Alliance for Historic Landscape Preservation (AHLP) Annual Meeting

AHLP 2013 Annual Meeting
Lynchburg, Virginia
20-23 March 2013
Resilience, Renewal, and Renaissance: Keeping Cultural Landscapes Relevant

The Alliance for Historic Landscape Preservation is excited to hold its 2013 annual meeting in the Virginia Piedmont. From March 20 through March 23, we will explore regional landscapes, both urban and rural, and hear from local experts and advocates. The Virginia Piedmont is in the heart of Virginia and is rich in natural beauty and American history.

We will be based in Lynchburg, Virginia, which began as a ferry landing in 1757 operated by John Lynch. Lynch’s Ferry became an important center of trade during the American Revolution, and Lynch established a town on the hill overlooking the ferry site. Our primary venue will be the Craddock Terry Hotel and Event Center, the original home of the Craddock-Terry Shoe Corporation, which at its peak, was the country’s fifth largest shoe manufacturer. Visitors will enjoy both the shoes that accent the hotel and its dog, Buster Brown, whom can be reserved for walks.

The Alliance will also visit the University of Virginia in Charlottesville. A leader in the Enlightenment, Jefferson founded the University of Virginia at the age of 76. Thomas Jefferson “envisioned a new kind of university, one dedicated to educating leaders in practical affairs and public service rather than for professions in the classroom and pulpit exclusively.”iiiIn addition to developing the curriculum and hiring the faculty, he “designed the Academical Village, a terraced green space surrounded by residential and academic buildings, gardens, and the majestic center-point – the Rotunda.”ivHe wished the school to have a national character and stature and considered the founding of the University to be one of his greatest achievements. The university, which served as a model for universities across America, is a designated National Historic Landmark district and World Heritage Site.

In addition to two of Jefferson’s landmarks, the Alliance will also visit sites in Lynchburg, including local historic districts, the Lynchburg Community Market, the Old City Cemetery, and the Anne Spencer House. Anne Spencer was a poet, a civil rights activist, a teacher, librarian, wife and mother, and a gardener. An important person in the African-American literary and cultural movement of the 1920s, her house and garden have been designated a Virginia Historic Landmark, a Historic Landmark by the Association for the Study for Afro-American Life and History, and listed in the National Register of Historic Places.v The Alliance will also tour the rural historic districts in Albemarle and Nelson Counties along Highway 29 between Lynchburg and Charlottesville.

For more information, click on the Call for Papers and/or Student Scholarships.
Click here for tentative conference SCHEDULE and other pertinent information.