GDG- Battle Rages Over Neutra's Cyclorama Center

[Jim Lamason]

To all, 

I wish there was a way for this to be printed as a reminder as to why it is
essential that this building fad into history.  

Thanks for reprinting this. 

Jim Lamason 

-----Original Message-----
From: gettysburg-bounces at arthes.com [mailto:gettysburg-bounces at arthes.com]
On Behalf Of Margaret D. Blough
Sent: Wednesday, October 03, 2007 7:51 PM
To: GDG
Subject: Re: GDG- Battle Rages Over Neutra's Cyclorama Center

Esteemed GDG Member Contributes:


Robert,

The article is quite wrong on many points, but one of the errors is that the
NPS has some sort of prejudice against Modernist architecture. That implies
that if the architecture were different, then there would be no objection.
The problem all along has been that ANY building was built on such a major
section of the battleline.  The same 1977 Advisory Council on Historic
Preservation (ACHP) report that called for the Cyclo's demolition also
called for the demolition of the current VC.  The whole issue has been
vetted at length, including a Section 106 review in 1999 by the ACHP. The
1999 report as a whole is worth reading, but I believe that no better
explanation of why the Cyclo's demolition is the correct thing to do (as for
moving it; if the Cyclo's advocates can come up with the money, a new
location, and the moving of the building from its current location to the
new one without undue damage to hallowed ground, fine, but I'd be opposed to
using public money for that purpose) 
exists than the conclusion of the panel conducting the review.

>>E.  The Basic Choice to be Made
 
To many Americans the GNMP is the Civil War. Without question it is the
war's most celebrated and hallowed battlefield. The grand reunion of Civil
War veterans, North and South, held at Gettysburg in 1913 on the occasion of
the 50th anniversary of the battle, reflected a spirit that makes America's
experience with fratricidal conflict unique in world history. Those who lost
the war were not hunted down, prosecuted and executed as traitors;
Confederate leaders are represented among statues in the U. S. Capitol. The
battlefield's memorials to both sides thus symbolize the healing of deep
wounds and the continuation of the Union.
 
This bloody battle of a most bloody war was a seminal event in U. S. history
not only for military reasons but for the battlefield's association with
Lincoln's Gettysburg Address, itself a document in American history that
rivals original documents like the Declaration of Independence and the
Constitution and is probably much more familiar to the American people.
Indeed, many historians regard the Gettysburg Address as signaling a second
American Revolution--a correction, as it were, of the American spirit. Few
have expressed this more profoundly, and with more scholarly foundation,
than Professor Garry Wills:
 
    "The Gettysburg Address has become an authoritative expression of the
American spirit -- as authoritative as the Declaration itself, and perhaps
even more influential, since it determines how we read the Constitution
itself without overthrowing it .... By accepting the Gettysburg Address, its
concept of a single people dedicated to a proposition, we have been changed.
Because of it, we live in a different America.'' ( 2 )
 
Gettysburg, as a site, thus represents a post-Independence turning point in
national history -- our development politically -- that has few if any
rivals. It is of paramount importance historically. The rehabilitation of
this key battlefield site so that the battlefield can properly be
interpreted must be regarded as a historic mission of the highest order.
 
This imperative transcends the reality that cumulative policies of NPS have
compromised this historic landscape in some areas of the battlefield and
that any landscape as a natural environment will inevitably change over
time. The exact replication of the 1863 battlefield, with its carnage and
devastation, and devoid of its commemorative markers, would be impossible
and undesirable even if possible. The Secretary of the Interior's
Standards for the Treatment of Historic Properties with Guidelines for the
Treatment of Cultural Landscapes recognizes that restoration standards allow
for the depiction of a landscape at a particular time in U. S. history by
preserving materials from the period of significance and removing materials
from other periods. The period of significance selected by the park
substantially predates the Cyclorama Building.
 
The Cyclorama Building, constructed in 1960 in the southern portion of
Ziegler's Grove, caused substantial changes to the topography and features
of this critical portion of the battlefield. It is located just east of the
highest point on Cemetery Ridge, the object of repeated Confederate attacks
on July 2 and 3 to gain the heights of Cemetery Hill. It was sited at the
focal point chosen by tile artist of the Cyclorama Painting and provides an
observation deck from which can be seen Seminary Ridge, the terrain of the
six-mile long Confederate line. 
 
The siting of the building was based on an approach to visitor orientation
that, by today's standards, would be rejected out of hand; indeed, it is
clear that such a location would violate the NPS's Management Policies, its
basic service-wide policy document. These policies provide, among others,
that "development will not compete with or dominate park features" (Chapter
9:2); and that "to minimize visual intrusion and harm to major park
features, visitor centers will generally not be located near such features"
(Chapter 9:11). The Advisory Council itself in a June 1977 publication
entitled A Plan to Preserve the Historic Resources of the Gettysburg Area of
the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, called for the relocation of the Cyclorama
Building and the nearby visitor center because they were "intrusions near
the cemetery and the climactic scene of the battle..." (p.6-7). 
 
No more dramatic demonstration of this intrusiveness can be seen than to
move along Confederate Avenue on Seminary Ridge and view the Union's
defensive line from this vantage point. The bulk and scale of the drum of
the Cyclorama Building is prominent in the viewshed, and from certain points
this and the long office wing with its ramp and observation deck introduce a
discordant and disturbing note in an otherwise pastoral landscape  dotted
with memorials that are themselves testimony to the emotions stirred
directly by the events that took place.
 
The Council should not reverse its 1977 recommendation in the absence of
compelling reasons to do so. The Keeper's determination of the building's
eligibility (even accepting the premise that the Mission 66 program made a
"significant contribution to the broad patterns of our history") does not
rise to this level of persuasiveness because it is focused on the building
in isolation from, and not on its relationship to, a paramount historical
objective: the rehabilitation of this key battlefield area. Those who would
question the historic value of such rehabilitation appear to believe that
the Building does not diminish or intrude upon visitors' understanding of
the battlefield events or, even if so, future generations may not focus on
the military as distinguished from the political significance of Gettysburg,
and that the re-creation of the conditions of 1863 is unrealistic in any
event.  To accept this view would open the door conceptually to further
construction in the future tha
t substantially changes the topography and viewshed.  Public and scholarly
interest with battlefield events has continued unabated for long after the
survivors have died. There is no basis to suggest that this would change in
the future, and this kind of speculation could undermine historic
preservation objectives generally.
 
It is no criticism of Neutra to give priority to this rehabilitation
objective. The architect was responding to the client's directive. The
massive drum was a direct expression of the function that was to be served
by the Building. In other hands the work would doubtless have been done less
admirably but just as intrusively because of the massing required to achieve
its purpose. With rare exceptions, the millions of people who have visited
the GNMP since 1962 have come to see the battlefield and not Neutra's
architecture. Neutra has a secure place in the pantheon of American
architectural history. There are other Neutra buildings; there is only one
Gettysburg Battlefield. The proper treatment of the Building would be
considered under quite different criteria, of course, were it on some other
site without superior historical competition.
 
The continued existence of the Building is consequently pre-empted by
another controlling historic preservation objective. In such circumstances
it is not necessary to enter upon any examination of whether the building
can be adapted to another use or can feasibly be altered to accommodate the
Cyclorama Painting or whether the Painting can be accommodated without any
such alteration. To engage in this examination is to presuppose that the
Building can trump the objective of battlefield restoration and
rehabilitation. It is also not necessary to evaluate, accept, or reject the
asserted defects of the Building in either design, construction or
maintenance. For the purpose of the unpleasant choice posed by its
unfortunate siting, it should be assumed that the building is completely
functional in all these respects. The result is the same. The Building must
yield.
 
F.  Conclusion
 
Accordingly, it is our recommendation that the Council endorse the GNMP
General Management Plan in regard to the treatment of the three historic
resources in question. It is not necessary, in our view, for the Council at
this time to concern itself with the controversy regarding certain aspects
of the new proposed Visitor Center other than to endorse the plan to house
within it the Cyclorama Painting under conditions suitable for its proper
preservation and display. This should be the focus of future Section l06
consultations, along with other mitigation policies as suggested by the
National Trust for Historic Preservation, to include review of the landscape
restoration plans.

Submitted by:
 
          Council Member Working Group
 
                    Herbert M. Franklin 
 
                    Bruce D. Judd 
 
                    Parker Westbrook
 
Date: May 10, 1999<<

Regards,

Margaret

-------------- Original message -------------- 
From: "Robert Lawrence" <lawrence at rwlcpa.com> 

> Esteemed GDG Member Contributes: 
> 
> 
> http://archrecord.construction.com/news/daily/archives/071003cyclorama.a 
> sp 
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