Gettysburg-Observation Tower

[Forks of the Ohio]

My husband's sister and HER husband went to Gettysburg for their three-day honeymoon a few years ago. They got their photo taken with a tall man in a Lincoln costume in front of that historic hotel. Er - maybe it was the ghost of Lincoln!

 

[ErnieMac]

I visited Gettysburg on a number of occasions while the tower was in existence. Thought it was an eyesore and never went up.

 

[CivWar4me]

The mound at Waterloo appears to be a worse intrusion. And I read that collecting the dirt for the mound affected the lay of the land.

View attachment 360919
The Lion's Mound is built on the right flank of the Allied line, near where the Prince of Orange was shot and injured during the Battle of Waterloo. This colossal construction, begun in 1822 and not finished until 1825, required over ten million cubic feet of earth to be moved by hand. 2000 laborers, with 600 horses and hundreds of carts, dug up the valley south of Waterloo for the task. In doing so, they destroyed the sunken road which ran through the centre of the battlefield, and built over the ridge of Mont St. Jean which the Allied army had fought to defend. Visiting Waterloo in 1827, the Duke of Wellington was said to have been astonished by the complete transformation, exclaiming: "They have ruined my battlefield."

 

[relichound]

I remember seeing it dominate the Gettysburg skyline for years and years.
Many Civil War buffs hated it, and so did I...and so I never went up to the top.
It was my way of protesting it.
The last time I went to the battlefield at Gettysburg, last August, I went with my oldest boy hood
friend who is also a CW buff, and at my age I had enough trouble climbing to the top
of the old observation tower at Culp's Hill! I enjoyed it though.

 

[infomanpa]

I remember seeing it dominate the Gettysburg skyline for years and years.
Many Civil War buffs hated it, and so did I...and so I never went up to the top.
It was my way of protesting it.
The last time I went to the battlefield at Gettysburg, last August, I went with my oldest boy hood
friend who is also a CW buff, and at my age I had enough trouble climbing to the top
of the old observation tower at Culp's Hill! I enjoyed it though.

Did you go up the Longstreet tower, also? I think the view there is vastly better than the one from the Culp's Hill tower.

 

[relichound]

No, I did not go up that one. He was driving at that point.
I remember the one on Big Round Top also that was torn down many
years ago.