Frederick Law Olmsted Memorial

The only memorial to the 26th president of the United States in the nation’s capital is a small island in the Potomac River. An architectural memorial and the restored natural landscape surrounding it together form a living memorial to the man known as the “Great Conservationist.” Theodore Roosevelt was the first president to make conservation of America’s natural resources a centerpiece of his domestic policy. For him, wise stewardship of land and wildlife made present and future growth possible. Almost 230 million acres of land came under the protection of the Federal Government during his term in office. Architect Eric Gugler and sculptor Paul Manship created the architectural memorial, with its open plaza and larger than life sized statue. Landscape architect Frederick Law Olmsted, Jr., and his associate Henry Hubbard, created the plan that still guides maintenance of the memorial landscape. Located opposite the busy colonial port of Georgetown, the island itself has a long history. For more than a century, it was "Mason's Island," the home of John Mason, grandson of George Mason of Gunston Hall, and one of the

Frederick Law Olmsted, Jr., assumed primary responsibility for the creation of the plan but received important help from his associate Henry V. Hubbard. The overall goal of the Olmsted plan was the creation of a restored woodland as a living memorial to Theodore Roosevelt. The woodland was to be “a real forest closely similar in character to the natural primeval forests which once covered this and other of the Potomac islands.” From 1934 to 1937, Olmsted directed the young men of the Civilian Conservation Corps in clearing the island of most non-native vegetation and planting about 20,000 native hardwood trees and shrubs. Work came to a halt in the late 1930s and did not resume until after World War