THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Tuesday, July 18, 1995 TAG: 9507180285
SECTION: FRONT PAGE: A1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY MARGARET EDDS AND ROBERT LITTLE, STAFF WRITERS
DATELINE: RICHMOND LENGTH: Long : 133 lines
The City Council capped a soul-searching debate over art, race, and reconciliation early this morning by voting 7-0 with one abstention to place a statue of tennis great Arthur Ashe Jr. on a boulevard previously dedicated to Civil War heroes.
The 1 a.m. vote for a site on Monument Avenue came after a six-hour public hearing in which many of the speakers, including members of the Ashe family, spoke in favor of the historic avenue occupied by Gen. Robert E. Lee and four other Confederates, all white. Ashe was black.
In voting, the council bypassd a plan proposed by Mayor Leonidas Young who is also black that would have put the statue in Byrd Park near tennis courts to which he was denied access as a child.
Speakers were nearly equally divided. Young called the debate, ``our finest hour. You missed a spiritual event. . . . You missed a balm being put on your wounds. We will forge a better future,'' said Young after the vote.
The statue will be at Roseneath and Monument, several blocks west of the Confederate statues.
Relatives of the internationally recognized humanitarian and tennis champion opened the public hearing by endorsing a site on Monument Avenue.
Mayor Leonidas Young, who is also black, said earlier in the day that he would seek an alternate site in Byrd Park, near tennis courts to which Ashe was denied access as a child.
Young outlined an elaborate plan for honoring Ashe with a downtown park in his name, adjacent to an African-American Sports Hall of Fame desired by Ashe. And he called for construction of a statue on Monument Avenue to African Americans who have led ``human rights movements in Virginia and in our nation.''
The mayor said a majority of the nine-member City Council would support his plan. That claim wasthrown into doubt Monday night, however, when legions of city residents urged council members to place Ashe's statue among the white Confederate heroes.
``No hero is greater than any other hero, whether he is a defeated Confederate soldier or a great humanitarian,'' said Northside Richmond resident Shirley Jackson.
Jackson said she has admired Ashe since the days she used to throw back the tennis balls he hit into the swimming pool when the two were children growing up in Richmond. For two weeks, she and her three children have protested at a Monument Avenue site.
``He deserves to be on any street in the country, because he is a hero,'' Jackson said.
The vote had been scheduled for July 31, Young said he wanted to put the fractious matter to rest by voting Monday evening.
Breaking the family's near-silence on the issue, Johnny Ashe opened the hearing by saying that his brother would be ``reduced to tears'' and ``thoroughly disgusted'' by the city's very public rending on the issue in recent weeks.
``The world is watching,'' he said. ``Will this become a modern day war of hypocrisy, or will the city of Richmond do the right thing?''
The Richmond that outsiders saw in an evening-long hearing that attracted 179 speakers was largely civil and not easily categorized by race. African Americans and whites spoke for and against Monument Avenue, though support leaned heavily toward the proposal.
The crowd was sprinkled with individuals wearing Confederate insignia, as well as others who said it would demean Ashe to place him among defenders of slavery.
Both groups seemed to be outnumbered by speakers calling for racial harmony. A decision to put non-Richmonders at the bottom of the speaking order moved many of those with ties to Confederate organizations far down the list.
Seeking to dispel a spate of negative national publicity, much of it focused on the opposition to placing Ashe on Monument Avenue, various council members urged calm as the hearing began.
``This debate has little to do with race except in the hearts and minds of a very few individuals,'' said Mayor Young. Media coverage to the contrary, the city's conversation has been ``heartfelt throughout and entirely civil.''
Reading the proposed resolution calling for a statue to African Americans on Monument Avenue, Vice Mayor John Conrad, who is white, admonished that there is ``unanimity on this council that we need to reconcile Richmond's history with its future.''
The statement suggested that there will soon be an African-American presence on the avenue, whether or not it is Ashe's. The resolution calls for completion of the statue within two years.
Sculptor Paul DiPasquale, who conceived the statue after hearing Ashe speak about six months before his 1993 death from AIDS, urged Monument Avenue as the proper place to honor ``Richmond's Civil Peace leader.''
A biracial site selection committee and the planning commission voted for that location. The matter was briefly considered closed until the council, responding to what members said was an outpouring of concern, reopened it by scheduling the public hearing and a vote.
Opponents to Monument Avenue offered a variety of reasons. Some said it would be unsafe for children and other pedestrians. Others questioned the aesthetic wisdom of placing a modern sculpture in a historic neighborhood. And still others said Ashe would be incompatible with the Confederates.
``It would be a flight of fancy,'' said Richmond resident Robert H. Lamb, ``to suggest that Arthur Ashe viewed the Confederate heroes on Monument Avenue as kindred spirits.''
Those favoring Byrd Park said it would connect Ashe to memories of him as the first African American to win at Wimbledon, and would allow for a hands-on experience by children and others. ILLUSTRATION: Color staff photo by Mark Mitchell
The Conflict
[Woman holding a sign]
The Statue
Color Staff photo by Mark Mitchell
Sculptor Paul DiPasquale, right.
B\W photo
Arthur Ashe
Color AP photo
The Avenue
Richmond's Monument Avenue pays tribute to Confederate leaders
Robert E. Lee, J.E.B. Stuart, Jefferson Davis, Stonewall Jackson and
Matthew Fontaine Maury. The statue of Lee, foreground, was the first
placed in the line, in 1890.
KEYWORDS: ARTHUR ASHE MONUMENT by CNB