Pea Ridge National Military Park completes 17-mile Fence Project
Mark Twain once said “History doesn’t repeat itself - at best it sometimes rhymes.”
Therefore, it should be no mystery that we did make history on a very windy and cold day in November of 2008. On this day, and as a part of Unilever’s National Parks America Tour program, volunteers placed the last split rail of a 17-mile long complex of worm rail fencing. For the first time in 146 years, the fencing that long ago stretched over the landscape of farms, fields and forests that served as the site of the March 7 and 8, 1862, Battle of Pea Ridge were put in place once again.
It all started seven years ago when on a cool Saturday morning in October of 2002 Pea Ridge National Military Park participated in its first National Parks America Tour. On that October morning there were enough split rails to build one mile of fencing and over 300 volunteers that had turned out to help. To say that the park staff was a little worried that first year, would be an understatement. We had never tried anything like this before and we had more questions than answers. Were we trying to build too much fence? Would the volunteers stay with it? Is this too many people? Are there enough people? Could it be built right? But, when that first mile of fencing was built by lunch time and everyone involved was having fun we realized that building another 16 miles of fence in this fashion was something that could indeed happen.
And happen it did. The National Parks America Tour came to Pea Ridge for the next seven consecutive years. Each of the following years volunteers at the tour would build another one to two miles of fencing. Additional miles of fencing were built by regional Unilever employees and their families, by Wal-Mart associates and their families and by local youth groups. Before you knew it 89,760 split rails had been placed into 17 miles of fence and a window into the past was re-opened.
But that window would still remain closed and the Pea Ridge Battlefield still fenceless had it not been for Unilever and the National Parks America Tour. With limited funding and staffing the chance of the park building 17 miles of historic fencing was remote. Each split rail cost $4.50 and we would need $403,920 just to purchase rails alone. Even if the rails could have been obtained a small park staff would not allow us to build that much fencing and still be able do anything else.
The National Parks America Tour is sponsored by Unilever and in cooperation with the National Park Foundation, Wal-Mart Stores, Inc., and Take Pride in America.The Tour has donated more than 285,000 volunteer manpower hours to the National Park Service, resulting in an in-kind donation of $4.75 million.The National Parks America Tour volunteer projects range from building accessible boardwalks at Whiskeytown National Recreation Area, and restoring historically accurate battlefields at Pea Ridge National Military Park, to erosion-preventing revegetation projects in Mount Rainier National Park. Unilever is also the longest-standing corporate partner of the National Park Foundation and a Proud Partner of America’s National Parks, and has a 25-year commitment that will exceed more than $100 million in cash and in-kind support for America’s National Parks by 2016.
Pea Ridge National Military Park has been invited to participate in Unilever’s National Parks America Tour program in 2009. We have scheduled the event for October 24, 2009. We may not be building fences this year but we will be doing something to further restore the battlefield to its 1862 condition. Additional information will be provided at a later date. Please plan to come out and help; you will not be sorry you did. Not only will you be able help make a difference in your National Parks but you will also be able to say that you are building “rhymes” about people of our past.