Recognizing All Our Vets

Kenosha's new Civil War Museum opened up a few months ago, although after the fire they had during construction the timeline was thrown off and it is still not yet complete. One exhibit that I was especially looking forward to is a room dedicated to the veterans of all wars and it opened recently. Honestly, although the Civil War Museum is interesting a museum about the Civil War in Kenosha involves some effort to appreciate. The museum is not dedicated as much to battles but instead the social impact the war had on the midwest. It is an important aspect of the war, and I'm sure it had a huge impact on the area and many aspects of society, it doesn't have quite the same impact as a museum in the south or at a famous battlefield would have. Social history isn't quite as sexy as battle history.

Anyway, back to the new room that opened, it is dedicated to the veterans of all American wars, and has artifacts from each. I found it to be moving, and the impact is much more easily appreciated. As I was standing there a family came through and looked around and a young man commented to the rest of the family that they 'have to bring Grandpa here to see this'. Although I appreciate the impact the civil war had on the midwest and the country, I think a museum dedicated to all wars would have been much more meaningful to the community, and certainly the civil war would be a part of that. It was proposed to the mayor prior to the building of the museum, although I do appreciate that the room is included in the museum.

I wish the exhibit was larger, it is very powerful, although it does not photograph as well.


The room is actually very dark as you can see in the other photos, this one I used the flash for just to get an overview of the room. The central part of the exhibit consists of soldiers from different eras around the campfire in discussion.

Each wall section has the name of an American War, and then the alcove behind it has artifacts from that conflict inside.





World War I





World War II



Vietnam



"Gulf Wars"



As I mentioned before the Civil War Museum is still under construction, including the main exhibit, which I walked through earlier this year. As part of the opening ceremonies in March and again in June the main exhibit was opened to the public. I blogged about it here in March. I'm a little less enthusiastic about it now than I was then because I haven't seen that it will be much more than what I saw in the early stages then. It looks like they have really been working on it though and it looks very interesting. This is the one area of the museum that will require an admission fee, the rest is open to the public.



I hope the museum will be a success, I just think I would have preferred something with a wider scope. But kudos to the city and to those who planned the museum to include an area that recognizes all our veterans.

Civil War Museum

In June this year the new Civil War Museum in Kenosha is opening. I know, you're thinking 'a Civil War museum in southeastern Wisconsin, what gives?', but I'll get to that in a minute. Today they had the dedication and sort of an open house for the community.

The museum has been fairly controversial (I seem to remember they had a non-binding vote on it and something like 80% voted against it) because of the subject matter, the money, and the location in Kenosha of it. We went to go check it out today. I have been pretty critical of the museum in the past as well largely because of its location (its big, sort of ugly, and right on the beautiful lakefront - which is what I most disliked), and also I was a little concerned about how well used the museum would be considering the subject matter. From what I saw today I am pretty impressed so far.

The focus of the museum is not battles for obvious reasons, but instead about how the Civil War impacted society. One of the speakers said that 11% of Wisconsin's population served in the Civil War - not 11% of men, 11% of the total - that seems like a huge number, and so its not surprising that it had an impact on society. The museum focuses on the contributions of the 6 states of the Upper Midwest: Wisconsin, Illinois, Iowa, Minnesota, Indiana, and Michigan.

I have to keep myself from being unimpressed with the size of Kenosha Museums, but having grown up in Chicago and the amazing museums there I tend to be overly critical of what other cities have to offer. That being said the museum is quite a big larger inside than I thought it was, and so I am looking forward to the opening in June.

One more interesting aspect of today was to walk through a museum that is still in the process of being built. Its sort of intirquing seeing things being built.

Of course I have pictures and video...





























They gave everyone a plastic kazoo bugle, and everyone saluted the opening of the museum.