Monday, July 11, 2011

Paint the field red

Looking for a fight? How about some flowers and grasses? Visit a battlefield. This one is in Centralia, Mo.


Here, on Sept. 27, 1864, Bloody Bill Anderson wiped out over 120 Union soldiers. Earlier that day, his men wiped out 23 others in a massacre by the train depot. It was a bloodbath. Now the place is mostly quiet, save for occasional reenactments. A small acreage worth visiting if you want solitude and some sense of the sacred.


If the birds and bugs don't make enough noise, try meditating to the 1861 Project, a collaboration of Nashville songwriters and other musicians to commemorate the Civil War. The website also encourages discussion of the war's meaning for contemporary citizens. It's a cool interactive project and if you like sentimental, mellow songs that tell stories then, well, here you go.

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