A month or two ago, I did a course on the preservation of the military patrimony here in Galicia,NW Spain. Most of it was interesting as it was a combination of military history and military architecture.

What struck me, was that the miltary has had an enormous influence (particularly here in Europe) on such diverse subjects as the planning of cities and the provision of services such as water and sewage (I kid you not! ). Also covered was the (always) complex subject of preservation of historic material such as artillery and vehicles.

This is not a country that has been particularly good at the 'preservation' side of things nor has it been particularly good at the commemoration of the past - a case in point is the Peninsular War, only one statue exists to mark an extremely crucial part of this country's history.

What the question is, in this thread, is how good is your country at 'preserving' the past?...Jim

interesting question jim,

as you will already know Britain is a country more steeped in history than most, and as such i would say we are excellent at preserving this.

As you mention in spain, military thinking was present in the design of most major cities and transport systems built throughout our history and much of this is evident today. the cities of york, edinburgh etc are testement to this.

We should be very proud of our nations history, and im glad there are organisations and museums dedicated to it!

regards

joe

Oh well, I'm part of that myself, just check my website...

Kris

The museums try to make a go at preserving our heritage, but there are various cultural (from both sides of the political spectrum) and state groups that seem to contra all their hard work. There is also a severe lack of funding.
The current government seems intent on destroying all reference to our colonial and darker past. To a certain extent this can be understood, but mostly not...

Here is an example of some good work done by the military museum: WW2 tanks rumble again

Here are the examples of the government f ing it up (sorry about the language, but it really destroys me to see this happen):
Museum's army vehicles seized
'Enough arms to raze Soweto'
Defence force 'looks foolish'
Museum probe continues
SANDF defends museum raid
Lekota praises museum seizure
Cops still have museum's guns

As Jim points out, our military heritage goes well beyond artefacts. Probably the biggest problem is knowing the sheer size of the resource. For instance, a few years ago a survey of defensive structures in Britain was carried out and the number recorded was huge (and I don't expect it picked up every site either)

http://www.britarch.ac.uk/projects/dob/index.html

I sometimes get to record WW2 structures at work (yes, WW2 is archaeology!) and the county council I work for has a programme of recording defence sites, to enhance the county Heritage Environment record. And they are disappearing faster than they can be recorded.

At least we don't have the problem that Rudi has, where the past is regarded as something to be deliberately erased.

On the subject of artefacts, there is an amazing amount of stuff out there, as I found while idly trying to compile a list of surviving WW1 tanks

http://www.landships.freeservers.com/survivors.htm

since that list was posted, even more turned up...

The problem begins with documentation.In the conversations I had with several people in the Spanish defence ministry, they simply don't know what they have in warehouses. The first step is to catalog the permament items (castles etc) and the second is the documentation of everything else - everything from tanks to commodes!...Jim

Doesn't look like any Yanks have spoken up so I'll jump in. America certainly doesn't have the rich history that Europe has. To us if it's 100 years old it's OLD. As an aside this was brought home to my Dad when he visited Notre Dame cathedral in World War II. The tour guide mentioned when it was built, 1300 or something like that. When he didn't get much response from the assembled Americans he pointed out that this was 200 years before Columbus discovered America. THAT put it into better perspective.

We do a fairly good job of preserving the major historical sites here. Mainly battlefields from the Revolution or Civil Wars are the biggest, most popular. I visited Shiloh in Tennessee several years ago and it was great. These sites are controlled by the federal government and have park rangers giving guided tours, demonstrations, things like that. I also lived in Arizona for a while and there are quite a few preserved native American sites preserved. These are also ran by the feds and have park rangers available for talks. They can be extremely well preserved.

When I was a kid my Dad was one of the few people who was really interested in historical sites. When we'd be on outings if he saw a road sign pointing out an historical market he'd be sure to pull over to check it out. These were mostly built in the 30s as part of the CCC, civilian conservation corps. This was kind of a "make work" group that gave jobs, any jobs, to people without work during the depression. I don't know if they've made many more of these markers since then. Mainly these were large stone things with a bronze plaque describing what happened on that site.

The History Channel on TV each year has a program called Save Our History. In it they go over the ten sites that are in the most danger of damage. It's usually pretty interesting.

I also think there is a perspective issue with American History. Basically--who's history do we preserve? Do we follow the dominate Anglo / Western European route? How do we portray the navtive tribes that lived here before any Europeans arived? How do we remember Africans that were enslaved and brought here? How do we portray immigrants groups that have made American what it is?

I agree with Halfyank that America is still a baby in the big picture of history. But I feel that there is an over-riding false sense of national identity in this country and part of it is because we never want to admit that we were wrong. Look at any textbook on American history...they are designed to prompt democratic citizens in this country. Issues are glossed over and they do not present any critical thinking on the part of the reader.

If one wants to preserve American history we need to take a serious and honest look at who we are as a country. Its not easy, I know.


Sean

Sean, i totally agree with you

so many european countries and asian countries as well have built out history. i think we owe it to them for the 'preservation' of our country. so many important things took place because of them

Shain,
My thoughts exactly

Sean

Similarly you can't deny the colonial influences, good or bad. In many cases it was this that shaped the countries.

To tired to make a considered contribution, but I'll keep an eye on this for later.

Good night

Henk

Jim this is a very good topic.

I intend to head down this route as a career once I leave school and attend University.
I think it is very important to record and preserve History whether it is Military or not.

NZ is a very young country even younger than the US. Here there has never been any military conflicts since the Maori land wars of the 1860's (which supposedly lasted till 1916 when the last Maori "rebel" was captured). This conflict is an integral part of NZ's history and to fully understand what is happening today in NZ's political forum one needs to know why people have certain veiws about land "ownership".

We have a wonderful Army Museum which has a few Military vehicles but also has an immense collection of NZ military uniforms and equipment.
We also have two brilliant Air Force Museums. Once which contains a original Lancaster and Catalina.
I would love more Military vehicles to be brought into NZ but the cost is immense.

Here in the South Pacific I think NZ and Australia should take a major role in Preserving the WWII battle sites and other sites of Historical interest in the area and recovering Crashed planes and other military equipment. This needs to be done because the small nations that many of these sites are on are struglling for money and space and are bulldozing pillboxes and selling Crashed aircraft and tanks for scrap metal.

Another important military thing that needs to be preserved is the veterans themselves many countries have shocking systems for taking care of these brave men and woman.
Before it is too late we should record as many of their stories as possible.

Sorry if this is long winded but this topic is very close to my heart

I spent 3 wonderful years of my life at RAF Lakenheath from Nov.1987 to Nov.1990 I had some opportunities to see some of the British Military Museums Such as Bovington and the Imperial War Museums in London and Cambridge

What impresed me was that they took very good care of the vehicles For the most part they were indoors so they wouldn't rust or rot due to the elements They even had some runners that would take part of battle re-enactments

Now when I left there on a PCS move to S.California air base I took leave on route in Pa I went down to Aberdeen Proving Grounds to the museum down there Some of tose vehicles are/were in sad shape

I took a look inside an SdKfz 251/1 halftrack The insides are/were rusted out Almost no floor inside I realize it's a W.W. 2 German halftrack but to me it should have been kept in better shape I guess it's a question of funding


One other thing I found out when I was over at Lakenheath We had an F-105 that had 5 kills of Mig's to it Was it in a museum preserved? No It was being used for Aircraft Battle Damage (ABDR) training Later on I had found out that the USAF uses these old planes for ABDR training first then maybe puts them in a museum

IMO this F-105 should have been an exception because of its history