On October 24, 2022 the Fayetteville City Council approved funding of $6.6 million for a new museum already under construction in the city that will tell the story of North Carolinians during the Civil War and Reconstruction. The funding, which has been the subject of several passionate town hall-type meetings, was approved unanimously by the nine-member council. The State of North Carolina has already pledged $59.6 million and Cumberland County approved $7.5 million. It will be located near the site of the old Arsenal in Downtown Fayetteville. Another $8 million will be raised from private donors. According to the new museum’s spokesperson, about $14 million more has already been raised.
According to a report in the Fayetteville Observer, the funding resolution says that the museum will tell the “true story” of the war, free from the Lost Cause Narrative that predominated in the state for more than a century after the war. Councilman Mario Benavente, a 32 year old first-termer who proposed the motion giving the funding, said that when he was in school in North Carolina, he was taught that the Civil War was the “War of Northern Aggression” and did not learn the true history of the war until he went to college.
The new city funding should allow construction on the main building at the center to begin. County funding had been made contingent of the city giving financial support.
Note: Feature Photo shows 2021 groundbreaking ceremony at the new Center in North Carolina.
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