The USDA Forest Service says the name is offensive based on Wayne’s past. Some vehemently object.
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But Wayne also had 47 enslaved people who worked on his rice plantations near Savannah, Georgia. He led portions of the Northwest Territory Wars, during which fighters killed Indigenous people and burned their villages so white Europeans could settle on the land.
Wayne has hundreds of cities, roadways and institutions named after him, including Wayne County, Michigan; Fort Wayne, Indiana and Wayne County, New York. But it’s the proposed Wayne National Forest name change that has caused a fuss.
The Forest Service, in its press release, wrote: “The current forest name is offensive because of this history of violence. Buckeye National Forest is one of the names suggested to the Forest Service by American Indian Tribes.”
Some lawmakers don’t agree.
Ohio Speaker of the House Jason Stephen criticized “the woke Biden administration” for a campaign to erase “Major General Anthony Wayne — an integral part in the settling of Ohio,” he said in a statement to the Ironton Tribune.
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