Tell Your Story

Dr. Mary Abroe: Why I Have Decided To Leave A Legacy Of Preservation

One of the great privileges—and joys—of my life has been my affiliation with the Civil War Trust and, before that, with one of its predecessor organizations, the Association for the Preservation of Civil War Sites. As a human being, mother, grandmother, and citizen, there are few things more important to me than leaving this legacy of preservation behind when I am gone and providing for the work’s continuation.

I became interested in the Civil War, as did many other people, when I was young. I read a kids’ biography of Clara Barton when I was eleven or twelve; Clara came under fire during the battle of Antietam, and I still remember that book’s description of “the dark, quiet valley of Antietam Creek” on the night before the battle. As I look back, I know that’s when I was “hooked.” My fascination with that battle has endured and grown, as has my interest in the Civil War.

I became involved with the modern battlefield preservation movement in the late 1980s when, as a history teacher and graduate student, I saw the grave threat posed to Antietam by the possibility of commercial development at the historic Grove Farm, scene of the iconic Alexander Gardner photograph of Abraham Lincoln and Gen. George McClellan taken near Sharpsburg soon after the battle.

One of the great privileges—and joys—of my life has been my affiliation with the Civil War Trust (now a division of the American Battlefield Trust) and, before that, with one of its predecessor organizations, the Association for the Preservation of Civil War Sites. I was an early member of the APCWS, whose board I joined in the late 1990s.

As a human being, mother, grandmother, and citizen, there are few things more important to me than leaving this legacy of preservation behind when I am gone and providing for the work’s continuation.

Ken and Wanda Hayward: Why We Want Battlefield Preservation To Be Our Legacy

We both became aware as we walked the battlefields that they were there for us because someone in the past thought that they should be given to the future for generations to enjoy, study and perhaps wonder at what occurred there. For us it is a unique feeling to leave something to the future for people we will never know, but to realize now that they will experience what we have experienced.”

–Ken and Wanda Hayward

Jan: Jan Kovarik

Historical records—paintings, photographs, and books—are one-dimensional. History is three-dimensional. You need the place where that history happened in order to see, touch, and understand the history. Reading about the signing of the Declaration of Independence is nothing compared to standing in that room, on the same floorboards, where those men stood. Reading about any battle during the Civil War is educational, but not as enlightening as standing on the ground where that battle happened. I found an extended life-long passion in being able to literally “touch” history—use on the same stone steps, touch the same doorknob, stand in the field, walk along a trench line, look out from a parapet. I re-ignite that passion every time I have the privilege of standing on a battlefield, or make a contribution to save one. We cannot relegate this country’s history to paintings, photographs, and books. We must preserve the “places”—forever—so that everyone has the opportunity to make the connections, “touch” history, and perhaps find their own passion.