Learn from all our history, good and bad

I am so proud of Hilton Head Island’s mayor and town manager, who put aside personal differences to issue a joint statement of positive actions being taken to educate residents and visitors about our mixed heritage on this island we call home.

When I was a teacher of American history/government in another state, I was told by a curriculum specialist that since “we can’t teach it all” we would start teaching American history/government with a period far removed from the founding of this country. My reply was, “Not in my classroom, we won’t.” When I was told again “you can’t teach it all,” my reply was “just watch me” and I did teach it all, for if we do not learn about and from our history we are doomed to repeat it.

We need to learn all about our heritage — the good, the bad, and the ugly. We need to learn from it all that the only way we are going to survive as a great nation is through acceptance of different races, cultures, and beliefs, but all operating under the laws of this country. What is happening today is not law-abiding. We need to leave icons of that history alone as a reminder of what we have evolved from. Leave the statues/names belonging to a certain era in our history alone; name new schools after today’s leaders and erect new statues to those individuals.

You can’t erase history, but you can avoid repeating it.

This story was originally published August 31, 2017 at 7:55 AM with the headline "Learn from all our history, good and bad."