Memorial Allowed After Debate Over Expression

By Jonathan Mummolo
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, June 19, 2008

What expression would an 18th-century woman have donned as her husband left for war? It depends on which government official you ask.

After nearly a decade of lobbying by a group to erect a memorial in Leesburg honoring local Revolutionary War participants, recent debate over whether to approve the monument's proposed design has centered largely on that historical, and somewhat existential, question.

The Patriot Project was proposed by the Loudoun Revolutionary War Memorial Committee, a nonprofit group that began organizing in 1999 after participants in a Memorial Day ceremony that year had no place to hang a wreath commemorating the War for Independence.

"We had to place it on [another] memorial," said group President Larry Moison, 79, a member of the Sons of the American Revolution who can trace his lineage to a Massachusetts Minuteman. "It occurred to us following that, that, 'Gee wiz, there should be a memorial.' "

Since then, the group has embarked on a long journey toward government approval, making its first proposal to the Loudoun County Board of Supervisors in 2000. On Monday, the board passed a motion allowing the organization to provide the memorial and approved a statue design and location on the grounds of the county courthouse in Leesburg.

The decision came after a lengthy debate about the proposed design that made for an unusual back-and-forth for a body that typically deliberates over such issues as whether to fund School Board budget requests or rezone land.

The privately funded bronze statue's design, chosen by the public last year over four other proposals, features a rebel soldier with his wife and child. In an artist's rendering, the man gazes toward the horizon with a determined stare. The boy's head is upturned, as he looks with pride at his father.

The wife?

"She's looking pretty beat; she's looking like she's sad," Supervisor Kelly Burk (D-Leesburg) said at Monday's meeting. "If we could get the representation of her to be more looking forward and knowing the future is there, and the future is for her, and her husband, and her children -- would that be possible?"

Moison said it probably was. But his years-long battle would not end there.

Supervisor Eugene Delgaudio (R-Sterling) asked whether the soldier had ammunition for his weapon. Supervisor Stevens Miller (D-Dulles) asked who would pay for the statue's upkeep.

When the floor opened up for public comments, it became clear where the real battle lines were drawn.

"The wife is telling her husband goodbye, and at this moment, she would be downcast, and she does realize that it's going to be in her hands to keep things going," a defiant Judith Lindsay, who serves on the group's executive committee, said to a round of applause.

A hit! Burk later fired back, formalizing her request to have the artist take a second look by adding an amendment to the motion for approval.

With the exception of the support from Supervisor Andrea McGimsey (D-Potomac), the amendment met with a barrage that could have beaten back the British.

"To me, there's a symbolism there of a woman who is saddened by the fact that her husband is going off to war and there's a very distinct possibility that he will not come home," Supervisor James Burton (I-Blue Ridge) said. "I don't see it as demeaning to the woman at all."

"The government really shouldn't be getting into the business of telling artists how to do their job," Miller said.

The chairman delivered the final blow.

"When I look at that picture, I see my mother when my father went off to the Vietnam War -- a very strong woman but a woman who was very concerned . . . wondering if her husband will come home," Chairman Scott York (I-At Large) said. "I don't think it would have been much different back there in the Revolutionary period."

Seeing the conditions on the ground clearly now, Burk made a tactical retreat.

"By listening to the comments and hearing the different points of view, at this point I am going to pull the amendment. But I do want to make the point that I think it's very significant that the women who spoke tonight -- and the woman in the statue and all of your mothers that you talked about -- all of them made a sacrifice, and they all were very strong women," Burk said.

The proposal then received unanimous approval, with one member absent, and it is now up to the memorial committee, which has raised a little more than $50,000 so far, Moison said, to come up with the rest of the money and erect the statue by 2011, when the approval will expire.

Moison said that he is confident his group will get the needed funds, especially now that the project has been approved, and that he hopes to dedicate the memorial in July 2010. But the bid submitted by the artist last year was $250,000, he said, and the cost of copper, a component of bronze, has risen sharply since then.

Now that's enough to make anyone frown.