Here’s a story that ran on the NBC affiliate out of Knoxville last night. Archaeologists are excavating the site of Confederate works from the siege of Knoxville and assault on Ft. Sanders.
Here’s another one about the Orange County Board of Supervisors striking a blow for low-wage, dead-end retail jobs; corporate competition for locally-owned businesses; and even more encroachment on Virginia’s historic landscape. Enjoy that soup, Esau.
In May 1864 more than 29,000 were killed or injured on the Wilderness Battlefield during the Civil War. In August 2009, with their vote for building a Wal-Mart Super Center on this hallowed ground, the Orange County Board of Supervisors effectively spat on their graves.
It does seem more than a little obscene to have cheap retail establishments all around a place where there was so much bloodshed. It’s like casually wiping your feet on a grave marker.
–ML
This news was pretty upsetting for me. I just visited Fredericksburg, VA earlier this summer and saw the affects of development on a battlefield. The Wilderness Battlefield is close by and I’d hate the same thing to happen to it. It’s another reason why to hate Wal-Mart.
Yeah, there’s been a heck of a lot of encroachment on a lot of the sites in that area. You can really see how extensive it’s been when you look at aerial photos on Wikimapia, Google Maps, and sites like that.
–ML