Confederate flag draws protests from Allouez, WIS residents

Duluth Superior ^ | Feb. 27, 2005 | APWire

[stainlessbanner]

ALLOUEZ, Wis. - Norm Watermolen has no plans to take down the Confederate flag he flies outside his shopping center, despite angry phone calls, letters and two thefts of flags.

The American history enthusiast said the replica flag, which flies alongside 17 historically significant flags, is an important part of the country's history, regardless of its association with the Ku Klux Klan and the effort to deny civil rights to blacks.

"I just don't see what all the trouble is," said Watermolen, 78. "Just because somebody decided years ago that it represented the Ku Klux Klan, and to some people in the South and here, it still does. But it's a significant part of our history, one that should be remembered."

Rita Drewieske, of Allouez, disagrees.

"I just find it so offensive," said Drewieske, whose daughter is black. "The flag keeps being taken, so I must not be the only one offended by it."

Watermolen created a flag plaza to display his collection of 18 historically significant flags at his Heritage Village Shoppes, an historically themed retail center. Twenty others at the center represent nations whose people immigrated to Brown County in the early 20th century.

After the second theft, he had the flag reinstalled with a hydraulic lift and padlocked, so it can't be taken unless someone shimmies up the pole and snatches it.

Ken Calewarts, who talked to Watermolen and wrote him a letter, said he had to complain about the flag to show his three children to speak up about things that are important to them.

Watermolen "legally has the right to fly the flag on his own property, and I agree with that. I don't think he's promoting (racism), but I think he's misguided. If he wants to make a statement of American history, I would respect him more if he flew it in front of his own home rather than in my neighborhood," said Calewarts, who is the Allouez village attorney, but spoke as a private citizen.

David Voelker, associate professor of humanistic studies and history at the University of Wisconsin-Green Bay, said when it was created, the Confederate flag was a symbol for a new nation the Southern states created when they seceded from the United States.

"They were certainly seceding in order to protect what they saw as states' rights, so there's no question there was that political principle at stake," Voelker said. "People have used the Confederate flag as a symbol of both slavery and racism. But historically people have used it as a symbol of states' rights - a symbol of pride in the independence of particular states. A freedom from oppression by a strong central government."

But Voelker said their number one concern was still slavery.

"They wanted to protect the institution of slavery, and they felt that the election of (President) Lincoln was a potential threat to the future of slavery," he said.

Peter Kellogg, chairman of the local chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union, said the version of the Confederate flag typically flown now was not widely used until the 1950s and 1960s, when opposition to school desegregation peaked.

"Therefore its modern use is definitely a symbol of a fight against equal rights for black people. So it is fair to say it is a symbol of racism," Kellogg said.

But Audrey Thiry, who plans to move her salon and a gift shop into Heritage Village at the end of April, said she and her customers aren't concerned about the flag flap.

"Norm (Watermolen) is absolutely not a racist. He is a historian; he is fond of our history," she said. "My clients are thrilled that we are moving into 'the nice mall, the one with the flags.'"

[TexConfederate1861]

And one more thing...if you're a native son of Virginia, I'm the Pope.......

[PAR35]

Flying, say, Bismark's flag, the rising sun battle flag,

Offended yet?  Try this:




"the ensign is the same as today, white with a red disc slightly to the hoist with rays (16 to be precise) extending from the disc to the edges of the flag. ... The naval flag was introduced in 1889 and that has 16 rays extending from the Sun "Mon" to the edge of the flag. The flag was "banned" by the Treaty of San Francisco which prevent Japan from having her own armed forces, but in 1952 she started to build up "self-defence" forces. The naval forces readopted the naval ensign in 1954.
http://flagspot.net/flags/jp%5E.html

[Ladysmith]

Only in the universities. The rest of us are pretty sane folks.

[nyg4168]

There is a God...

...and he let the North win.

[TexConfederate1861]

Oh...I wouldn't go that far.....:)
I realize you Yanks THINK you are superior, but if the South had the same resources in men and material, you guys would have been BURIED in your blue suits to the last man.

[festus]

Daisy scarred me thats fer sure....... ;-)

[libertyman]

Thank you for the correction. :-)

[jjmcgo]

You're like the guy in the commercial teasing the monkey with the banana and the monkey grabs the beer he put down. You're just flaming these guys and they're getting in their licks.
I think it's cool you worked at Stonewall Jackson's shrine and I'm sure you must have come away with many positive impressions of Jackson, the Confederacy and the people who believed in the cause, and their ancestors.
I love driving Rtes. 3 and 20 between Petersburg and Orange and seeing all the plaques dedicated to Jackson.
Too many people infuse racism into the discussion of the Confederate flag. Slavery didn't push to Lincoln to war, by his own words, and it didn't fuel the working-class Southerners, who didn't benefit from slavery but fought for the Confederacy.
I think people who are "offended" by the Confederate flag probably greatly overlap with those who are offended that they can't ban smoking from every place in America, even those places they don't own, or in most cases, frequent.
I despise them both.
The battle for black progress isn't being won over this issue, it's being won in black homes and school districts by dedicated families facing enormous obstacles, white racism being pretty far down that list.

[WoofDog123]

Thanks for your polite reply; with regard to this article, I am not sure why the mall owner isn't flying the bonnie blue flag. The battle flag, while much better recognized, really doesn't fit in with the them of national flags involved in impacting Wisconsin's history.

[Modernman]

Maybe you'll go down there and get your emancipated *ss kicked by some ticked off Southerner too.....Wouldn't THAT be funny :)

Virginia is part of the civilized South. People here can disagree without resorting to violence. Texans ought to try that sometime.

[mac_truck]

I stand corrected

Yer getting pretty good at saying that. I'll bet you've had a lot of practice..

[stand watie]

YEP!

the 2d National (the so-called Jackson Flag) was twice as long as it was wide & (without the "blood stripe") looked like a "surrender flag", when it was not windy.

so in FEB '65, William Porcher Miles had the CSA Congress add the BLOOD STRIPE.

free dixie,sw

[mainepatsfan]

The 2nd flag still didn't cause the confusion on the battlefield the first Confederate flag did.

[TexConfederate1861]

I happen to know some Virginians that would not agree with you. Especially in the Richmond area. You must be from the part of Virginia bordering Washington....Very few Southerners there....mostly transplanted Yankees.....I'd still be willing to bet YOU are not a native either....

[TexConfederate1861]

Unlike some of you Yankee Types, we are raised to admit when a mistake was made. And fighting Yankees wasn't one of them!

[TexConfederate1861]

Why would anyone want to fly the Bonnie Blue Flag?
It was NEVER an official flag at anytime. Theguy should fly the 2nd National Flag, and that would be historically correct.

[Modernman]

I happen to know some Virginians that would not agree with you. Especially in the Richmond area. You must be from the part of Virginia bordering Washington....Very few Southerners there....mostly transplanted Yankees

Yup. I'm from the part of the Commonwealth that keeps the rest of it from being the economic equivalent of Mississippi.

I'd still be willing to bet YOU are not a native either....

Got that right. I'm proud to call myself a carpetbagger.

[TexConfederate1861]

Now why am I not suprised.

Well you are entitled to your opinion, warped though it may be. Your words are rather insulting. Especially to the memory of the 60,000 or so Texans who bled defending the soil of Virginia. If you are so innocent as to think there are not many Virginians who would disagree with you, then by all means, keep your fantasy. As to your earlier remarks about "violent" Texans, well, keep in mind that Yankees NEVER conquered us. Texans did and don't take kindly to invaders.

[Modernman]

Your words are rather insulting.

As are the words of you and your ilk who defend traitors and rebels and insult anyone from up North as a "damnyankee."

Especially to the memory of the 60,000 or so Texans who bled defending the soil of Virginia.

Good riddance to traitors, I say.

As to your earlier remarks about "violent" Texans, well, keep in mind that Yankees NEVER conquered us.

The Union didn't need to bother invading Texas, but if it did, the same thing would have happened to Texas that happened to the rest of the rebel States: defeat and humiliation.

[TexConfederate1861]

Sir: You are a sorry piece of manure as far as I am concerned. You are not even fit to tread the sacred soil of Virginia with your filthy feet. Kindly take your remark about traitors and shove it up your *ss where it belongs.
One other remark for you: You know very little about History. Yankees tried several times to invade Texas and each time they did, they got soundly defeated. Try reading a REAL history book. I don't intend to waste my time any further with you, because you don't have the intelligence to even debate me. I hope you DO visit Texas. I will enjoy watching someone open a good old-fashioned can of whoop-*ss on you the minute you open your ignorant mouth. Yes....you are everything I EVER expected in a Yankee.