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Articles
In Pickup & GO!
Fulfilling Dreams
By Audrey Peterman
Finally, after 14 years of living it, talking about it, writing and
rewriting it, our long-awaited book is finally in print. We are so grateful
and appreciative to the legions of people who we have experienced along the
way and who have helped us. The book
is a record of our experiences in the national parks and publicly-owned
lands, as well as in the environmental movement. Most of those experiences
have been pleasant, and we have also laid out those areas which require
immediate change and improvement.
Shortly after we returned from our round-the-country adventure
in 1995, we visited the Koreshan State Park on the west coast of Florida,
where we were struck by a statement on the tombstone
of a woman named Hedwig Michel: "Be ashamed to die until you have done some
service for humanity!" she charged. Frank and
I took that statement to heart, and it practically became our motto. Not
that we’re planning to die or anything, but I finally feel that we have
accomplished "some service for humanity." You and other readers will be the
ultimate judge, and then it will be up to YOU to take on the challenge.
Simultaneously, last July, Frank and I fulfilled a dream he expressed the
night President Obama was elected. "Honey," he said, "the first time the
President goes to Sub-Saharan Africa, we have to be there. Can you imagine,
we were taken off in chains, and now a black man is going back as the most
powerful man in the world?"
Well, yes, thank you, I said and, as our lives tend to unfold in
miracles, I got two roundtrip tickets to Accra, Ghana for the princely sum
of $280 after trading in our miles. Suffice it to say, we were present for
the President’s visit, and joined the Ghanaians in paroxysms of delight and
revelry.
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One of the best things that happened to us
was meeting Ambassador Dr. Erieka Bennett, founder of the Diaspora
African Mission, a Trumpet Award Honoree whose feet are enshrined in
the International Civil Rights Hall of Fame at the Martin Luther
King Jr. National Historic Site. We took to each other as if we’d
been friends all our lives, and the Ambassador has been my mentor
and close companion since, helping me indescribably as I worked to
put together the First Biannual Conference & Expo: Breaking the
Color Barrier in the Great American Outdoors.
But she really blew my mind when she told me, "Audrey, when my
friend Lurma told me that these noted environmentalists were coming
to Ghana and I should take care of them, I assumed that you were
white. Because the only black environmentalist I know is my good
friend (Nobel Peace Prize Winner) Wangari Maathai…"
The she went on, "I think what you are doing
is really important, to reconnect African Americans with nature. We
have neglected that side of ourselves. Since I’ve been with
you and Frank, I find myself noticing the trees, I’m observing the
birds, I’m noticing things that I just took for granted before. And
it really makes me feel a deeper connection with the universe…it is
making my life richer…"
As always, the stories in this issue share
the inspiring ways that other people just like you are finding their
way back to the natural world, to experience the grand wildness as
Julia did in Alaska, the allure of a state park, as Andre did in New
York, or the mystique of a Ghanaian national park, as Frank and I
did in Cape Coast. But really, you don’t have to go anywhere… just
tune in to it right outside your door. And your neighborhood, state
and national parks are just waiting to welcome you.
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Buffalo
Soldiers
national
park needs
our help
by Frank
Peterman
The "Buffalo
Soldiers"
tamed the
American
West. When
Congress
authorized
the
establishment
of six
all-Black
regiments in
1866, the
newly-emancipated
African
Americans
would go on
to serve
with valor
and
gallantry
across the
Western
Frontier,
building
forts and
roads,
mapping the
wilderness,
protecting
settlers and
keeping the
peace in
some of the
most lawless
towns and
regions.
As a fan of
the National
Park System,
I’ve
encountered
the legacy
of the
Buffalo
Soldiers
among the
2,000-year-old
giant
sequoia
trees that
they
protected
high in the
Sierra
Nevada
Mountains of
California,
in Sequoia
and Yosemite
National
Parks. I’ve
read with
pride the
plaques and
exhibits
extolling
their
contributions
at the
Presidio of
San
Francisco in
Golden Gate
National
Recreation
Area in
California,
and I was
stunned when
I visited
Skagway/Klondike
Gold Rush
National
Historical
Park in
Skagway
Alaska to
learn that
the Buffalo
Soldiers
kept the
peace in the
super-charged
atmosphere
of this
frontier
town in the
"Gold Rush"
of 1897.
But nowhere
did I
experience
the Buffalo
Soldiers
more
poignantly
than in the
standing
relics at
Fort Davis
National
Historic
Site in
Texas. Here,
I was
literally
able to
touch the
walls of the
fort that
the Buffalo
Soldiers
built; see
their
drawings,
the remnants
of their
church and
hospital. In
their
bunkhouse, I
felt as if
they had
just gone
out on
patrol and
would return
any minute,
so precise
was the
order of
their beds,
uniforms and
weapons.
(www.nps.gov/foda)
The story of
their
involvement
in the conquest of the West is liberally told in a movie at the visitor
center, in
plentiful
brochures
and standing
exhibits.
Even more
intriguing,
I was able
to turn my
eyes upon
the very
same view
that the
Buffalo
Soldiers had
looked at
almost 150
years ago.
Behind
Officers
Row, one of
the most
prominent
features of
the park, I
could see
towering
black
granite
rocks shaped
like people
frozen in
motion
looming over
the fort on
one side. On
the other
side was a
sun drenched
bluff. I
wondered how
many times
the Buffalo
Soldiers may
have looked
at this
view, and
what their
thoughts
may have
been, so far
away from
home and
family in an
area where
even some of
their fellow
soldiers
discriminated
against them
because of
the color of
their skin.
So when the
Superintendent
told us that
the bluff is
for sale and
in danger of
being
developed, I
resolved to
do
everything
in my power
to help save
it. The
Conservation
Fund, a
national
non-profit
which
acquires
land for
preservation,
is handling
the
transaction,
and is
urgently
seeking to
raise funds
to buy that
bluff so
that it can
be added to
Fort Davis
Historic
Site. The
$600,000
required is
a small
price to pay
to save the
legacy of
the Buffalo
Soldiers
intact,
especially
if each of
us
contributes
something
and spreads
the word.
Andy Jones
at the
Conservation
Fund,
Tcftexas@aol.com
is handling
the details.
The deadline
is January
31, 2009.
From
Vicksburg to
the White
House
By Park
Historian
Terrence
Winschel
The
Emancipation
Proclamation,
issued by
President
Abraham
Lincoln on
January 1,
1863, paved
the way for
enlisting
black troops
into service
during the
Civil War.
More than
200,000
blacks
subsequently
joined the
Union army
or served in
the United
States Navy.
Their
story is now
a focus of
interpretation
at Vicksburg
National
Military
Park where a
new
permanent
exhibit was
recently
installed in
the park’s
Visitor
Center
commemorating
the heroic
actions of
black
soldiers in
what is
regarded as
the most
decisive
campaign of
the Civil
War.
During the
Vicksburg
campaign,
black
soldiers
from
Mississippi,
Louisiana,
and Arkansas
served in
defense of
Union supply
enclaves in
northeast
Louisiana.
On June 7,
1863,
Confederate
forces
attacked at
several
locations.
The most
severe fight
was at
Milliken’s
Bend where
troops of
the United
States
Army’s
African
Brigade,
aided by the
gunboats
Choctaw
and
Lexington,
repulsed a
determined
attack and
suffered
heavy
casualties.
Their
actions
answered a
question of
the time,
“Will the
Negro
fight?” It
also
affirmed the
belief of
Frederick
Douglass who
wrote, “Once
let the
black man
get upon his
person the
brass
letters
U.S.; let
him get an
eagle on his
button, and
a musket on
his shoulder
and bullets
in his
pocket, and
there is no
power on the
earth or
under the
earth which
can deny
that he has
earned the
right of
citizenship
in the
United
States.”
In addition
to
significant
combat
activities,
African-Americans,
citizens and
soldiers
alike,
played a
vital role
in the
military
operations
that focused
on
Vicksburg.
From
construction
of the
extensive
fortifications
that helped
Southern
soldiers to
defend the
city and
excavation
of canals
that sought
to enable
Union forces
to bypass
the
formidable
Confederate
batteries
overlooking
the
Mississippi
River at
Vicksburg,
to providing
intelligence
and support
services for
the armies
of the North
and South
throughout
the arduous
campaign, to
caring for
the wounded
and burying
the dead,
African-Americans
experienced
the triumph
and defeat
of war in
all its
horror and
glory.
Thousands of
black
soldiers and
sailors in
Union blue
suffered and
died in
military
operations
along the
Mississippi
River during
the Civil
War and in
occupation
of Vicksburg
during the
era of
Reconstruction
that
followed the
conflict.
Many of
these men
now rest in
the solemn
grandeur of
Vicksburg
National
Cemetery,
which is
also
administered
as part of
the park.
To recognize
their
services and
sacrifice,
the National
Park Service
has placed a
tablet
honoring the
African
Brigade at
the park’s
Grant’s
Canal Unit
along with
several
interpretive
wayside
exhibit
panels that
detail the
involvement
of
African-Americans
in canal
operations
and the
fight of the
Freedmen at
Milliken’s
Bend. On
February 14,
2004, the
State of
Mississippi
dedicated a
monument
“Commemorating
the service
of the 1st
and 3d
Mississippi
Infantry
Regiments,
African
Descent, and
Mississippians
of African
descent who
participated
in the
Vicksburg
campaign.”
This is the
first
large-scale
monument
honoring
black
soldiers to
be placed on
any Civil
War
battlefield
administered
by the
National
Park
Service.
Though long
overshadowed,
the heroic
service of
African-Americans
during the
Civil War is
justly
becoming a
source of
pride for
all citizens
of this
great
Republic.
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