NATIONAL PARK TRUST

WASHINGTON FAMILY LEGACY NATIONAL HISTORICAL PARK

By Steve Wright

The National Park Trust (NPT) is a private land trust organization founded in 1983 that focuses on land acquisition and the protection of the national parks. At the heart of its vision is for everyone to have a national park experience.

“We want to get kids back to nature because there’s a correlation between outside activity and lowered rates of obesity and ADHD. There’s also a correlation between early positive experiences (at national parks) and desire to preserve later on,” said Kit McGinnis, NPT’s Land Projects Manager.

NPT also strives to protect parkland from residential and commercial development. Threats to the continued existence and quality of the national parks include 4.3 million acres of land that are privately held within parks.

NPT is currently setting its sites on four properties in Jefferson County, West Virginia, the state’s easternmost county and home to portions of Harpers Ferry National Historical Park and the Appalachian National Scenic Trail.

This is George Washington country. Washington surveyed the area’s wildlands and was enchanted by its beauty and fertility. He bought his first property, comprised of about 500 acres, and founded Bullskin Plantation in 1750.

Washington convinced his brothers to buy land there as well. At one point, there were 12 Washington family homes located in the county. The Washington’s were the area’s most prominent family throughout the 1800s.

This NPT project would create a National Historical Park based on the George Washington Family Legacy by linking the four non-contiguous sites as part of the Harpers Ferry National Historical Park.

The cornerstone property is Bullskin. Brother Charles’ Happy Retreat (built in 1780), and two other properties (Claymont Court and Blakeley), both built in the 1820s by Washington’s grand nephews, round out the quartet.

“Washington had no biological children, so these were his heirs and a big part of who inherited his legacy,” McGinnis said.

NPT has four property owners willing to be part of a study – which will take six months to three years to complete -- on whether the sites merit inclusion in the National Park Service. Two of the properties are already on the market and the owners of the other two are interested in selling to the right buyer.

To make the properties more attractive to the NPS, NPT is raising private funding to acquire and restore the properties to their former grandeur.

Wright frequently writes about smart growth and sustainable communities. He and his wife live in a restored historic home in the heart of Miami’s Little Havana. Contact him at: stevewright64@yahoo.com