By Paul Waldschmidt
On Friday, project organizers briefed a group of community leaders, potential contributors, and supporters who want to build “The American,” a projected $38 million monument celebrating the state’s Indian heritage and culture.
At one time the proposed site was Holmes Park, seven miles northwest of downtown Tulsa.
That site has been abandoned, but “we’ve looked at and are considering several sites,” said Tulsa County Commissioner Karen Keith, who moderated the meeting.
“It is ready to go if we can get the fundraising together to build it,” she said. “It will be a game changer for this area.”
They've been talking about building this statue for years still nothing, I for one would like to see it built. Quit talking...pick a site and build it.
So the organizers lost their original site. It sounds as if they haven't started raising funds yet. Are they hoping some city will endorse them and bail them out with public funds?
The survey results they cite also seem questionable. For instance:
Longtime readers may remember my thoughts on The American. They haven't changed. A giant statue of a near-naked Indian holding a stereotypical eagle isn't the way to go.
Also, I'm kind of down on the whole idea of colossal monuments--unless perhaps they're embedded in the landscape like the Crazy Horse Memorial. How is a giant statue--or a giant casino tower, for that matter--consistent with traditional Native values? Answer: It isn't. Things like this are more akin to visual pollution than a visual treat.
For more on the subject, see Best Indian Monuments to Topple.
3 comments:
I hate these poorly written stories that lack a byline or something in the headline to tell where it is. I guess the concept of a dateline has escaped these "journalists".
I see many such sites, the ol "Gump Hollow Gazzette" dot com or whatever, and some lengthy article about a crime in the Hillcrest neighborhood... and you have to click on sponsor GIFs to get some of idea of where the place even is. Or decyper area codes in a real estate ad banner.
In this one, the lazy staff writer buried a clue to the location: Tulsa County, in the third paragraph.
Note to: White Guano Dude: I am criticizing the makers of the Mystery Spot web site, not Rob.
On to the content: Wouldn't the community be better served if they had these community leaders and contributers commit $38 to help with human needs instead?
Good point about the article's lack of a specified location. I scour the Internet whenever I work for PECHANGA.net and that's one of my pet peeves. Some websites have absolutely no geographic information on their home pages. You have to hunt through the site to find out where they are.
To be clear, the statue's proposed location is in the Tulsa area of northeastern Oklahoma.
Also a good point about our spending priorities. I had a similar discussion about the statue's value on Facebook. For more on the subject, see Is The American Worth It?
I know it was totally off topic. Just something that has bugged me about online news sites for years, and it was the first time I'd seen fit to mention it (grin).
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