This Is Shameful

From Guns.com

Even though Chicago is the site of many world-class museums, the city currently prohibits some firearms from being displayed, even as historical artifacts. One city alderman however introduced an ordinance on Wednesday to lift that ban, allowing museums to properly display these pieces of history.

Edward Burke, one of Chicago’s most powerful city alderman and a history buff himself, explained that he recently discovered an anomaly in the city’s code. “Museums are caught in a dilemma that if they have in their collections artifacts that can be defined as firearms, even though there’s historical significance to the memento, they can’t be registered in the city and can’t be displayed.”

If passed, according to Burke, the ordinance will allow “institutions to display unloaded firearms that often accompany uniforms and other historical artifacts.”

CEO and President of the Pritzker Military Library in Chicago, Kenneth Clarke points out that although the city is allowed to display firearms that are pre-circa 1898, that leaves out a significant amount – over 100 years – of valuable history, history that both Chicago residents and other visitors to the museum are missing out on.

Clarke explains, “It’s about preserving the stories of citizen soldiers from World War II, World War I … who have served our country.”

Alderman Burke agrees and uses the example of a World War II soldier’s family who donated his gun to the museum in March. Major General William P. Levine was one of the first American soldiers to liberate the concentration camp of Dachau during World War II. Following Levine’s death, his family donated his gun to the museum, a German Walther PP which was given to him during the war. Only under the current laws, the museum is not allowed to display such a piece of history.

[My emphasis.] Sorry, the embedded links didn't copy. The full story is here.

Mr. Big Food and I once went to Dachau. Once was enough to last a lifetime.

"The main part of the exhibition begins with documents illustrating the seizure of power by the Nazis on January 30, 1933. ... Disease and medical experiments in the camp infirmary conclude the first part of the exhibition."

"On March 22, 1933, the first German concentration camp was set up near Dachau on the grounds of a former ammunition factory. Political opponents, Jews, clergymen and so-called 'undesirable elements' were to be isolated here as enemies of the National-Socialist regime. ... According to files of the International Tracing Service, 31,591 prisoners died in the Dachau concentration camp. An additional number of a few thousand prisoners who had not been registered at all, were killed by shooting."

"The mortality rate among prisoners increased rapidly. The crematory constructed outside the prisoners' compound in 1940 proved too small. ... Upon orders of the ... (SS-Economic-Administrative Main Office) in Berlin a gas chamber was installed. This gas chamber, camouflaged as a shower room, was not used. The prisoners selected for 'gassing' were transported from Dachau... . Approximately 6000 Russian prisoners of war were executed on the .. . (rifle range)."

A United States citizen soldier used his gun to help end this. His gun-- and the free lives it represents-- is not welcome in Chicago.

Shameful. 
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And now... to fix another simply delicious supper and then sort through some Zane Grey novels.