Peter S. Carmichael, Director of Civil War Institute at Gettysburg College is effectively defending local Gettysburg industry.

What is the local Gettysburg industry? It is the selling of stuff like this.

Click on photos to see the entire photo.

Peter S. Carmichael, Director of the Civil War Institute at Gettysburg College has this article.

http://www.salon.com/2017/08/27/civil-war-historian-peter-carmichael-keep-the-statues-focus-on-racial-injustice/

The article shows how clueless Carmichael is and how he is denying the rather clear record on Confederate monuments and their purpose. I am sure the Gettysburg Chamber of Commerce is grateful that he is making this effort. I am sure that Carmichael is not consciously defending these items. I think the Civil War Institute needs to think if they will be relevant by 2030.

When I visited Gettysburg April 2017, the story I was repeatedly told is that a very large fraction of the visitors are from the South and that in 2015 they did a tremendous business in Confederate flag memorabilia. People actually believed the Confederate flag would be banned. However, now the sale of Confederate junk is way down. You have to wonder what type of people would think they urgently needed to buy Confederate flags after the massacre in Charleston, but that is what evidently puts food on many tables in Gettysburg.

Also, that Confederate reenacting is down. The Civil War Sesquicentennial seemed to be the last hurrah.

The city of Gettysburg is already switching to ghosts tours and that seems to be the coming industry. However, it seems to me you could do ghost tours anywhere there were old buildings and gullible people which is most anywhere. Dallas only has one of the two components. Having a ghost in Dallas would be seen as anti-real estate development which is Dallas's highest moral value.

Peter S. Carmichael represents the Civil War historians whose efforts will make the Civil War of little interest to future generations.

Gettysburg College should consider, along with the city of Gettysburg that they owe John Sims an apology.

Sure glad that the "Confederate and Neo-Confederate Reader" didn't win the Museum of the Confederacy Jefferson Davis medal

I am working with activists here and there working to get rid of Confederate monuments.

I have been handing out free some of my books including the "Reader."

With Jefferson Davis statues being taken down I am certainly glad that I don't have a Jefferson Davis medal printed on the 2nd edition, or some nonsense about it getting a Jefferson Davis award. Or something like this on the web page for the book or in book advertisements. I had to work on making sure this didn't happen. I had to put up with a lot of stuff and nonsense trying to persuade me to submit the book for the award.

This is the first part of the series I wrote on the Museum of the Confederacy which discusses why I wrote it so my book would not get the award.

http://www.blackcommentator.com/441/441_museum_confederacy_sebesta_guest_share.html

I am glad that I don't have to try to explain this away, with explanations that wouldn't be believed.

Of course this made me rather unpopular in the Civil War History profession. Many denunciations on Kevin Levin's blog.

http://cwmemory.com/2012/03/04/has-edward-sebesta-ever-visited-the-museum-of-the-confederacy/

http://cwmemory.com/2011/12/06/a-response-to-edward-sebesta/

http://cwmemory.com/2011/09/15/calling-out-edward-sebesta-and-calling-on-james-loewen/

http://cwmemory.com/2011/09/14/a-quick-response-to-edward-sebesta/

http://cwmemory.com/2010/12/09/the-edward-sebesta-circus-continues/

The "circus continues" is reference to an earlier activity in which I got a group of scholars to co-sign a letter to Obama asking him not to send a wreath to the Arlington Confederate memorial. That Levin is implying is a circus also, thus it is continuing.

Brook D. Simpson was critical of this as well.

https://cwcrossroads.wordpress.com/2011/09/17/ed-sebestas-dilemma/

https://cwcrossroads.wordpress.com/2010/12/09/edward-sebestas-publicity-stunt/

Simpson was on the masthead of Civil War History.

Neither of them would read even the first installment of the history.

Outside the Civil War history profession scholars thought my position was both sensible and obvious. One even wondered whether Loewen had gone "Genovese."

However, now in retrospect these denunciations just document how increasingly out of touch the Civil War history profession was and how they live in a Civil War Round Table reality, a world which is fading away.

What might be considered is how these Confederate monuments served to normalize the Civil War Round Table world and a historical profession that pandered to them and now as the monuments leave how abnormal the Civil War Round Table world will be perceived.

Of course there will always be a place for the Civil War Round Table where they can ruminate on brass alloys used in Civil War uniform buttons or perhaps the topic of mosquitoes and other biting insects at Gettysburg battlefield and resolutely ignore the issues of neo-Confederacy and race. This would likely be at the Civil War Institute at Gettysburg College.

Interest in the Civil War is dying because of a Civil War history profession and Civil War Round Tables which have a focus which isn't of interest to the modern world.

#BlackLivesMatter in history and historians who don't get this.

#BlackLivesMatter is a hash tag used in regards to public policy and practice involving policing and the justice system where obviously Black lives don't seem to matter much. The choking death of an African American man in a arrest involving the sale of a few loose cigarettes in New York City is an example where it seems that Black lives were disposable.

In the last few days I began to realize that #BlackLivesMatter could also be a call to change the practice of historians, to study and write history understanding that #BlackLivesMatter.

For example biographers and historians who minimize the racist policies of Woodrow Wilson are those for whom Black lives don't matter.

More specifically among those involved in Civil War history for whom Black lives don't seem to matter it would be those avoid recognizing the racial agenda of some of those involved in Civil War history. It would be those who make excuses for the Museum of the Confederacy and its historical practice. It would be calling neo-Confederate groups "Southern heritage" groups. It would be being involved in commemorations at Confederate monuments. It would be those Civil War historians that seek to minimize slavery as the cause of the Civil War.

It would also apply to some of our public school textbooks.

It would certainly apply to those use minimizing language over conflicts over Confederate symbols, like journalists who use terms like "flag flap." Would they every use the term "history hissyfit" over holocaust denial, absolutely not.

It would apply to churches that host neo-Confederate groups.

It would be for those who don't have necessarily a hostility towards African Americans, but for whom African Americans don't count for anything, for whom they are a nullity.

It would be those for whom African Americans are "them" and not a part of "us."

I think one reason that for some Black lives don't matter is that in the teaching of history all too often Black lives don't matter and people internalize this message.

I call upon all historians to take the stand that #BlackLivesMatter in the writing of history. To not be silent when other historians' practice of history shows that for them Black lives don't matter. The hashtag would be #BlackLivesMatterInHistory.

For related reading www.templeofdemocracy.com/breaking.htm.