C.2. NRHP Nomination - Moyaone Reserve NR Historic District
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C.2. NRHP Nomination - Moyaone Reserve NR Historic District DATE: January 14, 2020 TO: Historic Preservation Commission VIA: Howard Berger, Supervisor Historic Preservation Section Countywide Planning Division FROM: Thomas Gross, Planner Coordinator Historic Preservation Section Countywide Planning Division RE: Staff Recommendation on Moyaone Reserve National Register Historic District Nomination (83-055) Staff Recommendation Staff recommends that the Historic Preservation Commission forward its recommendation of approval to the County Executive for the nomination of the Cheverly Historic District to the National Register of Historic Places, based on National Register Criterion A and Criterion C. This nomination is being pursued by the Moyaone Association and is partially funded by the Historic Preservation Commission’s Non-Capital Grant Program. Next Steps in the Process According to the Certified Local Government (CLG) procedures, the Historic Preservation Commission’s recommendation will be forwarded to the County Executive seeking her concurrence with the proposed National Register nomination. The documentation will then be forwarded to the Maryland Historical Trust for review by the Governor’s Consulting Committee (GCC), which is scheduled to hear the nomination on February 18, 2020. Following the CLG and GCC reviews, the nomination will be forwarded to the National Park Service for listing in the National Register of Historic Places. Criteria Considerations The Moyaone Reserve Historic District meets National Register Criteria A and C, and is significant under the themes of Conservation, Community Planning and Development, and Architecture, with the period of significance extending from 1945, when Alice L.L. Ferguson first purchased land for the development of the Moyaone Reserve, to 1976, the year in which the last house designed by Charles F. Wagner was constructed in the Moyaone. The proposed district encompasses approximately 1,320 acres, of which approximately 1,080 acres lie within Prince George’s County. The district includes 125 contributing buildings, five contributing sites, and three contributing structures. Of these contributing features, all but 10 buildings and one site are located in Prince George’s County. Within the district boundary, 65 resources do not contribute to the historical significance of the district. The district lies entirely within Piscataway Park, which was listed in the National Register of Historic Places on October 15, 1966. The district contains two Prince George’s County Historic Sites, the Wagner House (83-032) and the Odell House (83-048). Moyaone Reserve Historic District (83-055) National Register Nomination Staff Recommendation January 14, 2020 Page 2 of 5 Criterion A: Association with events that have made a significant contribution to the broad patterns of our history. Conservation: The Moyaone Reserve Historic District is significant at the national level under National Register Criterion A for the period 1945 to 1966 in the area of Conservation for its role in the protection of the viewshed from Mount Vernon, a National Historic Landmark. The value of the view from George Washington’s eighteenth-century home and riverside plantation is widely accepted as a critical element of the cultural landscape and has been appreciated by generations of visitors. Architect Benjamin Henry Latrobe described the view after a visit to Mount Vernon in 1796. “Towards the East Nature has lavished magnificence,” he wrote. “Before the portico a lawn extends on each hand from the front of the house to the edge of the bank. Down the steep slope trees and shrubs are thickly planted. They are kept so low as not to interrupt the view but merely to furnish an agreeable border to the extensive prospect beyond.” In the 1950s, industrial development along the Maryland shore of the Potomac River threatened the integrity of outlook, inciting a decades-long effort led by the Mount Vernon Ladies’ Association to protect the viewshed, which encompasses the Moyaone Reserve, through the creation of a national park. In 1957, the Ladies’ Association and a determined cadre of Moyaone Reserve residents created the private, non-profit Accokeek Foundation to hold in trust key pieces of land within the viewshed, and, in 1961, Piscataway Park was established as the first national park to preserve a historic vista, becoming a model for subsequent federal parks across the nation. The Moyaone Reserve was founded on the principles of land conservation, and residents moved into the community because it promised a “green refuge” with low-density development, open spaces, privacy, and great natural beauty. As part of the development of Piscataway Park, Moyaone residents were given the opportunity to donate or sell scenic easements to the Department of the Interior to create a protected, wooded buffer of privately owned land within the Mount Vernon viewshed, reinforcing the vision of the community’s founders. In 1965, through the tireless activism of a dedicated group of Moyaone residents, the Maryland General Assembly passed legislation that enabled five counties, including Prince George’s and Charles counties, to grant special tax provisions to landowners with scenic easements. The following year, Prince George’s County passed the nation’s first local law granting tax credits for the preservation of scenic open space. As an innovative tool for land conservation, the ordinance became a model for other jurisdictions throughout the country. Today, all properties within the Moyaone Reserve are bound by scenic easements, ensuring the ongoing preservation of the historic view from one of our nation’s most revered historic sites and demonstrating the importance of easements as a method of encouraging private participation in conservation. The efforts of the Moyaone Reserve community in concert with the Mount Vernon Ladies’ Association, the Accokeek Foundation, and others to prevent development that would encroach into the panoramic view from Mount Vernon and to preserve the wooded setting of the community and the rural character of its surrounding landscape represents an outstanding achievement that has national significance within the conservation and historic preservation movements. Community Planning and Development: The Moyaone Reserve Historic District is significant at the state level under Criterion A for the period 1945 to 1958 in the area of Community Planning and Development for its distinctive land planning qualities, which demonstrate and affirm the Moyaone’s commitment to conservation and the integration of buildings and landscape. In the immediate postwar period, a small group of forward-thinking individuals came together to protect the area’s natural resources from destructive, small-lot, suburban development by creating a community grounded in a shared interest in rural resources and their settings, the preservation of trees, the retention of existing topography, and low-impact residential design that prioritized nature. Seen as an antidote to grid-based merchant-builder subdivisions that denuded the landscape and as an alternative to the curvilinear or neighborhood unit approach of some architect- builder subdivisions, the Moyaone Reserve developed organically without a preconceived design. Instead, restrictive covenants that prohibited the subdivision of land into tracts of less than 5 acres and prohibited the excessive and unnecessary cutting of large trees guided its development. Residents had the freedom to Moyaone Reserve Historic District (83-055) National Register Nomination Staff Recommendation January 14, 2020 Page 3 of 5 build houses of any style as long as the construction would not intrude on the natural beauty of the area. The community grew in size progressively as surrounding land became available for purchase and was platted with respect to the natural features of the terrain and to maximize privacy. A few farm buildings and tenant houses that were scattered across the landscape at the time of its initial development were recognized for their contribution to the community’s rural setting and were retained rather than bulldozed. Streams and valleys and large swaths of unbuildable land were set aside as nature reserves to encourage an appreciation for the local wildlife and ecology. Although residents of the Moyaone Reserve were wholly reliant on the automobile for transportation, roads were laid out to preserve the rugged quality of the landscape rather than for safety and efficiency. Besides the roadways, there were few infrastructure amenities, such as sewers or sidewalks. Prospective buyers were carefully vetted to ensure a shared appreciation for the area’s rural character and scenic beauty. With some houses set within small clearings, and others nestled into the tree canopy, the development has a variegated, patchwork quality evocative of agricultural landscapes. The Moyaone Reserve is a wholly distinctive community that helped advance important principles and practices of suburban development in Maryland during the postwar period. Criterion C: Distinctive characteristics of a type, period, or method of construction or that represent the work of a master, or that possess high artistic values, or that represent a significant and distinguishable entity whose components lack individual distinction. Architecture: The Moyaone Reserve Historic District is significant at the local level under National Register Criterion C and Criterion Consideration G in the area of Architecture for the period 1946