A tale of two arches — told in three parts

The president wants to build an arch. It will be golden, but no, it’s not McDonald’s arches, but wouldn't that be more appropriate?

I.

I know something about arches. Which is not to say I’m an architectural expert, but I work on a campus with an historic arch, so I listened with interest when I heard that 45/47 plans to build a triumphal arch in Washington, D.C.

He intends it to be an entry into the city, built below the house of Robert E. Lee and overshadowing the Lincoln Memorial in size and importance.

If you’ve been to D.C. and if you’ve visited Lee’s house, you’ll know that it stands on a bluff overlooking the city. Behind Lee’s property sits Arlington Cemetery. The symbolism is intentional and somber.

The proposed arch will effectively overshadow the Lincoln Memorial and this seems intentional, too. A happenstance of geography, you say? Of course not. Anything this man does always has an end goal: to stoke the fires of his needy ego and fan the flames of his need for attention.

So, yes, the president wants to build an arch. It wasn’t the will of the people, and it’s not a memorial. It’s not designed as a response to surmounting a crisis, unless you count not winning the Nobel Prize surmounting a crisis.

II.

I work at Buena Vista University, and the arch has been a defining symbol in our history.

Our first building, Old Main, was erected in 1892, one year after Buena Vista College sprang into existence. Old Main was a four-story behemoth that stood alone on a rise overlooking the shores of Storm Lake.

It sported arched windows and doorways and housed administrative offices, classrooms, labs, a library, a cafeteria, and student union. Over time, other structures were added to campus, of course, but Old Main served as the heart of campus.

A fire started in its upper story late in the evening on September 27, 1956. While the fire burned downward to the floors above, administrators, faculty, and students rushed into the building and carried out as much as they could, but by morning, the building was a total loss.

With the embers still smoking on the morning of September 28, President John Fisher declared that classes would be held in the other buildings on campus and in locations around town.

Before Old Main was razed, a quick-thinking administrator numbered and saved the stones of the main archway and a few years later, the arch was reassembled with a brick surround at the southeast corner of campus.

Dubbed the Victory Arch, students recessed through it after commencement ceremonies, and I don’t think I’m wrong in saying that it probably saw its share of kissing and make-out sessions behind its brick walls.

The Arch was a memorial to the resilient spirit of the college. As with most private colleges in Iowa, BV struggled financially through most of its first century until Harold Walter Siebens gave the college $18 million in 1980, making it, at the time, the biggest donation per capita to any U.S. college or university.

A massive building project ensued, which upended the heart of campus, including the southeast corner, where the Arch stood. The little college that made do could suddenly do great things, and the modest little arch was out of place with the campus expansion underway.

The Arch was relocated to a more central spot, and a tall, very grand brick surround was built around those historic stones. First-year students walk west-to-east through the Arch during Convocation, and four years later, they walk east-to-west through the Arch for Commencement.

Whether it’s during the fall, seeing the slightly terrified frosh galumphing through in shorts and t-shirts or watching them gowned and grown up four years later, the “March through the Arch” is a tradition that still chokes me up every time I clap students through the ritual.

The Victory Arch and its rituals memorialize triumph over hardship. It defines us. It’s real. It’s ours.

III.

We need symbols to inspire us, to remind us who we are. Anyone who has visited our nation’s capital knows the grandeur of its capitol building, the president’s house, its great monuments along the Capitol Mall.

The current president wants to build another monument. Not just a gateway, but a triumphal arch. What triumph are we celebrating, I wonder. It can’t be the triumph of low-cost health care, affordable housing, or justice for all because we don’t have those things, and the promise of them grows dimmer each day.

What else could the triumph possibly be? Ah, yes, the triumph of flash over substance, of ego over altruism, of narcissism over service. According to cnn.com, when asked “who the arch was for, the president pointed at himself: ‘Me.’ ”

Joan Zwagerman loves the “March through the Arch.”