Prince George's County: Prince George's rich architectural heritage was recognized as early as 1936, when the Historic American Buildings Survey photographed some ninety-seven early structures; today only sixty-five of those buildings are still standing. It was losses such as those thirty-two landmarks, and neglect of places such as Bowieville, Melwood Park, and the Ammendale Normal Institute, that galvanized county citizens into action. Now the county's landmarks are protected by a preservation ordinance and historic preservation master plan approved in 1981.
As the examples here show, historic buildings and communities provide the binding that connects the strands of our history. Houses, churches, schools, neighborhoods, farms, and historic landscapes all create the most tangible context for understanding an area's history and establish a link to the past. Landmarks provide a source of personal and communal memory and embody our architectural heritage.
Owners of historic properties in the county are partners in the stewardship of our cultural legacy, protecting and caring for their buildings so that they can be useful for years to come. The landmarks pictured in Landmarks of Prince George's County History are both privately and publicly owned and represent a cross section of the county's history: plantation houses and dependencies, farmhouses, tobacco barns, churches, meeting halls, a country store, a bridge, a train station.
Before the enactment of the county's preservation law providing for shared stewardship of our heritage, protection for historic properties usually came through acquisition by the county planning agency, the Maryland-National Capital Park and Planning Commission. The commission acquired historic properties as early as 1949, often because an important landmark was threatened with demolition or because the property was on land needed for another purpose. Today it owns two dozen historic properties.
PROTECTING COUNTY LANDMARKS
In 1969, three years after passage of the watershed National Historic Preservation Act, the commission undertook a survey of historic properties, identifying and mapping 186 in Prince George's County. The commission and the Maryland Historical Trust (the state historic preservation office) funded a project in 1973 to expand the 1969 inventory into a full-scale survey and to develop proposals for protection of the properties inventoried. This larger "windshield" survey, conducted between 1973 and 1975, identified more than 550 properties in Prince George's County. The 1975 survey was the basis for the listing of historic properties in the 1981 Historic Sites and Districts Plan.
When this plan and the preservation ordinance were approved in 1981, a nine-member Historic Preservation Commission was appointed to represent a wide variety of interests and disciplines. The preservation commission evaluates properties listed in an inventory of historic resources and can designate them as historic sites or historic districts. Designation decisions may be appealed to the Prince George's County Council. The commission also defines environmental settings; reviews and approves plans for exterior alteration, demolition, and new construction; and approves property tax credits for restoration and for new construction in historic districts.
Under companion legislation, the Historic Preservation Commission reviews land-use proposals affecting historic resources and makes recommendations to the Prince George's County Planning Board and County Council. Additional legislation passed in 1989 protects historic sites and their settings when land is being subdivided. Historic cemeteries are protected by a similar law. In 1992 the Historic Sites and Districts Plan was amended, adding thirty properties as historic sites and seventy-six as historic resources. Today more than 250 properties are designated as county historic sites, along with one historic district, the Broad Creek Historic District.
Prince George's County's preservation program has received the strong support of the county government, with staff assistance provided through two sections of the Maryland- National Capital Park and Planning Commission. The History Division in the commission's Parks and Recreation Department manages the restoration and interpretation of historic properties in the county park system; it also maintains research programs on archeology and black history. The Historic Preservation Section of the commission's Planning Department provides staff support to the Historic Preservation Commission, producing research on properties and historic communities, preparing materials for commissioners' review at public hearings, inspecting permit and tax credit applications, and continuing site and community survey work.
Federal Certified Local Government grants to support the Historic Preservation Commission have assisted in a survey and research program, covering more than 200 properties; research reports on towns, villages, historic roads, and landscapes; and preparation of more than twenty nominations to the National Register of Historic Places, including a nomination for a significant portion of a small city (Mount Rainier). Sixty individual county properties as well as four districts are listed in the National Register. In addition to the oldest sites, the county preservation program recognizes the importance of early to mid-twentieth- century architecture -- from Sears, Roebuck mail-order houses to gas stations and the first suburban shopping centers.
A PRESERVATION PARTNERSHIP
The Historic Preservation Commission works closely with two county-wide volunteer organizations, Prince George's Heritage, Inc., and the Prince George's County Historical and Cultural Trust. Prince George's Heritage took on the ownership and restoration of the Hilleary-Magruder House in Bladensburg; Heritage volunteers inspect protective easements on historic properties held by the Maryland Historical Trust and award seed grants for research and restoration projects. The Historical and Cultural Trust, the owner of Addison Chapel, has volunteers who operate the Newel Post, a salvage center where reusable architectural elements may be purchased.
Another long-standing preservation affiliate is the Prince George's County Historical Society, founded in 1952 and now headquartered at historic Marietta, owned by the Maryland-National Capital Park and Planning Commission. The society maintains a library of county history, publishes a monthly newsletter, and holds programs and special events for members, as well as guided tours and educational activities for the public at Marietta.
Reminders of the past are all around us. Throughout Prince George's County interest in preserving our long and varied legacy of historic sites and neighborhoods is growing. The challenges lying ahead for all of us include finding ways to provide support and incentives to owners of historic places, to preserve appropriate settings around historic sites even when zoning pressures tend to promote development, and to encourage preservation and conservation in older communities of the county. We have a unique heritage to preserve.
Learn more about
Three Hundred Years of County History,
Architecture: from Tidewater to Modern,
or return to the top of
this page.
Special thanks to
Prince George's County
Historic Preservation Commission
Maryland-National Capital Parks and
Planning Commission
14741 Governor Oden Bowie Dr.
Upper Marlboro,
MD
20772
(301)952-3520.
for letting us use these excerpts from Landmarks of Prince
George's County History -- available in local libraries.
