Arlington House has reopened after a 3-year renovation. It seeks to memorialize Robert E. Lee and acknowledge his role in the Confederacy while also telling the story of those enslaved there.
Mansion once home to Robert E. Lee reopens with new emphasis on those enslaved there
By Matthew Barakat
George Floyd hologram displayed over site of Confederate statue
The project is a collaboration between the George Floyd Foundation and Change.org, traveling to five U.S. sites mirroring the route of the 1961 Freedom Rides.
FALLS CHURCH, Va. - The Virginia mansion where Robert E. Lee once lived that now overlooks Arlington National Cemetery is open to the public again, after a $12 million rehabilitation and reinterpretation that includes an increased emphasis on those who were enslaved there.
The National Park Service opened Arlington House to the public on Tuesday for the first time since 2018. The mansion and surrounding grounds had been expected to reopen in 2019, but delays and the coronavirus pandemic extended the closure.
AP
The Virginia plantation house where Gen. Robert E. Lee lived before he abandoned it to lead the Confederate army during the Civil War has reopened after a multimillion-dollar renovation that focuses new attention on the enslaved people who lived and labored there.
Arlington House, The Robert E. Lee Memorial, was built by enslaved people and indentured workers between 1802 and 1818, and more than 100 African Americans were enslaved there in the decades leading up to the war, according to the National Park Service.
The park service worked with the descendants of several enslaved families to tell a more complete history of the home, the statement said. The Greek Revival mansion overlooks the Potomac River and Washington, DC.