Obligation exists to save Iowa’s heritage

Iowa is a great place with a rich history. However, sometimes this heritage is not respected.

The Fort Madison City Council has voted to allow Dollar General to build a store on the location of the original Fort Madison. This site, dating to 1808, now lies intact beneath an asphalt parking lot.

The original Fort Madison was the oldest fort on the Upper Mississippi. There a battle of the War of 1812 took place, the only battle of that conflict west of the Mississippi.

Old Fort Madison is also the oldest military cemetery in Iowa. The site, including the foundations of the structures that stood there, is well-preserved beneath the asphalt, as demonstrated by archaeologist Dr. Marshall McKusick, who performed test excavations in 1965.

Advocates of the Dollar General project say that the plan is to build the store on the least important half of the site. However, when you have something precious, you don't decide it's acceptable to destroy only half of it. There is only one Fort Madison of the War of 1812 and when it is degraded and desecrated that part of it is lost forever.

Lee McNair

Boone