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Editorial
The Blade (Toledo, OH)
09-25-95
Three issues have emerged in regard to the Fallen Timbers battle site, which was pinpointed by archeological field work and lab research over the summer by Prof. Michael Pratt of Heidelberg College.
One is the validity of the site, which now seems established beyond any doubt. In fact, the site of the battle, fought in 1794, may have been established by contemporary accounts and maps, crude as the latter were. That is, unless Gen. Anthony Wayne, his troops, and members of the defeated Indian confederacy, scattered musket balls around to confuse researchers 201 years later. Not likely.
The site is an undeveloped tract within the Maumee city limits at the junction of I-475 and U.S. Route 24, north and east of the present Fallen Timbers memorial. The city of Toledo owns the land, but Maumee Mayor Stephen Pauken is seeking federal funds to complete a National Park Service study and buy 160 or more acres at $13,000 an acre - double the original price paid. Mayor Carty Finkbeiner wants top dollar, noting that he has a potential option on the site at $50,000 an acre.
The second issue is the custody of the battle artifacts. Mayor Finkbeiner demands their return by Sept. 30, though as yet he has no clear plans for them. The city is not in the museum business, and nobody on his staff is a professional archeologist or museum curator.
These are fragile items, which the public should be able to see. However, they should not be pawed over by amateurs, and in this field the city is an amateur. Governments come and go and often are poor custodians of important items. One could cite the now-lost Toledo Tomorrow exhibit which won the city national publicity in the years after World War II. It just disappeared.
The Fallen Timbers artifacts must be carefully preserved. Suppose another expert did want to appraise them? The mayor should postpone his deadline until his staff has arranged for professional handling of the finds. Technically, they belong to the nation because they stem from a battle that, however one views it, was a seminal event in America's westward movement across the continent.
The third and most important issue is what is to be done with the site. The city of Toledo has granted an option for adjacent land to the developer of a proposed regional mall. If this materializes, the city will have parted with its land, not for job-creating enterprises but for a mall whose necessity and value has been sharply questioned.
The two cities are far apart in their current estimates of the value of the land. Mayor Pauken, who is strongly committed to a park, thinks nothing is gained by arguing about price at this point. If the city of Toledo got a developer's price for land, it would mean the blacktopping of a historic site and lead to decades of recrimination. Its logical use is as a battlefield park under local, state, or national auspices.
The concept of a shopping mall at Fallen Timbers should be revisited, also. It would exacerbate unplanned urban sprawl, which hurts the entire metropolitan area. The city should persevere in its efforts to market the acreage it controls to potential job-creating customers. Plans for another mall off I-475, north of the Fallen Timbers site, are proceeding on schedule. Even if the region needed yet another major shopping center, it certainly does not need two.
A place in civic history awaits political leaders who grasp the significance of a long-range asset to the region: a battlefield commemorating the clash of arms that, in effect, ended the Revolutionary War and decided the political fate of the Northwest Territory.
NOTICE: This article, which may be copyrighted, is reprinted with specific permission granted to Heidelberg College. Further reprint rights must be secured from the publisher.
Heidelberg College / Office of College Relations
/ webmaster@heidelberg.edu