Marvin Samuels, a veteran of over 20 years in the Army, opened a restaurant called Liberty Island Foods in Fayetteville, N.C., paying tribute to Fort Liberty, a military base he served at. The base was originally named Fort Bragg, after a Confederate general, but underwent a renaming in 2023. Shortly after Samuels opened his restaurant, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth announced a reversal to the base's original name, now honoring a World War II soldier. This decision sparked questions for Samuels about the implications of these administrative changes on the military-integrated city.
"The base had been known as Fort Bragg, named after a Confederate general who owned enslaved people. Then in 2023, the Defense Department renamed it."
"Mr. Samuels shrugged it off. But the change did leave him wondering: How else would the new administration's orders affect this city, which is so deeply intertwined with the military?"
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