CORNERING DEBATE
Dump moniker: Calls rise to replace name associated with the Confederacy Preserve past: Others argue renaming would be rewriting piece of local history
At Confederate Corners, a humble outpost on the southern edge of Salinas, life moves pretty quietly — or at least it did until a raging national debate thrust places like this one into a harsh spotlight.
People, especially field workers picking lettuce heads across the street, mill in and out of the Casillas Brothers Market and Beacon gas station. Faculty and staff are prepping for the new school year at the Montessori Learning Center, and the Bokay Nursery sends customers on their way with new plants.
Many folks around here weren’t even aware of the implications of the name of this area, so dubbed because it was settled by a group of Southern separatists in the mid-1800s. But then, in the wake of the
“Out-of-towners know better about this place than the people who live here.” — Rafael Casillas, owner of Casillas Brothers Market at Confederate Corners in Salinas
violent Charlottesville, Virginia, protests spurred in part by a debate over relics of the Civil War in that Virginia city, President Donald Trump lamented publicly Thursday that tearing down Confederate landmarks and designations across the nation are signs of “the history and culture of our great country being ripped apart.”
And suddenly Confederate Corners feels quite different.
“I didn’t even know that label existed until Google Maps showed it five years ago or so, and quite frankly never thought anything of it,” said Steve McShane, a Salinas city councilman who has an eponymous nursery located a stone’s throw from the intersection of Hitchcock Road and Highway 68 that draw the corners.
Carrie Nelson, an administrative assistant at the Montessori school, similarly discovered the historical name of where she has worked for several years.
“I only found out about it when I was printing up (Google) maps,” Nelson said. “I kind of wondered about it but never really dug into it.”
It appears that recognition of Confederate Corners is largely reflective of a generation gap. Dian Reese, an employee at the Bokay Nursery, knew it as a young middle-schooler in the 1970s.
“The older generations remember it,” Reese said. “The name has been passed down for generations.”
Originally known as Springtown or Spring Town, the place was named Confederate Corners after some Civil War veterans settled there in the late 1860s. It was also the inspiration for the fictional small town Rebel Corners in John Steinbeck’s novel “The Wayward Bus.”
The Montessori school and the Bokay Nursery are both housed in the remnants of the old Spring School that operated a century ago, with incarnations as a union hall before its current form. A barn around the corner from the gas station is thought to have been a meeting hall for the veterans who founded the colony, which existed long before Salinas had established its borders.
Rafael Casillas, who owns the market and gas station with his three brothers, said the site attracts its fair share of tourists thanks to both the Steinbeck connection and its presence on an online database of Confederate-influenced sites.
“Out- of- towners know better about this place than the people who live here,” he said.
Confederate symbols on public land can be found elsewhere in California, according to a survey by Southern Poverty Law Center. The city of Fort Bragg was named for the commanding officer of the military post set up there in the summer of 1857, Capt. Braxton Bragg, who was considered by historians as among the worst Confederate generals of the Civil War, given his record of defeats on the battlefield.
On Wednesday, a plaque honoring Confederate President Jefferson Davis was removed in San Diego while a monument commemorating Confederate veterans was removed in Los Angeles at the Hollywood Forever Cemetery, a response to requests from hundreds of activists that it be taken down or, according to some correspondence, risk being vandalized.
Now, a dormant effort to change Confederate Corners’ name could be resurrected. In 2015, after the furor over the use of the Confederate battle flag in South Carolina, the California Legislature considered a bill that would have required most place names, schools and other public places linked to the Con- federacy to be changed to something else.
Senate Bill 539, authored by state Sen. Steve Glazer, D- Orinda, was eventually vetoed by Gov. Jerry Brown. On Thursday, Glazer released a statement condemning the white supremacist movement and asking cities and towns around the country to “remove symbols honoring the Confederacy from our public places.”
Asked whether Glazer would reintroduce any name- changing legislation at this point, a spokesman said only that the senator was “evaluating the situation.”
That goes too far for several area residents who say they value preserving history, with one calling the renaming proposals “bull (ex- pletive).” Another person, whose family has staked several generations in the region, was equally critical but asked not to be named out of fear of public reprisal and ridicule.
“It’s part of our country’s history. I’m a strong believer in history,” he said. “Confederate Corners should actually have a wee bit more attention paid to it. I don’t think people have a negative or positive feeling about it. It’s just the name it was given.”
He added: “We’re not raising Confederate flags here. You have both the right and the left, and both of them are wrong. They’re tearing the country in half.”
Regina Mason, newly elected president of the Monterey County branch of the NAACP, said the newfound attention on Confederate landmarks, and debate over their existence, is necessary.
“Not many people have had open dialogue about it until lately. There is no place in our country for Confederate Corners,” she said. “It’s now time to stand up and get back our roots of coming together to deal with issues of white supremacy and black inferiority.”
McShane, the city councilman whose business pretty much stands on the footprint of Confederate Corners, said no matter the sensibilities of the past, Charlottesville has prompted a vital re-examination.
“If it were up to me, I’d have that title removed,” he said. “In light of the national discourse and recent events, it comes to mind in a different light.”