Last updated: September 9, 2023
Article
Celebrating the Volunteer Tradition at Longfellow House-Washington's Headquarters National Historic Site
Located near Cambridge, Massachusetts’ historic Harvard Square, the tall shade trees and variety of residences that line Brattle Street are part of its historic character. A stately yellow house, set back from the street, shares a colonial design with others in its neighborhood and yet attracts attention. Sweeping walkways, grand trees, and lush gardens surround it, adding to its sense of dignity. For those new to the area, the national park sign outside the house might hint at the site's importance. To locals and those familiar with the house and its history, the Longfellow House-Washington's Headquarters National Historic Site gardens are filled with beauty and wonder.
In addition to the history it interprets, the site is committed to serving as a community space open to all. Longfellow House connects through a variety of community events like Juneteenth and Pride, and continues to celebrate the arts with concerts, tours, and poetry readings. The volunteers who work in the Longfellow House’s garden are an important part of its community, and their service is an important part of its preservation.
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Landscape History
Though it eventually came to be known as the Longfellow House, the house at 105 Brattle Street was originally built in 1759, and it had a rich history before Longfellow lived there. After the English Loyalist for whom it was built fled Cambridge, Massachusetts during the Revolutionary War, George Washington used the empty house as his headquarters during the Siege of Boston. Later, the house changed hands several times until the 1820s, when its owner Elizabeth Craigie, began renting out rooms. Her most notable tenant was Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, who eventually became the house's longest-standing resident.
NPS / Museum Collection (LONG 4439)
The most famous American poet of the early nineteenth century, Longfellow connected deeply with the house's colonial history and was especially inspired by its relationship to Washington. Longfellow found the house’s setting and landscape inspiring, and when he first visited, he was especially impressed by its view of the Charles River. “The window blinds were closed but through them came a pleasant breeze and I could see the waters of the Charles River gleaming in the meadows.”[1] When Longfellow married, his father-in-law purchased the house as a wedding gift and included the land that lay between the house and the Charles River to preserve this precious view. Longfellow also loved the house’s garden and its trees, expressing joy when they thrived and sorrow when cankerworms or over pruning damaged them.
Early Preservation Efforts and Community Involvement
In 1847, Longfellow commissioned the English designer Richard Dolben to design a formal garden for the house. His daughter Alice Longfellow commissioned two redesigns: One by Martha Brooks Hutcheson in the early 1900s, and another by Ellen Biddle Shipman in the 1920s. The garden received limited maintenance after Alice’s death and during the twenty-year transition from family home to historic site. By the early 2000s, the garden had declined, despite diligent efforts to maintain what remained of Alice's 1920s garden.
Longfellow's fame as a national poet endowed the house with a new layer of history. Longfellow remained in the house until his death in 1882, and various descendants lived there until 1950. Conscious of his legacy, his heirs worked to preserve the home and its gardens as a tribute to the poet's memory. Other members of the Cambridge community agreed with the Longfellow family that the house's ornate formal gardens were an essential part of the site's interpretation, legacy, and pride. Acknowledging its importance, the Cambridge Plant & Garden Club (CP&GC) volunteered to preserve the garden in memory of Longfellow and Washington.
In the decades before and after the property was transferred to the National Park Service in 1973, CP&GC volunteers were dedicated to maintaining the historical feel of the site's landscape and gardens and its many original shrubs and trees. Now, the National Park Service maintains the garden as it looked in the 1920s. In the early 2000s, the Friends of the Longfellow House, an independent group that helps support the site, mounted a successful fundraising campaign to restore the gardens. This restoration relied on the 1997 Cultural Landscape Report, a document that uses historic sources to recommends preservation and maintenance for the formal garden. This campaign culminated a garden restoration from 2003-2007.
The Longfellow House's strong connection to local gardeners and volunteer groups continues today, and the site offers many opportunities through the NPS Volunteers-in-Parks (VIP) program. Local garden clubs recognize the beauty and historic value of the landscape and volunteer their time to help care for the gardens. Massachusetts Master Gardeners, who commit to gardening education, certification, and service hours, count Longfellow House as one of their service and internship locations. Independent volunteer gardeners and Master Gardeners visit weekly between April and October to help the site’s staff gardener Chris Noris and landscape management interns realize the cultural landscape report’s vision. Every spring, the CP&GC comes back to help deadhead lilacs as well.
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Volunteer Stories
"When I learned the site has been referring to historical archives and blueprints to maintain the original appearance of the garden as much as possible, accurate to every species and variety, I deeply felt the close connection between our volunteer work and history." Master Gardener and volunteer Jane Li
Courtesy of Jane Li
Several Longfellow House garden volunteers shared stories about their connection to the site, their experience working there, and how they got involved.[2] They also described what aspects of the site or its landscape made them feel most connected to its history. Each volunteer voiced their appreciation for the site and its garden on several different levels.
Since many volunteers live in urban Cambridge or Boston, the Longfellow House garden is a space to connect with a type of gardening that other areas of the city don’t usually support. It’s also a place where volunteers can connect to both local and national history and become active stewards in preserving it for the future.
"...all the beauty and joy that gardening brings to the gardener"
Lindsay Greimmans, a member of the Cambridge Plant & Garden Club, and community gardener through the site’s Volunteers in Parks program, described how her volunteer experience at the Longfellow Site emerged organically.
“I moved to Cambridge from the Boston suburbs in 2010. The Longfellow House Garden and landscape is part of my neighborhood. I have walked by the house frequently since arriving in Cambridge and it has always been a delight to stop by to enjoy what is blooming in the garden. Ten years ago I joined the Cambridge Plant & Garden Club which has had a long history with the garden. At least one member of the Club has consistently been affiliated with the Friends of Longfellow House. I remember that one spring the Longfellow House hosted one of our Club meetings and following that event we were treated to a tour of the gardens with Mona McKindley [the site’s former staff gardener and current consultant]. That was my first formal introduction.”
Though Lindsay left Cambridge during 2020, her occasional visits back piqued her interest in helping to care for the site. After talking to Chris Beagan, the Longfellow House site manager, she rekindled the relationship between the CP&GC and the Longfellow House with a yearly day of service.
“For the past three springs a group, including myself, has spent a morning deadheading the many lilacs on the property. It has been my pleasure to be the liaison between Longfellow House and the garden club. The pruning has been a lovely way to enjoy the landscape and each other's company. Personally, being the age I am, I always walk away with the sense that I have been one of George W. Bush's ‘thousand points of light’ and I enjoy the feeling that I have contributed to both my neighborhood and my country.”
Lindsay added that the garden provides a welcome outlet to exercise her green thumb.
“I'm really only in Cambridge to help during busier seasons and my schedule has only allowed a limited involvement. However, because I live in a garden-less condominium, I appreciate the opportunity to have the Longfellow House Garden as a city location where I can learn, get my hands dirty, and enjoy all the beauty and joy that gardening brings to the gardener.”
"My favorite locations vary with the blooming season"
Art Kreiger, a Massachusetts Master Gardener, learned about the Longfellow House garden after his certification.
“I became a Master Gardener in 2015. In 2016, my classmate Libby Baylies got Massachusetts Master Gardener Association approval to add Longfellow House to the list of gardens where our hours count for continuing certification. I started volunteering at the Longfellow House in 2017 and have been the Master Gardener Project Manager or co-PM since then."
Art continues to serve as a co-Project Manager for the Master Gardener volunteers at the site. When asked about how he connected to the site’s history, Art noted several specific elements that included plants and parts of the landscape that connected to the site’s former residents.
“My favorite locations vary with the blooming season. I love the lilacs when they're in bloom, the center of the garden when the peonies and irises are, the Napoleon's Cap roses on the pergola when they are, etc. The lilacs evoke the site's history because they were Henry Longfellow’s favorites, and Alice Longfellow's Garden does because she enjoyed sitting there and viewing it from the house."
"We are preserving the history of our country"
Courtesy of Jane Li
Jane Li, a Massachusetts Master Gardener like Art, described how her initial volunteer experiences as a Community Gardener VIP at the Longfellow House began her journey as a Master Gardener.
“Soon after moving to Cambridge in 2007, I visited the Longfellow House, and I really love history. I also enjoyed Sunday events there each summer. In 2018, I saw the news of the recruitment of volunteers for the Longfellow House and signed up. Elliot Doughty, the head gardener, gave me some guidance, and from then on, I became a volunteer gardener. I started working every Thursday and later joined the Master Gardener's workday on Tuesday. As a result, I met some Master Gardeners and Mona McKindley, a consultant for the National Parks, who is the most hardworking and knowledgeable person, and who gives excellent talks on gardening during the break each Tuesday. Through these years, I have learned horticulture and greened up my thumbs. In 2022, I passed the exam and internship requirements and became a certified Master Gardener in MA.”
Jane’s journey didn’t stop at gardening. Through working in the formal garden, she has connected to the history of the site, the people who lived there, and the country.
“Of course, my favorite part is its formal garden. From all angles, the scenery there is different and very interesting. Especially in spring, the exquisite blue and white violet in the rose bed, as well as peonies, poppies and irises, are very beautiful and breath taking. When I learned the site has been referring to historical archives and blueprints to maintain the original appearance of the garden as much as possible, accurate to every species and variety, I deeply felt the close connection between our volunteer work and history. We are preserving the history of our country and nation. This makes me feel very proud and satisfied.
"Every summer when my granddaughters visit, I take them to this garden to participate in voluntary work, allowing them to experience this beautiful historical site. They were very proud to get their junior ranger badges there! In 2019, my 87-year-old mother visited me from China and she enjoyed pruning the lilac trees in Longfellow Garden. I am very grateful for the opportunity to participate in the work of preserving history and contribute my humble efforts to the enjoyment of beautiful gardens and learning of history for future generations. Thanks to the NPS for continuing this voluntary project!”
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The Legacy of Stewardship Continues
Longfellow House-Washington's Headquarters is grateful for the incredible work of volunteers. Volunteer involvement is an important part of life at the Longfellow House, and the National Park Service as a whole. The NPS measures that, “nearly 300,000 volunteers donate more than 6.5 million hours of service in a typical year across the NPS - for a value of more than $185 million.” Longfellow House Volunteer Coordinator Elizabeth Wasson added, “Our garden volunteers are not only an essential part of our mission, but an essential part of the site’s community. In 2022, our VIP program recorded over 50 volunteers in the garden giving nearly 600 hours of service. We are so grateful for the incredible care they take of this very special place each year, and excited to continue to see the program grow.”
If you’d like to join Lindsay, Art, and Jane in preserving the past and present of Longfellow House, you can become a VIP Community Gardener today.
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[1] Longfellow National Historic Site, Volume 1, Site History and Existing Conditions: Cultural Landscape Report, National Park Service, page 27.
[2] Statements from volunteers have been lightly edited for length and clarity.