Editorial: The best gift for St. Augustine's 450th birthday

Our view: City's 450th -- What's the best gift?
Created 05/21/2011 - 12:01am
Summary:

As we listened in Wednesday on a discussion by local officials with a senior National Park Service administrator to plan the first meeting of St. Augustine's 450th Commemoration Commission, reality sunk in.

As we listened in Wednesday on a discussion by local officials with a senior National Park Service administrator to plan the first meeting of St. Augustine's 450th Commemoration Commission, reality sunk in.

Our birthday celebration is really going to happen and a federal commission will help us celebrate in style.

A group of fine leaders in history, corporate America and fundraising are on the commission and ready to go. Soon we will be hearing about a date for that commission's first meeting.

Mayor Joe Boles affirmed Wednesday the goal in his message to David Vela, regional director, for the National Park Service's southeastern office, Atlanta. Community events should be the foundation and supported by the federal commission of which Boles is a member.

No doubt, we all will hear that message again and again.

Gordie Wilson, superintendent of the Castillo de San Marcos and Fort Matanzas, also a federal commission member, summed it up in birthday terms. The commission should ask the community, What do you want for your birthday? Makes sense to us. Isn't the gift question the first we get asked as our own big day nears?

We saw outcomes being thought of around the room and Vela said they ranged from the celebration itself and the fundraising and friend-raising that the commission will be involved in, to the lasting impact after the party is over.

Heads nodded at his comment.

So how big should the gift be?

Bob Harper, executive director of the Lightner Museum, offered us good insight. His image of major gifts is drawn from 50 years ago. Out of the 400th birthday we got The St. Augustine Amphitheatre and the Great Cross at the Mission of Nombre de Dios.

So let's set our sights on a birthday celebration and think big when it comes to the gifts. What do you want for your birthday?

What do you want the community to look at 25-50 years from now as 450th birthday presents?

Send us your wish lists.