Monument Square visions clash amid differing priorities

Monument Square has memorials to fallen Civil War veterans, service members from other wars, and even a British soldier killed in the American Revolution’s early hours. 

What to do with a lone open parcel left in the square remains up for discussion. 

“What is it about Acton that we want to memorialize?” Select Board member Mary Hartman asked colleagues last month.

One group previously suggested a broad memorial that recognized underrepresented people throughout Acton’s history.

Concord250 Corp. members recently proposed a monument to people with ties to Acton who died in the Revolution, calling this an obvious omission from the town center.

Residents also differ on aesthetics.

Corporation President Henry Dane nearly forced a debate on the matter at last month’s Town Meeting. He yanked his warrant article but still wants the Select Board to take up the issue.

Earlier plans 

Concordians mulled what to do with a town-owned patch of grass next to the Acton-Carlisle Catholic Collaborative’s parish center long before Dane’s proposal. A small stone on the parcel marks the site where jailers held Henry David Thoreau for not paying his taxes in an anti-slavery protest.

One design from planning around the 250th anniversary of the Revolution’s start featured glass pillars and a long, polished stone wall. 

Signs on the wall would have mentioned “the fight at North Bridge” while acknowledging milestones such as civil rights activist Ellen Garrison’s birth and Black soldier George Washington Dugan’s Civil War enlistment.

Resident Tooey Rogers co-chaired the town subcommittee behind the idea and recalled the feedback his group gathered. 

“People really did not want more granite blocks with names on them,” he said during a March public hearing.

The process sputtered, nonetheless, as critics questioned whether such a contemporary tribute would look out of place in Acton Center.

‘Didn’t like glass towers’

Concord250 Corp. is a private non-profit that Dane founded when he was chair of the Select Board in 2022. It’s separate from the town’s Concord250 Executive Committee, which led planning for the 2025 semiquincentennial, although it had some of the same officers.

Historian Beth van Duzer listed at least 22 men to be included on the Corporation’s patriot soldier memorial.

A vast majority of the fallen fighters were white. Three were Black, van Duzer said.

Concordian Dennis Fiori, president emeritus of the Massachusetts Historical Society, said this wasn’t a debate about whether to honor underrepresented groups. 

“We’ve been in favor of that from the very beginning,” he said after van Duzer’s presentation. “We just didn’t like glass towers.”

He said there would be “plenty of room” to honor both Acton’s Revolutionary dead and lesser-heard voices from the town’s past that Rogers’ group wanted to recognize. 

The private 250 Corp. proposal still faced its own set of questions around transparency and public input on an eventual design.

Dane’s Town Meeting article offered to have his non-profit design, finance, and build the monument. The non-profit’s leaders reversed course amid pushback and opted not to bring the item up for discussion.

“There was broad support,” Dane said in response to Bridge questions, “but, since the [Revolutionary] War Monument needs to be located on town property, the ultimate decision is in the hands of the Select Board.”

The Corporation will “make its resources available in a cooperative effort,” he wrote in an email to Select Board Chair Mark Howell, whose term ended shortly after Town Meeting wrapped up.

Dane said this spring that his organization had between $150,000 and $200,000 available for a project. 

What’s next?

Howell acknowledged during a pre-Town Meeting discussion “the concerns that progress doesn’t appear to be being made” on a new monument.

Hartman suggested officials shouldn’t rush to get a project done and said she’s heard from people who want a “cooling-off period because there’s passion around what should be done.” 

On a sunny morning this month, two benches in the existing pocket park sat empty. Fallen petals from flowering trees speckled the ground, and a volunteer planted day lilies on the adjoining church lot. 

Asked about a possible new memorial, Select Board member Wendy Rovelli told The Bridge “We’re going to talk about it” at the group’s May 18 meeting.

Whether it’s a formal goal or not, Rovelli said a memorial “absolutely will” be a topic of conversation over the next year.