Battling for Manassas: The Fifty-Year Preservation Struggle at Manassas National Battlefield Park

Zenzen, Joan

Headlines reading "Storm over Manassas," "Battling over Manassas," "Where Men Fought and Fell," and "Hallowed Ground" could have been published in the aftermath of the two Civil War battles fought in 1861 and 1862 along Bull Run near the rail center at Manassas Junction. These titles recall the great losses suffered by both Federals and Confederates as they confronted each other in the first major land engagement of the war and, later, in the contest that paved the way for Confederate General Robert E. Lee's first invasion of the North. Victory for either side would be hard won and the lessons long remembered. [1]But these headlines actually refer to a more contemporary battle over Manassas. In January 1988, the Hazel/Peterson Companies aroused nationwide concern for the integrity of the Manassas National Battlefield Park when it announced its intention to add a 1.2-million-square-foot regional shopping mall to an originally proposed office and residential park. This commercial complex would have stood on the historic land where General Lee had established his headquarters during the Second Battle of Manassas. Mall opponents ultimately won this battle in the fall of 1988 when the U.S. Congress employed a rarely used procedure called a "legislative taking" to acquire the contested land, but the fight had been difficult and the cost high, as much as $134 million to buy the 550 acres of land from the Virginia development firm, its president John T. ("Til") Hazel, and the other parties who had begun developing the land. [2]The controversy over William Center, Hazel/Peterson's name for the disputed tract of land, was quickly followed in 1993 by another national debate centered around the Walt Disney Company and its proposed historic theme park. Disney's America, with its accompanying hotels, campgrounds, residential subdivisions, and commercial complexes, would have been located just 3.5 miles from the Manassas National Battlefield Park. Supporters in state and county government welcomed the expected tax benefits and new jobs that Disney promised. Opponents, who included residents in surrounding counties and a national coalition of historians and preservationists, believed that Disney's theme park would unleash urban sprawl that would choke the battlefield park and leave the remaining open spaces clogged with traffic. National Park Service officials saw a double-edged sword with Disney: a willing negotiator interested in aiding the federal government in its quest to reduce congestion in the battlefield park and a magnetic company that would draw new development and new problems to the surrounding landscape. Disney retreated in the face of sustained protests that threatened the company's cherished public image. The national park waits for the next development proposal.

Battling for Manassas: The Fifty-Year Preservation Struggle at Manassas National Battlefield Park

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