Editor, Gazette-Journal:

In a few short days, we will be celebrating Yorktown Day—Oct. 19, 2011—and I am thinking about both truth and deception.

The truth of the bloodshed and anguish felt by thousands of patriots to bring about the surrender of British General Lord Cornwallis and the deception of the new "replica" of the 18th century Yorktown windmill now sitting on the beach next to the Watermen’s Museum.

As the psalmist wrote "through thy precepts I get understanding, therefore I hate every false way." (Psalm 119, verse 104)

Surely, falsehood and deception should not be practiced by those making decisions about 17th century Yorktown, whose "preservation" boundaries were set by an Act of Congress on July 3, 1930 when the Colonial National Monument was created. On Oct. 15, 1966, in another Act of Congress, the entire area was listed on the National Register of Historic Places.

At the last meeting of the York County Board of ...