Civil War vets post reopening

February 7, 2010 at 12:00a.m.

CARNEGIE, Pa. (AP) — For some 30 years, Civil War veterans met in a room at the Carnegie Library to share memories of victory and defeat and comrades past. Part social hall and part museum, the Grand Army of the Republic post was home to a collection of swords, rifles and other wartime mementos — and where old soldiers gathered to socialize.

But some time before the Capt. Thomas Espy Post’s last member died in 1937, the room in the town library outside Pittsburgh was locked and all but forgotten. Beset by funding problems, the library did not have the means to deal with the treasures inside, said Carnegie Library executive director Margaret Forbes.

With water-damaged plaster, rattling windows and peeling paint requiring more immediate attention in the century-old library, the post’s belongings — including records, cotton tufts plucked from a Virginia battlefield, bullets, a canteen and a newspaper printed on wallpaper when Ulysses S. Grant entered Vicksburg, Miss. — had to wait.

But now the post — one of about a half-dozen that remain largely intact — will reopen this month as part of the library’s celebration of the 201st anniversary of President Abraham Lincoln’s birth.

The renovations come courtesy of Bill Brown, who learned of the room’s existence and donated the funds to refurbish the space.

“It was just a way to give back to the community,” said Brown, 64, president and CEO of a company that makes equipment for steel mills. He declined to say how much he donated.

Brown isn’t a Civil War buff, although he had ancestors who fought on both sides.

“I could imagine the old Union soldiers sitting in there reliving their tales of battle and victory and defeat. I just thought it was neat,” he said.

Indeed, the room looks as if a veteran might return at any moment.

Restoration included installing a dedicated ventilation system, reflective window coatings and repainting the room its original color, which Forbes describes as “pumpkin chiffon pie” orange.

The post occupies a roughly 24-by-24-foot room on the second floor of the library, which itself is undergoing a multimillion- dollar restoration, along with the attached 425-seat music hall.

Carnegie, about six miles southwest of Pittsburgh, formed when two municipalities agreed to merge and rename in exchange for industrialist Andrew Carnegie’s funding the library.

At one time, nearly 7,000 GAR posts dotted the country. Some were in buildings that no longer exist or were converted to other uses after veterans died.

The shuttered Espy post became a time capsule of sorts, making it one of a handful that survive as they once were, according to Stuart McConnell, a history professor at Pitzer College in Claremont, Calif., who wrote a book about the Grand Army of the Republic.

“The post room is special, I think, in just the degree to which it’s been preserved. There’s a lot of original fixtures in there and original documents,” he said.

The post is also unusual because it was racially integrated, he said. Many posts, particularly in larger cities, formed along racial lines.