{"nrhp_refnum":"00000896","name":"Lee Memorial Park","other_names":["Lee Park","123-83"],"category":"district","location":{"address":"1832 Johnson Rd.","address_restricted":false,"city":"Petersburg (Independent City)","county":"Petersburg","state":"VA","lat":37.202284987500036,"lon":-77.40700261277895,"geom_source":"nps_gis"},"listed_date":"2000-08-14","is_nhl":false,"nhl_designated_date":null,"areas_of_significance":["Community Planning and Development","Black","Landscape Architecture","Social History"],"significance_levels":["local"],"summary":{"what_it_is":"Lee Memorial Park is a roughly 300-acre city park district on the southern edge of Petersburg, Virginia, centered on Willcox Lake. The City of Petersburg designated the park in 1921, and it includes Civil War earthworks, a WPA-era wildflower and bird sanctuary, and recreational facilities.","why_significant":"The nomination argues the park reflects Petersburg's early twentieth-century municipal park development and a New Deal conservation project. The WPA Lee Park Wild Flower and Bird Sanctuary, created from 1935 to 1940 by the Petersburg Garden Club, employed unemployed women, including African-American crews. The park also shows Jim Crow-era segregation and preserves a section of the Confederate Dimmock Line earthworks.","narrative":"Lee Memorial Park covers about 300 acres along the southern edge of Petersburg, Virginia, wrapped around Willcox Lake, a reservoir created around 1895. The city set aside 462 acres in 1921 and developed roads, trails, a swimming area with bathhouse, picnic areas and ballfields. These facilities were segregated, and African Americans were excluded. During the Depression, the Petersburg Garden Club, led by Mrs. Donald Claiborne Holden, secured Works Progress Administration funding for a wildflower and bird sanctuary. From December 1935, crews of unemployed African-American women, working under white supervisors, cleared ravines, planted flowers, trees and shrubs, and cut trails across about 25 acres. Funding ended in 1940. The park also preserves a stretch of the Confederate Dimmock Line earthworks, which includes sites of Fort Walker and Battery Pegram. Contributing features include the superintendent's house, the bathhouse, the lake, the earthworks, the trail system and the sanctuary landscape. Portions were later sold for development.","period_of_significance":"1921-1940","architect_builder":"City of Petersburg, VA; Petersburg Garden Club","architectural_style":"Late 19th and Early 20th Century American Movements: Naturalistic Landscapes","criteria":["A","C"],"status_note":"Still in use as a city park; most WPA sanctuary areas remain largely unaltered and retain the plant habitats of the 1930s.","vacant_flag":false,"machine_generated":true,"model":"claude-sonnet-5-5","prompt_version":"v1.0-2026-10-29","generated_at":"2026-10-29 02:52:00.808283-05","source_pdf":"https://s3.amazonaws.com/NARAprodstorage/opastorage/live/36/6825/41682536/content/electronic-records/rg-079/NPS_VA/00000896.pdf"},"photo":{"url_800":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/media/00000896/591ed290f3-800.webp","url_1600":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/media/00000896/591ed290f3-1600.webp","licence":"CC BY-SA 4.0","author":"Mojo Hand","credit_html":"<a href=\"https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Lee_Memorial_Park.jpg\" rel=\"noopener\">Mojo Hand</a>, <a href=\"https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0\" rel=\"license noopener\">CC BY-SA 4.0</a>, via Wikimedia Commons","source_page":"https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Lee_Memorial_Park.jpg"},"district":null,"sources":{"nps_snapshot_date":"2026-05-22","nara_catalog":"https://catalog.archives.gov/id/41682536","wikipedia":"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lee_Memorial_Park","wikidata":"https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q16894047"},"indexable":true,"url":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/virginia/petersburg/lee-memorial-park-00000896/"}