National landmarks embody competing visions of America’s past | The Excerpt

On a special episode (first released on May 30, 2024) of The Excerpt podcast: National landmarks hold a special place in American history in their celebration of the unique American places that tell our story. Whether that story is the incredible natural beauty of the Grand Canyon, or the man-made wonder carved into Mount Rushmore, these are the places that inspire awe and invite reflection. But some historic landmarks reflect competing visions of American history, and in an election year, may be used to stoke a cultural divide. Which view of our American national landmarks resonates with you? USA TODAY National News Reporter Lauren Villagran joins The Excerpt to discuss who controls the narrative.

Hit play on the player below to hear the podcast and follow along with the transcript beneath it. This transcript was automatically generated, and then edited for clarity in its current form. There may be some differences between the audio and the text.

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Dana Taylor:

Hello and welcome to The Excerpt. I'm Dana Taylor. Today is Thursday, May 30, 2024, and this is a special episode of The Excerpt.

National landmarks hold a special place in American history in their celebration of the unique American places that tell our story. Whether that story is the incredible natural beauty of the Grand Canyon or the manmade wonder carved into Mount Rushmore, these are the places that inspire awe and invite reflection. But some historic landmarks reflect competing visions of American history, and in an election year may be used to stoke a cultural divide. Which view of our American national landmarks resonates with you? Here to discuss who controls the narrative is USA TODAY national news reporter Lauren Villagran. Thanks for coming on The Excerpt, Lauren.

Lauren Villagran:

Yeah, thanks, Dana.

Dana Taylor:

As we've seen with other cultural institutions like the National Museum of the American Latino, who gets to tell the story is a critical part in determining what story is actually told. You write that there were two competing visions of America's stories. Can you give us a 30,000-foot view here?

Lauren Villagran:

For the past 10 years, the park service has been trying to remedy what it sees as a historical viewpoint that left out key moments in American history that are important to diverse communities, and they've undergone an effort to expand the diversity of national historic landmarks, the places that mark moments in American history that may not always be rosy. There are more than 2,600 national historic landmarks across the country, and only a fraction of those sites represent versions of history that are important or sacred to communities, including Black Americans, Native Americans, Latinos, and the LGBTQ community.

Dana Taylor:

Lauren, why are national landmarks so important to our cultural identity and why are diverse groups seeking those designations now?

Lauren Villagran:

Having an actual place to go to, to see where history was made has historically been considered important in American culture. I can speak to a site that is near El Paso. It's called the Rio Vista Farm. Until it received national historic landmark status in December, it was a site where folks wouldn't even know what had happened there. It had been the site of a Bracero camp, a place where Mexican farm workers were recruited during World War II and after to support American agriculture. The site was wasting away in the desert, wind and rain, and now with historic landmark status, it can be preserved and there will be a museum there and a place that the community can go to learn about this critical history.

Dana Taylor:

Since 2022, the National Park Service has directed millions to diversify its landmarks to cover a wider diversity of American stories. What's the park's approach to accomplishing this?

Lauren Villagran:

So some of these designations, Dana, can take years to achieve. In the case of Rio Vista Farm, for example, it was more than a decade of bureaucratic wrangling applications, commissions. So it's not something that's easy to get, and the diversification effort has also been slow as a result of those 2,600 national historic landmarks that exist. In 2022, just around 40 landmarks could be tied directly to the history of women, the LGBTQ community, Asian Americans and Black Americans. So you can see that there's really still a lot of work to be done.

Dana Taylor:

As you mentioned, not all of the proposed landmark sites are celebrating our diverse history. There are some controversial sites on the list that capture aspects of American history that are less savory, Japanese internment camps, for instance. Talk a little bit about what people are working on there.

Lauren Villagran:

Despite being controversial in some ways, there was some unity in Congress around the designation, for example, of the detention camp known as Amache that served as a Japanese internment camp for US citizens of Japanese descent during World War II. That history had only previously been preserved at one other site. Now there are two, and I know that that has been important from our reporting to the Japanese American community and descendants of those who were interned there. There are also sites tied to the nation's history with slavery. There are sites that the National Park Service is studying for recognition that mark lynching sites across the south. So there are a number of places, Dana, that the National Park Service is considering including on its list of historic landmarks, even though they're the sites of dark periods in American history.

Dana Taylor:

Yes, and slavery is another one of those periods in history that's being addressed. Tell me about one of these sites and what it's noting.

Lauren Villagran:

Yeah, so the National Park Service has recently designated the Frederick Douglass House a national historic site. Douglass, a formerly enslaved man, became an abolitionist. He moved to Washington DC in the 1870s, and he intentionally bought a house in a whites only neighborhood at a high elevation. And the park service explains that one of the reasons he did that was so that he could see the places where decisions were being made that could affect millions of people into the future. So that house is now preserved as a part of the National Historic Landmarks list.

Dana Taylor:

We've reported on the conservative movement across the country that's been reflected in book bans, for instance, or restrictions in the way Black, Latino, or LGBTQ history is taught. How is this playing out regarding national parks? What does the conservative vision look like on the ground?

Lauren Villagran:

Right. So former President Donald Trump's campaign spokeswoman said that should he return to the presidency, he would create a National Garden of American heroes that would uplift heroes in American history and be a place that they say all Americans could visit and enjoy. What we do know is that many of these designations, as I mentioned, take years to receive, and many of the applications proceeded during the Trump Administration as well. So the Interior Department, which runs the park service, was committed to diversifying its historic landmarks even during the Trump Administration. That being said, I do believe there is a conservative viewpoint that some of these sites might highlight periods of American history that could make certain people feel blame for past failings. The park service, though, will say that only by honoring and preserving all of American history can we learn from it.

Dana Taylor:

Our colleague, Deborah Berry, spoke with the head of the Interior Department's National Park Service for this piece. What did she share about their goals and challenges here?

Lauren Villagran:

Yeah, I think the prevailing viewpoint in the Interior Department right now is that the history of all groups of Americans belongs to all Americans. Black history is American history, Native American history is American history and so on. So it does seem that the park service is committed to this effort into the future.

Dana Taylor:

And Lauren, what was the most surprising thing or interesting thing that you learned while reporting this story?

Lauren Villagran:

Yeah, Dana, well, I have lived in the El Paso area off and on for 20 years, and I never knew Rio Vista Farm existed. Like I said, it's a group of buildings that were made of Adobe that saw tens of thousands of Mexican farm workers go through. It's a place that the community wanted to honor and remember, because also of the abuses that happened there during the Bracero Program between 1942 and 1964, Mexican farm workers were recruited. They were a key part of the United States World War II effort. At the same time, they were mistreated there, they were stripped down, they were sprayed with the toxic pesticide DDT supposedly to "delouse" them. It was a period of humiliation for them. Now, with the preservation as a national historic landmark, the site is going to see an influx of funding. There's going to be a Bracero museum. There's going to be a public library for the community, and it is already functioning as a community center and place for seniors in that community, including former Braceros and their family members.

Dana Taylor:

Lauren, it's a lot to take in here. Thank you so much for joining us on The Excerpt.

Lauren Villagran:

Thank you for having me, Dana.

Dana Taylor:

Thanks to our senior producer Shannon Rae Green and Bradley Glanzrock for their production assistance. Our executive producer is Laura Beatty. Let us know what you think of this episode by sending a note to podcasts@usatodaytoday.com. Thanks for listening. I'm Dana Taylor. Taylor Wilson will be back tomorrow morning with another episode of The Excerpt.