Historic Districts Interactive Guide: Text Version

Introduction

Quakers settled Taylorstown in the 1730s on the Catoctin Creek. The district features early log and stone buildings through late 19th century Victorian architecture. The heart of the District is the 18th century stone mill, now a residence; and "Hunting Hill," which served as the miller's home. It is one of the earliest standing structures in the County. By request of village property owners, the County designated Taylorstown as a historic district in 1976. It is listed in the National Register of Historic Places.

District History

Narrator: Taylorstown is home to one of the oldest structures in the county. This stone mill is the heart of the community and represents a lifestyle long past.

John Lewis: Well, it was a milling community and quite frequently the miller was the only one who took grain to, say, Baltimore. So, if you wanted to do any banking or had any business to attend to, he would do it for you. It was just a normal village of people living an agricultural life.

Narrator: And that life was not easy.

John Lewis: Six or eight cords of wood they had to cut to get through the winter, by hand; and cut the fence post by hand; and cut the rails and split 'em by hand; and plow with a horse. That's why they had the meetings, it was the only time they saw anybody else. As a rule, most of their life was spent where they were, preparing food, preserving food, growing food and raising animals, they were pretty self-sufficient.

Preservation

Ann Larson: So, in the 1970s, I think '74, the Army Corps of Engineers and the Fairfax County Water Authority decided to investigate Catoctin Creek as a possible feeder lake. The creek would be dammed down stream from here, downstream from Taylorstown, and it would become a feeder lake. This whole area would have been under water. All of the historic, all of these homes, including the mill, would be under water. So, the person who lived here at the time, it had been turned into a house, Phil Erenkranz was a lawyer, and Miss Anna, who also lived in the oldest standing stone house in Loudoun County, and the two of them realized that if they worked hard and got the community together it could become an historic district. And, at the same time, the creek itself would be a state scenic river with the provision that you could not dam the creek. We needed to have everything documented and John Lewis was the one who helped us, and those three people made it possible that we were then protected in that way. And it took seven years for this all to come true but the Army Corps of Engineers simply went on to other places, to other things. We put up too much of a fight, and we're all proud of it to this day. And look at what we have to show. Here is this beautiful mill. It's always been the center of Taylorstown.

New Construction

Ray Cheronis: You know, what really is upsetting is when I see houses today and the houses are just, the dormers are oversized and everything. It's just architecturally correct. I mean it has a rhythm to it. And if you don't have the rhythm you can say, jeez they tried and they missed, but I was very careful. Even the [unknown] and all of that, the shutters, all that, the new shutters that I put on. I was very, very careful, and the siding, the right measurement for the siding, and the beading to the siding.

Narrator: Little else has been done to the properties in Taylorstown since the turn of the previous century. Any modifications to these historic structures have been in keeping with the county's guidelines.

Waterford Historic District

Introduction
District History
Preservation
New Construction

Introduction

A prosperous Quaker mill town settled in the 1730s, Waterford boasts examples of nearly every popular architectural style through the early 20th century. Waterford was designated a National Historic Landmark in 1970. Loudoun County created the local historic district in 1972 to preserve the historic architecture and streetscapes of the district, while accommodating the needs of a growing village community.

District History

Narrator: Settled in the 1730's, Waterford is a time capsule of life in the 18th and 19th centuries. It's a perfect example of the typical Quaker village, with highly concentrated houses surrounded by farmland, that is different from areas settled by other groups in Virginia. Yet it's Waterford's role in African American history that makes it so unique.

Brown Morton: By and large, most Quaker families strongly disapproved of slavery. And there is a lot of information in the meeting minutes of the Fairfax meeting, which was the Waterford Quaker gathering, discussing the issue of slavery and how it did not fit with Quaker ideals.

Bronwen Souder: Although we did have slaves, Virginia was a slave state, there were many free blacks. Where the proportion of slave to free was maybe five to one for slaves in Loudoun County, it was five to one free in Waterford.

Narrator: In fact, Waterford became a destination for freedmen and runaway slaves alike in the years prior to the civil war. In keeping with these sympathies, Waterford has the distinction of being one of the only southern villages sympathetic to the Union during the war. The miller at the time, Samuel Means, even organized a union regiment known as the Loudoun Rangers, pictured here at a reunion in the 1920s. Today, a small cottage stands at the bottom of Main Street that seems to embody the egalitarian spirit of Waterford.

Brown Morton: After emancipation, the family that had lived in that house as slaves, picked it up and got the owners permission to move it to Waterford and build it again right next to the mill, it's a teenie little, log house, right next to the mill in a new location. And so they brought the building and their story and placed it in a new context.

Narrator: This little cottage, the John Wesley Church and the Second Street School stand as living monuments to the African American Heritage in this historic village.

Preservation

Brown Morton: I am convinced that by preserving places such as the historic districts of Loudoun County provides an anchor for our citizens where they can understand the roots of the place they live, buy into the story, see that they too are part of that story building the latest chapter in a long story, and that that kind of connectedness helps people to do, what I like to call, "bursting into full bloom." And I think that historic preservation, by keeping the setting together and keeping the story alive and honest, helps that larger goal of promoting successful human development. Historic preservation, all by itself, cut off from that deeper objective, to me, makes no sense.

Kathy Middleton: All you have to do is come to Waterford during the fair. When you come and you see children actually seeing old places, and you can see in their eyes that they're understanding that this was here a long time ago, they don't know what 200 years is but they know it was a long time ago, and things begin to click. One of the primary reasons that I would be willing to take on a project like this is that I know, in a hundred years, it's still going to look the same. I mean, it's a beautiful place. We can walk to the top of the hill and we can look for acres and acres and not see anything, and I know in ten years and it'll still be the same. That's huge, especially in the day and age with all the development. I mean, I think that's priceless, frankly.

New Construction

Kathy Middleton: Actually, originally I didn't realize I had the option of stone and so initially , in the first drawings, we put the hyphen in a siding which it still will be on the front, to kind of delineate the difference between the brick, the old brick, and the new addition. But then I found out that it was acceptable to use stone, and with all the stone that was here from old foundations of other buildings I decided that by far the best look would be to have stone be the largest part. I think once it is completely finished, we'll have a really great feeling that it's been here for a long, long time.

Rob Hale: It's not about the person moving in. It's about the house and how it evolves because of you and re-establishes itself, re-defines itself in the context of its community. So your actions, as a steward, come to bear on that house, in that place, in that community, and that's how you become a part of it, just as all the countless generations and all the other people have brought their ideas, their notions of living the good life in this, in a community such as this, and that's what knits it all together.

Margaret Good: I always refer to historic districts as sort of a quilt, and each piece is an integral part of that quilt, and just like if you keep pulling pieces out you're going to lose it, if you keep adding in the wrong pieces you're also going to put it at risk.

Goose Creek Historic District

Introduction
District History
Preservation
New Construction

Introduction

Goose Creek and the village of Lincoln were settled in the 1730s. Lincoln is graced with late 18th and early 19th century meeting houses and simple Victorian structures. Quaker settlers built stone and brick structures on family farms south of Lincoln and north of Beaverdam Creek. Many are still owned by their descendants. By request of district property owners, Goose Creek Rural Historic District was adopted by the County in 1977 and expanded in 2005. The 11,000-acre district is listed in the National Register of Historic Places.

District History

Narrator: The area around Goose Creek was settled in the 1730s by Quakers migrating primarily from Pennsylvania. The village of Goose Creek, now known as Lincoln, grew up around the Quaker meetinghouses that still stand today. This was an extremely important area in colonial times.

Asa Moore Janney: From here to Westminster, Maryland was the finest wheat-growing country in the United States. We were known as the breadbasket at that time. Just think! Revolutionary War, we were known as the breadbasket of America. It's hard to realize.

Narrator: That importance continued through the civil war, so much so that the Union army set fire to nearly every barn in Loudoun County.

Jean Brown: Bill's grandparents, during the Civil War, were sitting out in the front field counting the fires across the horizon. And at that moment a hawk flew overhead. They told their son to go and shoot the hawk. He fired two shots. They learned the next day that General Sheridan's men were coming down the road to burn this barn and heard the two shots and turned and went the other way because they thought Mosby was lying in wait for them, and they would be outnumbered. So this barn is one of the few pre-Civil War.

Narrator: This historic area, still inhabited by descendants of the original settlers, was nearly flooded in the late 20th century.

John Lewis: Goose Creek was threatened with a dam. So I took this quad-map and outlined exactly what would be impounded if that dam had been built down below Oatlands, and put the property names of the people that would be impounded. I showed it to then Asa Moore Janney who had the store and post office there in Lincoln, and he just looked and said "you just let me put this in the meeting house and I'll get you signatures from the Quakers."

Narrator: In 1977 Groose Creek Rural Historic District was adopted by Loudoun County at the request of a majority of property owners within the district.

Preservation

John Lewis: In the 1970s and 80s there were just an incredible number of original 1740s log and stone story-and-a-half buildings, mostly with the original fabric in it to which a later generation added a two-story stone house in the 1820s.

Jean Brown: People ask me, "Why do we have to be in a historic district?" Well the answer it that we live in a special place. And this gives a designation to it that it deserves. And on a building in Washington there is inscribed on the outside, "What is past is prologue." In other words, if we don't know where we've been, how do we know where we're going. So it's important to preserve these historic landscapes in my view. And once farmland is gone, it's gone forever. You can't break up a concrete parking lot and put a cornfield out there again.

Lynne Updegrove: Well I think that we are stewards of the land. You know, this is a one-shot deal, this is all we get. So we do need to take care of it. And once we've created something that's not desirable, it's going to be there for a long time. So it's much better to really consider what you're doing and try and stay in the character of what surrounds you rather than create something that's out of place.

David Updegrove: This area's so rich in history, too, and to think that that'll be lost in the areas that aren't concerned with preserving and keeping that link with the past. It's a shame for future generations to not be concerned about maintaining that. So we're proud to be part of that.

New Construction

Lynne Updegrove: Well, we'd been looking for property for many years, found this beautiful property and planned to build a barn first with an apartment and then build the house a little bit later, and it got stuck. [laugh] We couldn't get our permit. We didn't know why, and found out that we were in a historic district and needed to go through a process in order to get a building permit.

David Updegrove: I initially thought that it was kinda neat to be part of a historic property and was curious to know what it meant. I didn't really think it would mean anything in terms of what we wanted to do with the property.

Lynne Updegrove: We had had a house designed, drawn up. And they said, "It's not going to work." It's too much of a European-looking house and we want more of a colonial-type house. And we couldn't see how we were going to really change it into what we wanted, something with some character. But someone suggested on the committee that we start all over again. So that's what we did. Well, I think we appreciate the historic district and we appreciate things staying, you know, in an old type of way. We don't want to see a bunch of modern houses, and we appreciate them being able to be stewards of the old houses, and stewards of the land in general. Once you build a house it's going to be there for a long time and it changes the flavor of the community forever. They're not so rigid that they won't let you do something that you really, really want. But you do have to present an argument. But I think it's to everyone's advantage who is building a house in a historic district to really learn the guidelines.

David Updegrove: One of the real advantages of having several architects on that review group was getting some, really some improvements made to the original design of the house. They were helpful from a structural standpoint and a functional standpoint beyond what we were even expecting.

Lynne Updegrove: The houses that are built that are not in character are going to be very difficult to sell and they certainly aren't going to appreciate in value the way that something that blends in more with the area is going to. It's a great asset to be able to stick with the character of your surroundings.

Oatlands Historic District

Introduction
District History
Preservation
New Construction

Introduction

On land given to him by his father in 1798, George Carter built a Georgian style house with Classical Revival additions, including accessory structures and an elaborate garden. Oatlands grew into a small community with a post office, mill, school and church. All but the mill exist, and form the basis of the historic district. A National Historic Landmark, Oatlands was designated as a local Historic District by Loudoun County in 1972. Easements limit new construction, with renovation as the central focus in the District.

District History

Narrator: Oatlands plantation is a unique historic property with national significance. It was started as a wheat plantation by George Carter, a descendant of Robert King Carter, who was thought to be the wealthiest colonial planter until his death in the 1670s.

David Boyce: Young George came here and began to build this magnificent mansion behind us which started as a Georgian house but would later be expanded by young George to reflect it's current Greek revival appearance.

Narrator: George Carter developed quite a lucrative wheat plantation here. In fact, this part of Virginia was known as "King Wheat" in colonial times.

David Boyce: Mr. Carter would export wheat to Europe in the aftermath of the Napoleonic Wars. While construction on this building was going on, Oatlands also saw the construction of additional dependencies, one of which is the oldest restored propagation greenhouse in the country, built in 1810 by George Carter. In all Oatlands has some twenty-five structures under roof, which is really quite something. While it also features an extraordinary four-acre English Terrace garden that is on the east side of the mansion.

Preservation

David Boyce: Oatlands' contribution to the economic development of Loudoun County is truly significant. We are considered Loudoun's most popular tourist attraction. We had some 40,000 visitors last year. Of course those visitors all need to find overnight lodging, they need gasoline, they like attending local events as well as dining in all the local restaurants. So, obviously our contribution to the economic welfare of this county is significant. Now the question then you need to ask is why do they come to Oatlands? And the answer is obvious. It's because of our unspoiled view-shed, our unparalleled ambiance, our interpretation of this wonderful property as a nineteenth century wheat plantation and its authenticity. And this is why preservation pays. And we want to ensure that our visitors today who are greeted by this unspoiled view-shed and can readily envision how this was a successful wheat plantation in the nineteenth century. We want to ensure that our visitors have an authentic experience in their feeling and their knowledge of how life was in the nineteenth century.

New Construction

Narrator: Many properties in the Oatlands Historic District are owned by families who have lived there for generations and very little new construction has occurred. Nevertheless, maintaining the architectural integrity of the area is still a major concern for residents and visitors alike.

David Boyce: As good stewards of this property we want to ensure that future generations have an equally wonderful experience. And in order to do that we have to be very sensitive to future development and what impact it would have on Oatlands, which trickles down, of course, to the visitors' experience of what Oatlands is all about.

Aldie Historic District

Introduction
District History
Preservation
New Construction

Introduction

The village of Aldie grew around the 1807 mill built by Charles Fenton Mercer, now the centerpiece of the Historic District. With the adjacent Mercer House, it was listed in the National Register of Historic Places in 1970 and designated as a local district by the County in 1972. In 1978, at the request of property owners, the local district was expanded to include most of the architecture along Route 50, which includes early 19th century Federal style brick residences and simple 19th and early 20th century wood frame structures.

District History

Narrator: From its grand federal-style manors to its simple frame houses, the architecture in the village of Aldie reflects the rich history of the original settlers and those who made their living here over the centuries.

Brenda Branscome: This was not a German Quaker community like the northwest part of Loudoun County. The people were more of English descent, and it was reflected in the churches here. We have a Presbyterian church, an Episcopalian church, a Methodist church, so I think that sort of reflects people's backgrounds.

Murrell Partlow: This property here belonged to Charles Fenton Mercer. And, somewhere between 1807 and 1809, he decided to build a mill here. And the village of Aldie developed around the mill.

Narrator: Named after Mercer's family castle in Scotland, Aldie, with its mill, was a major industrial center in Loudoun County throughout the 19th century. And it was a strategic area during the Civil War.

Brenda Branscome: There was significant activity at Aldie Mill all through the Civil War. There were a lot of skirmishes and chases up and down the turnpike here. One of the stories is that Southern troops chased General Custer into the Little River, where he fell off his horse. When he got up the Confederates said, "He looks just like one of us!" because his uniform wasn't blue anymore, it was grey just like theirs.

Narrator: In 1972, citizens of the village successfully petitioned the county to make Aldie a historic district.

Brenda Branscome: The people here wanted to preserve their heritage. They wanted to preserve what we had. It was worth doing, and it was worth getting the protection that the county zoning ordinance offers.

Narrator: The mill stayed in operation until 1981, and has been beautifully restored.

Preservation

Tucker Withers: People love coming into this village and seeing these buildings from 1810, that is not contrived. And it leads to a great place to visit, but I'd like to talk about a great place to live. Our kids grew up here and they knew the buildings by "The Carter Home" or "The Rectory" or "The Mercer House." So one day we go to visit somebody in the eastern part of the county, and they have a street address. And our kids said, "We had no idea that people had street addresses, we thought everybody's house was given a name." And so that's kind of part of history that we take for granted, our kids took for granted. And they've lived in a house that's 1810 with walls that are nineteen inches thick, eighteen inches thick. And they go visit somebody else's house, and they're just fascinated about how cheap the construction is, shall we say. But it is true. And at times they will complain about living in an "antique. When they go visit the new subdivisions where the houses are ten feet apart, they say, "Boy, I'm glad I live where I live."

Brenda Branscome: One of the really neat things is that we have the 1853 mill ledger. The wonderful thing about that document is the fact that all of those names that you see over and over again in that register are family names that are still here today. So the ties are long and they're deep, and we're protecting a really long history here. And it's really nice to see these families still having, they're still here today and they're still here having children and that's a wonderful, wonderful thing.

New Construction

Tucker Withers: We bought this one in 1985, started restoring it, have three kids. We ran out of room, and we wanted to add on to the house, but couldn't figure out how to do it and save the oak tree. We pulled in Dana Malone, who was the tree expert in Loudoun County for a number of years. Dana came down and said, "That tree is 200 years old, if you put a foundation too close to it, you could lose it." So we came over here and found this location to build an addition. We went through the historic district review committee three times to get the approval. Now if you do something, as we say, "in kind," you replace a nine over six window with a nine over six window, you don't go before them. But if you make any exterior improvements, including a sign or anything that is different on the building, you have to go before them. And I do see a need for it because it creates a village that you're very proud of, and you're happy to walk down and look at the other buildings and say, "Hey, if that wasn't a historic district somebody might have really done something else to it."

Brenda Branscome: It keeps the unique character of the village when you don't have inappropriate structures being built. And it's a cohesiveness, a visual cohesiveness, that's really important. And if your property looks good, my property looks good. It keeps the context of the village more pristine. And it certainly is good for your property value.

Bluemont Historic District

Introduction
District History
Preservation
New Construction

Introduction

Originally named Snickersville after an early landowner, the village of Bluemont was settled in the early 19th century at the foot of the Blue Ridge Mountains, flourishing in the late 19th and early 20th century as a summer retreat for city dwellers. The architecture includes early stone and log structures, through the late 19th century Victorian styles. After a petition by several village property owners, the County adopted the local Bluemont Historic District in 1988, and is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.

District History

Narrator: The village of Bluemont is situated at the foot of the Blue Ridge Mountains along the historic Snickersville Turnpike which has a history older than America.

Henry Plaster: The turnpike and the road through Bluemont was the original Indian hunting ground path. And so they not only moved east and west but they hunted along here. In the early days also George Washington used this in the 1750s to visit his relatives in the county beyond. The village itself was started and incorporated in 1807.

Narrator: In 1824 the village was officially named Snickersville after Edward Snickers who ran the ferry across the Shenandoah. The turnpike was well traveled all through the 19th century in fact the stagecoach ran through the village twice a day.

Henry Plaster: The heyday of Bluemont began July 4th, 1900, when what's now the W&OD railroad opened its terminus here in Bluemont. And it was subsequent to that, actually in 1907, that the post office changed the name from Snickersville to Bluemont, that being to entice more summer visitors to a better sounding name for the village. Unfortunately, the automobile came shortly after that, 1920s, 1930s, and all the summer visitors tended to whiz by in their automobiles. Also, the depression had some effect on the village. So it's really today a sleepy village in the same style it was for the last two hundred years.

Preservation

Henry Plaster: What has happened here, is that it used to be small farms, mostly dairy farms. Loudoun County was the largest, I'm told, the largest milk-producing county in the United States in the 1950s. That's just 50 years ago. Today, there is one dairy farm in Loudoun County. And that's too bad. People don't have an opportunity to get out and learn about rural areas today, and 50, 100 years ago. Because it was the heart of the United States, and here you can see it close hand within 50 miles of Washington, DC.

New Construction

Narrator: Relatively little new construction has occurred in Bluemont since it was adopted as a historic district in 1988. The historic homes vary from the stone structures of the earliest settlers to the Victorian homes that represent Bluemont's heyday. Modifications that have been done, like this porch addition, were handled with sensitivity to the architecture of the house and the surrounding buildings of this historic village.