Rapidan Camp: Cultural Landscapes Inventory, Shenandoah National Park
Killion J. 2025. Rapidan Camp: Cultural Landscapes Inventory, Shenandoah National Park. Cultural Landscapes Inventory Report. 300126. National Park Service. NPS Northeast Regional Office, Boston, Massachusetts / CRIS-CL Database
Rapidan Camp is the former retreat and “summer White House” of President Herbert Hoover, situated on a level area of land at the headwaters of the Rapidan River, in a remote and rugged area of Shenandoah National Park (NP) in Virginia. The site, a designated National Historic Landmark, today encompasses approximately 106 acres and is accessed by Rapidan Road, which connects to Skyline Drive at Big Meadows. Development at the site began in 1929, and of the thirteen original buildings three still exist, as do trails, paths, stone footbridges, a stone fountain, a massive outdoor stone fireplace, and man-made water channel and trout pool. Many of these features have been preserved and restored to convey the camp’s original function, appearance, appeal, and significance. There are also remnants of other Hoover-era buildings and infrastructure throughout the camp, as well as old barbeque pits and other structures from when the site was maintained and used by the Boy Scouts from 1948 to 1958. Since the mid-1990s, storm events and diseases have caused a dramatic loss of the towering hemlocks and other trees that historically shaded the site, and now there is considerably more sunlight and understory vegetation growth. As requested by Hoover when he deeded the property to the Commonwealth of Virginia in 1933 for eventual incorporation into Shenandoah NP, Rapidan Camp can be still be used by the President and his administration, though only one since Hoover’s term has done so.
- Type
- Published Report
- Authors
- Killion, Jeff
- Date of Issue
- 2025
- Publisher
- National Park Service
- Units
- NER , SHEN
- Keywords
- Boys Scout of America, camp, Camp Hoover, Government Office, Herbert Hoover, Historic Designed Landscape, Polical and Military Affairs, Politics, Presidential Retreat, President's Camp, Recreation, Skyline Drive, The Creel, The Great Depression, The New Deal, The President, The Prime Minister, Virginia