Booker T. Washington NM Landscape: Cultural Landscapes Inventory, Booker T. Washington National Monument
Killion J and von Bieberstein A. 2026. Booker T. Washington NM Landscape: Cultural Landscapes Inventory, Booker T. Washington National Monument. Cultural Landscapes Inventory Report. 300025. National Park Service. NPS Northeast Regional Office, Boston, Massachusetts / CRIS-CL Database
The Booker T. Washington National Monument (NM) is located in Franklin County, Virginia, twenty-two miles south of Roanoke. Established in 1956, the 239.01-acre park commemorates the birthplace of America’s most prominent African American educator and orator of the late-nineteenth and early-twentieth centuries. The property evokes an 1850s middle class tobacco farm, representative of Booker T. Washington’s enslaved childhood at the Burroughs farm. Washington was born in 1856 to the family’s cook, Jane, and lived on the farm through the end of the Civil War. The park contains a visitor center, administrative offices located within a former elementary school building, an 1890s tobacco barn, reconstructed and replica agricultural outbuildings, two marked archeological sites, three small cemeteries, and two walking trails that loop back through the historic core of the property. Twentieth-century replicas include a kitchen cabin/slave cabin, smokehouse, blacksmith shed, hog pen, duck lot, and chicken house. All replicas are highly conjectural; their designs are derived from anecdotal evidence and regional precedent. The local landscape is characterized by rolling topography, agricultural fields, and substantial wood lots typical of this part of Virginia’s Piedmont region. The park has traditionally been located in a remote area of southwestern Virginia but recent growth from nearby Rocky Mount and Smith Mountain Lake have placed development pressures on the region. While the local landscape used to be almost entirely agricultural, suburban, retail, and service-oriented growth is pressing in from several directions. The landscape directly abutting the park retains its rural character, keeping the integrity of setting fairly high. However, the park will need to work closely with the surrounding community to protect its rural context.
- Type
- Published Report
- Authors
- Killion, Jeffrey; von Bieberstein, Alexandra
- Date of Issue
- 2026
- Publisher
- National Park Service
- Units
- BOWA , NER
- Keywords
- Abolishment of Slavery, Abolitionism, Agricultural Field, Agricultural Outbuilding, Agriculture, Archeology, Architecture, Birthplace Memorial, Black, Booker T. Washington Birthplace Memorial, Booker T. Washington National Monument (BOWA NM), Burroughs Farm, Burroughs Plantation, Campground/Picnic Area, Cemetery, Civil Rights Movements, Conservation of Natural Resources, Creating Social Institutions and Movements, Developing the American Economy, Education, Educational Related Housing, Elementary, Ethnic Heritage, Expressing Cultural Values, Farm (Plantation), Historic Preservation Movement, Historic Site, Historic-Non-Aboriginal, Horticulture Facility, Intermediate and Secondary Education, Leisure-Passive (Park), Multiple Dwelling-Other, Museum (Exhibition Hall)-Other, NPS Mission 66, Origin and Development of the National Park Service, Plantation Agriculture, Politics – Government, School, Shaping the Political Landscape, Single Family House, Slavery and Plantation Life, Social and Humanitarian Movements, The Civil War, Transforming the Environment, Vernacular Architecture., Vocational Training, Ways of Life