Most Concordians are 
aware that their local history intersected broader history at the outset of the Revolution and during the 19th century American literary renaissance. Fewer know that Concord thought it might again assume national and international significance in the 1940s, when it was considered as a possible site for the headquarters of the new United Nations.
The U.N. was established through conferences in 1944 and 1945 at Dumbarton Oaks, Yalta, and San Francisco. Adopted in June, 1945, its charter went into effect on October 24. Even before the U.N. began its official existence, there was tremendous American interest in the location of its permanent facility.
Eager to bring the U.N. to Massachusetts, Governor Maurice Tobin formed a committee that traveled to London in December, 1945 to present the state's case to the U.N.'s site committee. Today it seems far-fetched that there was ever thought of situating the U.N. anywhere but Manhattan. In 1945, however, Massachusetts residents had reason to believe that the organization might make its home here. The U.N. sought non-urban places that would not require the displacement of many people, with sufficient acreage to accommodate a large facility and accessibility to transportation and to city advantages.
In the November 15, 1945 issue of the Concord Journal, William Walker suggested that Concord was an appropriate location for the U.N. A short news piece in the December 20, 1945 issue of the Journal reported that Edith Nourse Rogers of Lowell, local representative in the U.S. Congress, was working to convince Washington officials that Concord -- "where the first blow for liberty was struck" -- was the logical spot for the U.N. This information unleashed a short-lived but intense volley of local reaction in the Concord Journal and the Concord Enterprise.
Strong responses quickly came from two prominent, long-time Concordians, lawyer Samuel Hoar (donor to the federal government of land for the Great Meadows National Wildlife Refuge) and historian and author Allen French. Their letters to Journal editor Samuel G. Kent were printed in the December 27 issue of the paper. Hoar expressed alarm that the "juggernaut" of change would crush Concord. The town's atmosphere would be irrevocably altered by the U.N. There would be no financial benefit in the form of tax revenues, and Concord would be expected to supply services -- water, sewer, electricity, schools, road maintenance, police and fire protection. Parking, traffic, and town planning would be problematic. In the time-honored tradition of evoking history in support of opinion, Hoar stated that the Concord Fight of 1775 had been fought to ensure the right of self-government, which was now threatened by the fact that the community at large had not been consulted prior to Mrs. Rogers's advocacy of Concord as a U.N. site.
In relatively few words, Allen French presented a series of polarities that painted the issue starkly. He contrasted local with outside control, old-timers with newcomers, city people with small-town folk, the hustle and bustle of progress with transcendent separateness from worldly values, change with stability. He suggested that the presence of the U.N. would "not merely change Concord" but would, in fact, destroy it, and urged its location rather in some growth-minded suburb or undeveloped area.
By January, 1946, the controversy was in full swing. Other residents jumped into the fray. The James J. Mansfield Post of the American Legion publicly favored location of the U.N. in Concord. Stedman Buttrick (whose property by the North Bridge later became part of the Minute Man National Historical Park) was reported to have offered two pieces of land for U.N. site purposes. Writing for the January 3 issue of the Journal, Concord historian Ruth Robinson Wheeler criticized fear of change.
Mrs. Wheeler pointed out that the U.N. site committee would make its assessment of Concord's suitability regardless of local opinion, that the center of town would remain unaffected, and that the U.N. would not likely depend on municipal services. She saw the growth of Concord as inevitable, and remarked that an influx of diplomatic families -- "the intellectual cream of the countries of the world" -- would provide some quality control over the future composition of the community. She reminded her fellow citizens that some had wrongly predicted in 1840 that the railroad would destroy Concord, in 1890 the trolley, in 1910 the automobile, in 1940 the airport. "Concord can be spoiled only by stagnation," she 
commented. After all, the Concord Fight had been fought by agents of change against those dedicated "to keep the Past upon its throne." In the January 10 issue of the Journal, in a letter to the editor beginning "My how the fur flew!," Roland Wells Robbins -- Lincoln resident, archaeologist, and excavator of the foundation of Thoreau's Walden cabin -- praised Mrs. Wheeler's "sensible summation."
The U.N. dispute raged through January. H.R. Bygrave criticized resistance to change and a too Concord-centric view of the world. Signing himself "Spirit of 1775," Wallace B. Conant stated outright that he didn't want "any international organization" coming to Concord. Artist Mary Ogden Abbott wrote cuttingly of those opposed to locating the U.N. here as reactionaries, Tories, and rejectors of Emersonian humanitarianism. The height of passionate rhetoric was achieved in Gertrude Rideout's poem "The Host," the first verse of which read: "If Jesus came to Concord Town, / We would not let him in, / Because some wise men in our midst / Believe that change is sin."
As quickly as it had descended upon Concord, the controversy disappeared. Late in January, the U.N. delegation visited sites in the northeast. An article in the Enterprise for January 24, 1946 reported that an extended area including parts of Sudbury, Marlborough, Lincoln, Wayland, Framingham, Southborough, and Concord had been examined and favorably regarded by the delegation. By early February, however, it was clear that sites elsewhere were preferred. John D. Rockefeller, Jr. trumped efforts to locate the U.N. in New England in December, 1946, when he offered property in mid-town Manhattan for the U.N. headquarters.
The really fascinating and Concord-characteristic part of this story lies in the powerful, divergent responses of local residents to the idea of the U.N.'s location here, in their willingness to speak out publicly on a controversial issue, and in their ability to carry on civilly with one another once the brouhaha died down.
Photos: Art Today.
Backgrounds: Word of Mouth Design.
This piece was originally published in the Concord Journal.
