By: Lydia Crawley
The Parsons Advocate
After 11 years in operation, the Corricks Ford Battlefield Association has been dissolved. Roger Ware addressed the Parsons City Council to present a check for the remainder of the organizations funds to the council. Ware presented the City with a check for $3,774.19 with a recommendation that the funds go towards the purchase of benches for the park.
According to Ware, the organization was founded 11 years ago. “I’m Roger Ware and about 11 years ago we started an organization called Corricks Ford Battlefield Association,” Ware said.
Ware said the group was tied to the 2011 celebrations at the battlefield. “Primarily it was tied in with the big event we did in 2011 over at the battlefield which was stellar. You won’t find a finer reenactment situation with educational opportunities for people, speakers, music, pretty much we had it all,” Ware said.
Ware said he thanked everyone who contributed. “It cost a lot of money to do it,” Ware said. “But we thank everyone that contributed to that.”
According to Ware, the organization has been relatively inactive since the 2011 event. “We, as an organization, have been pretty inactive, pretty much, since that time,” Ware said. “We’ve lost our big highway grant. Which we had some big plans to do things with that and that just sort of took the air out of the balloon.”
Ware said the organization has also recently lost one of their officers. “Here recently, we lost one of our officers, Kathy Moore, and that was pretty huge,” Ware said. “I was really close with Kathy.”
According to Ware, the decision was made to dissolve the organization. “At this point in time, we just felt that its best that we dissolve the organization rather than to have it be a dead organization and not doing anything,” Ware said.
Ware said that during the dissolution process, money was left in the bank. “But in that process, we also have some money left in the bank,” Ware said. “And to that, we addressed that with the bank and with the other officers and things and decided that we’ll give that money to the City of Parsons. It would be the best thing to further Corricks Ford Battlefield.”
According to Ware, a walk in the battlefield spurred a thought as to how the money could be utilized. “Now one thing, and when I first talked to people about this, I didn’t really have any idea what the money should be used for,” Ware said. “But I went out there the other day and I was walking around and was like, ‘We need some benches.’ We need something that will hold up. A good commercial type bench. They’re about a $1,000 a piece to get a sizable bench a few people can sit on and enjoy the place out there. And with that, I would like to recommend that we use this money towards purchasing something that will be there and as a reminder that people did come together at one time to do what they thought was good for the battlefield.”
Ware said he wished the best for the future of the site. “And with that being said, if its ok with you all, I have a check made out to the City of Parsons for $3,774.19,” Ware said. “We hope that the City can move forward with that in mind and just take advantage of that for the battlefield. We just hope good things happen in the future…You’ve already done some good things over there.”
