1/11/2005

The Chancellorsville Battlefield appeal

You can read Civil War Preservation Trust's extended appeal for contributions here.

It appears that CWPT has left the door open to the possibility of failure - of letting their deal with Tricord collapse, which would forfeit battlefield land, if their members to not pledge enough money to meet CWPT's obligations.
But if for any reason we cannot fully pay for this land, those developers will pounce, and you can bet the prices on battlefield land will skyrocket even faster than they already are! Even worse, if we fail, we will lose - perhaps forever - key credibility in the eyes of the world. (I can only pray that I am saying this well enough for you to see what is at stake today.)
Sitting on over $16 million in assets, with over $1 million per year streaming in from dues income, I cannot understand why this group does not either liquidate assets or borrow money to secure this deal and this land.

We will look at this appeal tomorrow from the perspective of these and other open questions.