The roughly 80 people who assembled on a wet, overcast Sunday afternoon at the Mary Washington Monument to honor Mary Ball Washington and the women who memorialized her remained undeterred.
It was rainy, too, 70 years ago on a mild Sunday in May when President Dwight D. Eisenhower and first lady Mamie Eisenhower attended a similar event at the site off Washington Avenue in downtown Fredericksburg.
Fitz Johnson looked on the ceremony this Sunday, as did Billy Withers. Both were in attendance as young children in 1954.
Johnson grew up just four houses down Washington Avenue from the monument and was just five years old during Eisenhower’s visit. His father Orrick F. Johnson served on the planning committee for the event and brought him along.
“I remember, my dad had me on his shoulders so I could see the president,” he said. “I remember it like it was yesterday, I saw his bald head.”
Withers was 11 years old and attended with his grandmother Hattie Withers. “She took me to all the ceremonies,” he said.
“It was raining like today. I remember seeing the president and Mrs. Eisenhower pull up in the limo, and she was peeking out of the back [to see the weather].”
Sunday’s celebration commemorated the 130th anniversary of the monument’s dedication on May 10, 1894, when yet another president — Grover Cleveland — addressed a crowd of thousands to commemorate the life of Mary Washington and the bands of women determined to preserve her name.
It’s a tribute that keynote speaker Laura Galke described as the first American monument commissioned by women to honor a woman.
Galke, a historical archaeologist and historic interpreter for the Mary Washington House, has spent 15 years studying the life of Mary Washington. She said she has “come to admire… this remarkable woman,” who has been celebrated locally “for three centuries.”
The site was chosen as her final resting place by Mary herself, Galke said. She chose to be buried there rather than with her late husband at the family’s home at Pope’s Creek. The spot “was a sacred one” for her. She routinely went to the mediation rock to pray “for her son George during the Revolution.”
Galke described a misunderstood but complicated historical figure during her talk. Washington is often described as “selfish austere, domineering….But [George Washington’s] early reading, etiquette, training was guided by this woman…who was astute.
“She overcame tremendous odds, legal and social, to run the family’s plantations, raise her children and keep their gentry status as a widow.”
But she was also a flawed person, who Galke noted, “overcame those boundaries because she profited off the support of people she enslaved. By the end of her life, she enslaved six people, Little Bet, Old Bet, Lydia, George, Tom and Frederick. In her will, she callously separated the people who supported her between members of her family.”
The actual location of Mary’s grave is unknown, but the Washington Heritage Museums have been working with historical preservationists from the University of Mary Washington to find her actual resting spot. The work is ongoing, Darron said.
The women of Fredericksburg were the catalyst for this monument, said Galke.
“The original marker was badly worn,” she said, and even though a monument was authorized and the cornerstone laid by President Andrew Jackson in the 1830’s, it was never finished and “remained a melancholic ruin” for many years.
Scouts present flags at the Mary Washington Monument. (Photos by Lindley Estes).
This changed in 1889 when an advertisement of the property’s sale appeared in The Washington Post, boasting, “The Grave of Mary, the mother of Gen. George Washington, to be sold at Public Auction.” It was called a “terrible announcement” by locals and resulted in an uproar that led to the formation of two groups that worked to save the site and erect a permanent monument.
This was during the “City Beautification Movement” that saw civic improvements across the country during the 1890s and early 1900s. Authorizing fundraising for the monument was even the first act of the newly-formed Daughters of the American Revolution.
Two groups, one local and one national, formed to fundraise and build the monument. But the relationship between the groups soured. They fought over the grounds and upkeep and eventually in 1966, the property was deeded to the city of Fredericksburg.
Now, the property is owned and being interpreted by WHM. In 2023, the city of Fredericksburg deeded the land where the lodge and monument sit to the group.
Fredericksburg Mayor Kerry Devine laid a wreath at the base of the monument after her remarks. Just over a year ago, the city transferred ownership of the monument, grounds and cottage to the Washington Heritage Museums.
“It gives me great joy, because I know the integrity, hard work and dedication members of the WHM would have for this site,” Devine said.
The site includes the monument, grounds, meditation rock and adjacent hillside, as well as the caretaker’s lodge.
Anne Darron, WHM executive director, said they are working to increase the visibility of the site as well as its accessibility.
“It’s important for us to honor America’s First Mother,” Darron said. “Last May, we had a small open house here, and we were amazed at how many people just didn’t even know that the monument existed. We hope that people will learn more about how they can become involved, both as donors and volunteers.”
A commemorative piece of stone from 1833.
She invited visitors into the lodge to glimpse “pieces of history you do not see every day” from the museum and private, local collections. Among those were pieces of the original monument cornerstone that were broken up and painted by locals, and often sold during the current monument’s 1874 fanfare. Some were simply written on, while others depicted visitors in Victorian garb gazing at the obelisk. There were also pins, ribbons and artwork from the 1894 event.
WHM is now embarking on a $1.6 million capital campaign to improve the grounds and renovate the house to welcome visitors and ensure Mary’s story continues to be told, Darron said. A portion of the campaign will also go toward renovating the Caretaker’s Lodge to house offices and programming space.
The funds will be used to brace the hillside around the monument and Meditation Rock, and to make the entire site more accessible to visitors, through the addition of pathways for individuals with varying abilities, and interpretive signage that can educate visitors about the site at all hours.
She said it will ensure the site can be enjoyed for generations. Johnson, who was at the 1954 event, fondly remembers the hill and rock as his playground. So does John Cowan, who was also at the event. His father, Mac Cowan was mayor at the time and invited Eisenhower.
He walked from the family’s downtown home to see his father sharing a stage with the president.
“I remember it was raining,” he said. “And I wouldn’t have stood out there otherwise, but I was so proud of my father. Later, at the dinner table he reached out to hand me a program the president had signed for me.”
It was an everyday historical artifact, and Cowan still has it, framed, on his wall today.
