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Gettysburg regains its Civil War-era battle vista as observation tower falls
Tuesday, July 04, 2000 By John M.R. Bull, Post-Gazette Harrisburg Correspondent
GETTYSBURG -- Joy Boden camped out 11 hours to have the best view of the 30-story observation tower overlooking the battlefield being blown to pieces.
She invited friends. She planned her tower explosion party two months ago. She hated the ugly thing that much.
"I've had to look at it for 26 years. I wanted to see every inch of it blown up," said Boden, of Gettysburg, who is a battlefield tour guide.
Yesterday, she got her wish.
U.S. Interior Secretary Bruce Babbitt gave the order to fire.
Two Civil War-era cannons aimed at the structure were set off in a symbolic gesture.
A demolition expert immediately pushed the button that did the actual job by setting off 10 pounds of RDX explosive placed at the base of the tower.
With a flash and a loud boom, the 200 million-pound tower slowly crumbled in on itself. It seemed to fall in slow motion for the six seconds it took to crash to earth. It landed with a dull roar and a cloud of smoke.
Thousands of spectators cheered wildly.
Even for a town steeped in the tradition of guns, explosions and destruction, the demolition was a big event.
"Honestly, what brings me here is the whole testosterone thing," said Tony Rentsel of Gettysburg minutes before the big bang. "If you're going to blow something really big up, I want to be here."
Removing the tower, constructed 26 years ago on private property next to the battlefield, was the first step in returning the battlefield to the condition it was in during the Civil War.
"It is our obligation to honor this sacred landscape by preserving it and to replenish it to the way it looked in those three days," when the decisive battle of the war waged in Gettysburg, Babbitt said.
"This is sacred ground. Americans come here every year to learn of this past."
John Latschar, superintendent of the Gettysburg National Military Park, called the tower the "the ugliest commercial structure to ever intrude on the sanctity of a national park."
The state had fought construction of the tower in 1974 but couldn't stop it.
The federal government tried for seven years to gain possession of the property on which the tower was built. Last month, it was legally acquired through court condemnation proceedings.
When a Baltimore-area demolition company, Controlled Demolition Inc., offered to blow it up virtually for free on July 3, the anniversary of the battle, the park service jumped at the chance.
How much the federal government must pay the property owner for possession of the land remains to be worked out in court.
The structure loomed over the battlefield for decades, a towering landmark seen for miles that provided visitors who ascended to the top a bird's-eye view of the battlefield.
It had been in place so long that some people didn't want it torn down and considered it a kind of classroom in the sky.
"I always thought of it as an icon, not an eyesore," said Raymond Kline of Gettysburg, who had a video camera at the top of the tower that took around-the-clock panoramic shots of the battlefield that he posted on the Internet. "I'm mostly irritated by the loss of an educational tool."
Others, including many local residents and Civil War purists, considered the tower a monstrosity.
"Demolition is usually an ugly word, but not today," said Richard Moe, president of the National Trust for Historic Preservation.
David Holtzclaw of Sterling, Va., drove his family 11/2 hours to watch the tower topple and made a family picnic out of the excursion, complete with folding chairs, blankets, snacks and umbrellas for the rain. He waited in place almost five hours to watch the tower fall.
"I'm a big Civil War buff," he said. "I find it a major eyesore. It just sticks up like a sore thumb. It takes away from the sense of authenticity. The view up there is spectacular, I must admit; still, it detracts."
Blowing up an ugly tourist attraction next to a park dedicated to the men who died in the bloodiest battle of the Civil War was "a tribute," said Paul Rivenburgh of Albany, N.Y.
Boden had the best view of anyone. She and her friends were several hundred yards away as the tower blew up and crumbled.
"It was incredible," she said with a laugh.
"I'm very happy. Look at how clear the sky is now. It's gone."
Her only regret was that she couldn't push the button that would have blown it to pieces.
Brian McDonald, an intern with the Pennsylvania Legislative Correspondents Association, contributed to this report.
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