Virginia Kendall State Park Historic District

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Virginia Kendall State Park Historic District
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Nearest city Peninsula, Ohio
Coordinates 41°13′4″N81°31′15″W / 41.21778°N 81.52083°W / 41.21778; -81.52083 Coordinates: 41°13′4″N81°31′15″W / 41.21778°N 81.52083°W / 41.21778; -81.52083
Area 530 acres (210 ha)
Built 1933
Architect Harold S. Wagner; Albert H. Good
MPS Recreation and Conservation Resources of the Cuyahoga Valley MPS
NRHP reference # 96001515 [1]
Added to NRHP January 02, 1997

The Virginia Kendall State Park Historic District is a historic district located near Peninsula, Ohio. It was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1997. [1]

Peninsula, Ohio Village in Ohio, United States

Peninsula is a village in Summit County, Ohio, United States. The population was 565 at the 2010 census. It is part of the Akron Metropolitan Statistical Area.

National Register of Historic Places federal list of historic sites in the United States

The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the United States federal government's official list of districts, sites, buildings, structures, and objects deemed worthy of preservation for their historical significance. A property listed in the National Register, or located within a National Register Historic District, may qualify for tax incentives derived from the total value of expenses incurred preserving the property.

Historic

The Virginia Kendall State Park Historic District consists of approximately 530 acres in the Cuyahoga Valley National Park, and reflects the naturalistic landscape style and rustic architecture associated with the Civilian Conservation Corps. Cleveland coal baron and industrialist Hayward Kendall acquired this property in the first part of the 20th century for use as a hunting retreat. Upon his death in 1927 the property transferred to his wife, Agnes, with the stipulation that it would eventually become a park named in honor of his mother, Virginia. Agnes Kendall was not interested in the property and turned it over to the state in 1929. [2]

Cuyahoga Valley National Park national park of the United States

Cuyahoga Valley National Park is an American national park that preserves and reclaims the rural landscape along the Cuyahoga River between Akron and Cleveland in Northeast Ohio. Cuyahoga Valley is unusual among American national parks being adjacent to two large urban areas and including a dense road network, small towns, and private attractions.

Civilian Conservation Corps public work relief program

The Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) was a public work relief program that operated from 1933 to 1942 in the United States for unemployed, unmarried men. Originally for young men ages 18–25, it was eventually expanded to ages 17–28. Robert Fechner was the first director of the agency, succeeded by James McEntee following Fechner's death. The CCC was a major part of President Franklin D. Roosevelt's New Deal that provided unskilled manual labor jobs related to the conservation and development of natural resources in rural lands owned by federal, state, and local governments. The CCC was designed to provide jobs for young men and to relieve families who had difficulty finding jobs during the Great Depression in the United States. Maximum enrollment at any one time was 300,000. Through the course of its nine years in operation, 3 million young men participated in the CCC, which provided them with shelter, clothing, and food, together with a wage of $30 per month.

In 1933 Harold S. Wagner, the Director-Secretary of the Akron Metropolitan Park District filed with the National Park Service to create a Civilian Conservation Corps camp at Virginia Kendall Park. Approval of the application required evidence of the ability to work with the rustic architecture style. Harold Wagner partnered with Akron architect Albert Good, who had previously designed the rustic lodges of the adjacent Boy Scout Camp Manatoc. Good went on to edit Park and Recreation Structures and Park Structures and Facilities, which are the definitive “parkitecture” books for the National Park Service. [2]

National Park Service United States federal agency

The National Park Service (NPS) is an agency of the United States federal government that manages all national parks, many national monuments, and other conservation and historical properties with various title designations. It was created on August 25, 1916, by Congress through the National Park Service Organic Act and is an agency of the United States Department of the Interior. The NPS is charged with a dual role of preserving the ecological and historical integrity of the places entrusted to its management, while also making them available and accessible for public use and enjoyment.

Virginia Kendall Park consists of four naturalistic style landscapes designed around the sandstone ledges that mark the prehistoric edges of Lake Erie. Built by the Civilian Conservation Corps, the drives, parking areas, meadows and wooded areas were all carefully laid out using the National Park Service’s master planning process. The buildings were incorporated into the landscape rather than the landscape framing the buildings. Man-made improvements to the landscape were designed to harmonize with the natural patterns. Locally quarried sandstone and wormy chestnut were used to construct numerous comfort stations and shelters that anchor “playstead” meadows. The shelters evidence sophisticated design and placement; the Octagon Shelter located on the top of a knoll, the Ledges Shelter's rectilinear plan parallels the ledge wall face and the Lake Shelter sited at the base of a hill that fronts the man-made lake surrounded by rolling hills. [2]

Lake Erie one of the Great Lakes in North America

Lake Erie is the fourth-largest lake of the five Great Lakes in North America, and the eleventh-largest globally if measured in terms of surface area. It is the southernmost, shallowest, and smallest by volume of the Great Lakes and therefore also has the shortest average water residence time. At its deepest point Lake Erie is 210 feet deep.

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