroe’s connections to George Vinnie Reams, and sat in theater Armstrong Custer. All that boxes to watch performances remains is to know if we are will- by Lawrence Barrett and Edwin ing to tell his story to the world Booth. He broke trails in the or keep it our west with Wild Bill Hickok and secret? Buffalo Bill Cody and served as Unfortunate- an American diplomat when the ly, Custer often Grand Duke of Russia toured the is relegated to United States. a single day Custer has an international fol- in Montana lowing along with half a million known as Civil War enthusiasts seeking to “Custer’s Last know more about him. STEVE Stand.” Each ALEXANDER Monroe has a story to tell year more about a small-town youth who than 300,000 went on to become an inter- people visit that battlefi eld to national sensation during his learn less than sits in our own — Evening News file photo lifetime and a legend thereafter. museum downtown. We have so The statue at N. Monroe St. and W. Elm Ave. honors Gen. George Armstrong Custer’s service during the Civil War. It’s all right here. We just need to much more than Montana. This capitalize on it. Partnering with includes an exemplary Civil War Fire: The Life, Death, and Mythic And if you think the defi nitive pened at Gettysburg (which is the National Park Service will get collection and personal items of Afterlife of George Armstrong book has been written, think depicted in the statue at W. Elm the word out. his time here in Monroe. Custer,” has exclaimed that again. On average, 12 books a Ave. and N. Monroe St.) With a little effort we can cap- Although born in New Rumley, “certainly the equestrian statue year appear in print on the life Appomattox Court House, a ture tourist dollars, going further Ohio, Custer’s home of choice of Custer in his hometown of and times of Gen. Custer. smaller town than Monroe, sees than any other place could in was here. His legend and story Monroe, Michigan, would be the The story includes the fasci- more than a quarter million telling the true story of George continue to reverberate with most prominent.” nating romance between Gen. visitors each year. It was there Armstrong Custer, the rest of the each new generation. Research for the book brought Custer and his bride, Elizabeth that Custer received the fl ag of story no one else can tell and no Custer wrote: “In years long her to Monroe, as our library (Libbie) Bacon. We don’t have to surrender from Gen. Robert E. one else will ever tell if we don’t numbered with the past, when alone has more than 25,000 reconstruct her birthplace as it Lee. Union Gen. Phil H. Sheri- do it. I was verging upon manhood, pieces relating to Gen. Custer. already exists here, as does the dan gave Libbie the table on The plan as proposed by my every thought was ambitious Indeed all paths in this fascinat- church where they were married. which the terms of surrender the Monroe County Historical — not to be wealthy, not to be ing story eventually lead to and Custer’s distinctions abound. were penned, attaching a note Society and host of supporters learned, but to be great. I desired from Monroe. He was the youngest major that said “... there is scarcely an takes into account the resources to link my name with acts and We are fortunate while other general in our military’s history. individual in our service who has that currently exist, the working men, and in such a manner as towns grasp for recognition as He became the most photo- contributed more to bring about relationship we have already to be a mark of honor — not dubious as “Home of the Nerf graphed man of the 19th century this desirable result than your established and cultivated with only to the present, but to future Ball.” Other towns would have to (yes, images won’t have to be very gallant husband.” the National Park Service and generations.” erect something to draw tour- located; they already exist in our A replica of the table is in our the assets that can be utilized to Those future generations now ism; here it already exists in the museum’s archive.) He captured museum. make this all happen. traveling across Colorado, Idaho, architecture of our town, the the fi rst Confederate battle fl ag He was asked by President What remains is the question: Montana, Nebraska, Oklahoma shoe house where he bought his of the Civil War. He was one of Andrew Johnson to accompany Should our museum become and South Dakota pass through boots, the downtown and the our country’s fi rst aeronauts and him on a national tour as his the “Custer National Museum?” counties, forests and towns countryside he knew. became the boy general of the personal bodyguard and he went I can think of no reason why it named for him. Villages, town- Along with a wonderful col- Union Army, sporting a unique head-to-head on the govern- should not. ships and cities in Michigan, uniform (a replica is in our ment’s Indian policy with his lection of artifacts (touted as the ◆◆◆ Minnesota, Pennsylvania, Ohio largest collection of Custeriana museum). commander-in-chief, President and Wisconsin all pay tribute in in the world), we have an archive In more than 60 successful Ulysses S. Grant. Steve Alexander is a Custer name. of materials and periodicals that cavalry charges he had 11 horses Visiting the Centennial Exhibit expert, re-enactor and author who Louise Barnett, author of the any future Custer author worth shot from under him and his in Philadelphia, he marveled at lives in Elizabeth Bacon Custer’s bestselling book “Touched by his or her salt could not resist. most successful charge hap- the world’s largest man-made childhood home.

OTHER VIEWPOINTS ▼ Which Ike to like? Barefoot Kansas boy or world leader?

n World War II, he tamed Amer- tention and which could be delegated to Iica’s allies and conquered its We celebrate (Eisenhower) because of what he did with that subordinates,” Jean Edward Smith wrote adversaries. “ in a new biography to be published later As a conservative college president, he ordinary heritage, with the lessons of his humble parents and the this month. “His experience as supreme defended liberal professors caught in a childhood that was so typical.” commander taught him to use experts virulent red scare. without being intimidated by them. He As NATO commander, he projected structured matters so that he always strength without projecting force. uncommon, so much so that Stephen E. and his father John (the president’s son) had the last word. ... The lines of author- In the White House, he presided over Ambrose opened his two-volume Eisen- are united in arguing that the memorial ity were clear, the national interest was the sort of peace and prosperity that hower biography this way in 1983: should refl ect Eisenhower’s extraordinary broadly defi ned and there was no buck today’s presidential candidates can’t plau- “His heritage was ordinary, his parents record more than his ordinary roots. passing.” sibly promise. were humble folk, his childhood was Along with all his accomplishments, For a long time — even in his own time Now, Dwight David typical of thousands of other youngsters there was always more to Eisenhower — Eisenhower was the subject of ridicule. Eisenhower, seldom the growing up around the turn of the centu- than met the eye — especially the eyes of The consensus, especially among the center of contention, is at ry, and most of his career was humdrum historians. opinion-makers who preferred the some- the nexus of a controversy and unrewarded. On the surface, every- “Although Eisenhower, with his big grin, times serious and sometimes sardonic that raises vital questions thing about him appeared to be average.” looked like a gregarious soul,” Michael Adlai Stevenson, who lost two elections to about the character of cap- It is true that Eisenhower was like so Korda wrote in his 2007 biography, “this Eisenhower, was that the 34th president’s ital memorials, the nature many others of his time and place. But was in part a facade, or a protective speech was plain, his vision uninspiring, of historical remembrance David his style unengaged, his personality lack- Shribman that’s ultimately why the barefoot-boy mechanism, like a lot of things about and the relationship motif seems so discordant, so at odds him.” ing fl ash and fi nesse. between a national fi gure’s Creators Syndicate with our notions of decorum in civic After all, here was a man at the center of Stevenson was pate de foie gras to origins and destiny. statuary. American and world politics in the center Eisenhower’s Salisbury steak with a side All because the design for Eisenhower was not at all like so many of the American Century — the personifi - of mixed peas, corn and carrots — and in the Eisenhower Memorial others, or any other American of his time cation fi rst of our innocence and ingenu- truth Swanson came out with the TV din- in Washington, D.C., includes a statue of or any other time. The reason we cel- ity and then of our power and preroga- ner, a special favorite of the Eisenhowers, him as a barefoot boy from Kansas. ebrate him nearly a century after he left tives from World War II through the fi rst the year he became president. Nobody contests that Eisenhower rose West Point is not that he was unremark- third of the Cold War. But for all that, Eisenhower now is re- from humble Abilene at a time when its able. We celebrate him because of what In Eisenhower’s time, and in part at his garded as a successful chief executive and unpaved streets retained a whiff of the he did with that ordinary heritage, with bidding, the United States moved from a his record is admired by his successors Chisholm Trail cow drives. Eisenhower the lessons of his humble parents and the peripheral to a principal role in big-power and historians alike. He helped to win seldom thought of himself as a barefoot childhood that was so typical. politics, even as it harnessed its industrial World War II and helped to preserve the boy, perhaps because there actually was, David Eisenhower, a University of might to produce a consumer economy peace, and a career without peer deserves in Ike’s time, a Republican known as the Pennsylvania historian and biographer, and confronted its past to reconcile its a memorial that matches the man and his barefoot boy. He was Wendell Willkie, the said the family is proud of his grandfa- soaring ideals with its sordid racial reality. achievements. GOP’s 1940 presidential nominee from ther’s heartland roots. “There are 3,000 Through it all, Eisenhower possessed an “We’re not speaking to ourselves right Wall Street by way of Elwood, Ind. ways you can do an Eisenhower me- alluring self-confi dence that his country- now,” Susan Eisenhower said. “We’re Though the Eisenhowers spent White morial,” he said of the controversy in a men came to share, a carefree air that speaking to future generations. So we House nights in front of tray tables watch- phone conversation the other afternoon. pervaded the nation at home even as need to think about what Eisenhower ing Westerns on television, the truth is “Combining a military career of that tensions simmered abroad, a manage- meant to this country.” that the president was shaped more by stature and a two-term presidency is no rial mien that suited the times or, just as He lived his past as a barefoot boy in West Point than by the town that helped easy task.” likely, shaped the times. Abilene, but with his signature Ameri- make Wild Bill Hickok famous. Even But Eisenhower, his sister Anne (a pro- “He appeared to be performing less can confi dence, in both fl ip-fl ops and so, part of the Eisenhower elan was his fessional designer), his sister Susan (an work than he did because he knew in- wingtips, he helped create the future we irresistible mix of the common and the expert on Russian-American relations), stinctively which matters required his at- now tread.