Opposition to moving 89 year old WWI statue in New Castle, Indiana

Opposition to Moving 89 Year Old ‘Spirit of the American Doughboy’ Statue Henry County Memorial Park in New Castle, Indiana by Mark Sean Orr

In northeast section of Memorial Park just north of New Castle, stands  the WWI statue “Spirit of the American Doughboy”, on a large earthen  mound covered with shrubs and foliage looking down on Park Road 3 about  50 feet to the east.

The statue was paid for and dedicated by the American War Mothers (Est,  1917) in a carefully chosen area of the park to be visible (50 ft. from)  State Road #3. The mound was meticulously built by many citizens and  businesses in Henry County. It’s beautiful and in the local Courier

Times newspaper from 1929 it was written that they hoped it would be  there for years to come.

The dedication of the doughboy was attended by hundreds of citizens with General William “Soul Saver Solider” Everson giving the dedication speech and Captain and Civil War veteran R.H.H. Tyner doing the unveiling. The New Castle Cadet Band played and there was a picnic on the ground prior to the event.

The artist Ernest Moore Viquesney imagined his statues in a “no-man’s land” type setting and out of the 11 doughboy statues left in Indiana, ours is the only one in that type of “Argonne Forest” setting.

The park board voted to relocate the statue (after restoration) before the public was aware of the situation. The public opposition is overwhelming, but the board would not even take a second vote despite hearing compelling arguments from the director of the Historical Society, Tim Rainselo (765-529-4028) who suggested the park do some landscaping and make the statue accessible where it was dedicated.

Excuses to relocate the doughboy have all been countered effectively and included; too man mosquitoes”, “kids don’t want to walk trails anymore”, “kids want to see everything on their phones”, “no one knew the statue was there before”, accessibility and ADA compliance.

All of these arguments can be countered and some are just ridiculous. There is a road size trail that leads right to the doughboy. It could be made ADA compliant and the regular trails in the park are already

scheduled to be fixed. My son has driven to the statue and the park drove a truck to it when they removed the statue for restoration.The American War Mothers do not want the statue moved, and nether do over 90% of respondents to three  online polls.  A petition online has over 400 signatures with many of them being veterans.

Memorial Park was created as a living park and not a museum. These memorials are supposed to be in select locations in the woods and surrounding park areas. Taking the doughboy or any other monument in the park and moving it to a concrete setting would be detrimental to our great park.

Founding Father of the park Salem Shively stated “”Let us not spend money on the erection of (only) stone monuments to the memory of our soldiers, which would neither quench the thirst nor rest their bodies from the toil of the day, but let us dedicate and set apart this piece of ground to their memory.”

And finally a perfect quote by filmmaker Ken Burns captures the sentiment perfectly ““We strain to listen to the ghosts and echoes of our inexpressibly wise past, and we have an obligation to maintain these places, to provide these sanctuaries, so that people may be in the presence of forces larger than those of the moment.” — Ken Burns