Letter to the Editor: Why I support the Institute's Housing Plan

To the Editor:

I fully support the Institute for Advanced Studies in its plan to expand their faculty housing. It is essential to give proper weight to former fields of battle in the lives of their communities, balancing remembrance with the requirements of communities to maintain rational and eminently reasonable development.

The Institute needs to provide affordable housing to its unique community of scholars, and I have to believe all Princeton residents can appreciate the need for affordable housing. In 1971 the State of New Jersey and the Institute reached an agreement on developing the Institute's own land for future housing. The recent demands that Institute land should not be developed because it is "hallowed ground" simply stretches credulity.

Over 234 years have passed since the guns fell silent on the Princeton Battlefield. The hallowed ground is the common grave, on State Park land, holding the mortal remains of 15 American and 21 British troops. Much of the battlefield is preserved- the expansive fields, the common grave, the Clarke House, the Washington Oak and the young Mercer Oak.

We Princetonians take seriously our charge to be faithful guardians of our heritage for future generations. The events from that bitterly cold day, January 3, 1777, are fully integrated into the life of our community. The current State Park, coupled with efforts of such groups as the Princeton Battlefield Society, Spirit of Princeton, and the Princeton Regional Schools keeps the battle relevant, and in so doing Princeton benefits profoundly.

Opponents to the Institute’s plans highlight the fact that some 52 battle-related artifacts were found in a past survey on the land in question, while downplaying the fact that over 700 agricultural artifacts were also found. After the battle, the fields reverted to their original agricultural use- so much for the “hallowed ground” argument.

As an aside, should the development plan be approved, there is a unique opportunity to include Princeton Regional School students in the archeological assessment. It is a teachable moment, and a way to bring our history alive.

In Europe, no stranger to wars, fields are tilled where battles once raged. Cities, once scourged by house to house fighting, now ring with the laughter of children. Battlefields serve as a memento mori and as a cautionary tale, with the enlightened understanding that the human landscape is far more important than the topographic. Princeton Battlefield State Park as currently constituted ably fulfills both duties.

Communities must have the flexibility to grow, or they run the very real risk of stultification and decline. We must not let our society become a cult of the dead, especially at the expense of the living, and have our future held hostage by distorting the past.

Mark Scheibner
Prospect Avenue
Princeton