Upon graduation in June 1861, he was commissioned a first lieutenant in the U.S. Army. Cushing participated ... but an end to the hopes of the Confederate States of America for independence.
Calvin C. Bliss was one of the thousands of Arkansans caught in the chaos of the Civil War and Reconstruction, but he came to Arkansas as an educator and became the state’s first lieutenant governor.
The army installation’s name was changed to Fort Liberty in 2023, after Congress passed a law to rename all military bases named after Confederacy officials and generals.