Thomas Scheetz: Perspectives on the Bennington Battle Monument, from one who lives in its shadow

This commentary is by Thomas Scheetz. He is a lifelong resident of Monument Circle in Old Bennington, the author of a book on Old Bennington history through structures, and a first-year student at Harvard.

Last month a bombshell report circulated in regional media detailing the Bennington Battle Monument and an impending $40 million investment towards alleviating dire troubles in its superstructure. Dismaying enough was the revelation of such deterioration at the leviathan. Even harder to bear is the reactionary discourse that has followed, including some suggestions that the colossus be entirely removed.

I feel spurred to write in defense of the befallen behemoth, as someone close to it: 235 feet away from my family’s home, the 306-foot Monument’s base is more acquainted with my residence than with the star garnishing its top, and I have quite literally spent my (admittedly, relatively short) life in the Monument’s shadow.

My perspective sees the Monument as a source of wonder. I credit the Monument with placing me on my present path, dual-concentrating in government and architectural history at college. Cookies and lemonade I peddled years ago to the Monument’s visitors help — as each penny does — pay for my education. I keep a scale model of the Monument in my dorm room. I even wrote an admissions essay about the Monument. 

The Monument is defining — for me, and for Bennington. There is no greater town metonym, no more reverent symbol of southwestern Vermont. The Monument allows Bennington its foray into the profitable Vermont iconography and attracts busloads of visitors to the oft-forgotten town — surely this boon comes, over the centuries, to far exceed the startling, but one-time, maintenance cost.

It is true that the Monument was initially a misadventure, its construction frivolous. Conceived amid an irreplicable, centennial-spurred frenzy for national monuments and architectural patriotism, and during a Gilded Age more broadly, the only concern at the Monument’s erection was building, and opulently.

Practicality was hardly considered. In no other narrow segment of American history would such recklessness ever have seen fruition — had the Monument’s construction been delayed even five years, past 1893 and its devastating Panic, completion would have been unlikely. 

Worse yet, in memorializing history, the planners actually destroyed it: where the Monument and the green now are, there was once a thriving historic neighborhood with houses, a book shop, a tavern, a printing press, a general store, a convenient road to the north. A northern extension of lovely Old Bennington, all leveled.

I think people were once certain that the Monument would become a national attraction — it ranked among the nation’s tallest structures at its completion — but, alas, it was remote and soon overshadowed by city skyscrapers, and it may forever languish as only a backcountry curiosity.

But a backcountry curiosity is still a curiosity; a misadventure can transform to a great prize. The Monument stands now as a living, engaging link between our and bygone generations. Experiences in and around the Monument unite centuries of Benningtonians and millions of chronologically disparate Vermont visitors. 

The Monument enthralls guests not just in the fervor of the 18th-century battle, but also in the splendid – if shortsighted – monumental aspirations of the 19th century, and in the accessibility efforts of the 20th century and beyond, like the elevator and the meticulous dioramas. Its story enriched over time, the Monument becomes an enrapturing taleteller; there is hardly a more engrossing lesson than that which one can step into.

Valid critiques swirl that the Monument is merely an outdated celebration of militarist lust, Masonic phallicism or exclusionary history. Indeed the Monument may have been one or all of these things at its inception, but today it means so much more: a rare and interactive bond, an immersive touchpoint to reflect on rich centuries of history and their big, implicative questions. 

These cultural benefits of the Monument, too, diminish the original sin of its creation and surpass the financial burden of its maintenance. And in any case, its historicity displays that we’re in too deep, about 140 years too late to betray the giant. The Monument is here, and has been. Given the complications in changing that — dust, weather, the unusual obelisk form, the surrounding residential area — dismantling the thing would doubtless cost as much as fixing it. Why not bite the repair bullet?

Investment in the Monument should hardly be controversial anyway. It has previously not been, even in modern times. Within this 21st century the state and public subscription raised considerable monies to install huge subterranean lights beneath the Monument, illuminating it for nighttime observers miles around to see. Apparently the public has forgotten this, but my neighborhood has not, bedazzled every night by the brilliant glow.

Now, let us all remember again: the Monument needs and deserves our affection and attention. Letting it go would be like tossing the Statue of Liberty into the harbor. Bennington cannot lose its dear monolith!

Read the story on VTDigger here: Thomas Scheetz: Perspectives on the Bennington Battle Monument, from one who lives in its shadow.