Biography

Benjamin C. Howland, Jr., FASLA

1923–1983

Professor of Landscape Architecture
1975–1977, 1978–1983

by Elizabeth K. Meyer, FASLA

Benjamin Cregan Howland, Jr.’s career with the National Park Service (NPS) was the core of his life-long commitment to public service. Beginning with the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) and the U.S. Marine Corps, and culminating on the University of Virginia (UVA) Landscape Architecture faculty, Howland dedicated his career to stewarding the nation’s cultural and natural resources. The NPS afforded Howland extraordinary opportunities to design new visitor centers and experiences within renown older parks as well as to develop master plans for new types of parks, such as national seashores and urban recreation areas. While much of this work was realized under Director Conrad Wirth’s "Mission 66," a ten-year, $670 million park program to improve visitor services leading up to the NPS’s 50 th anniversary in 1966, his sustained efforts over a quarter century were focused on the design and planning of his beloved the nation’s capital, Washington, D.C. For his superior accomplishments as a park planner and designer, Howland was made a Fellow of the ASLA (1981) and received a Department of Interior Meritorious Service Award (1966) and a Citation for Distinguished Service (1971). Those awards stated “ ... .Mr. Howland’s creativity, sincerity and untiring ambition led him to be recognized as one of the foremost landscape architects in the National Park Service” and commended him for “those unusual qualities of initiative, drive, and dedication ... ” as well as “his technical excellence, sincerity of purpose and unselfish contribution.” Howland ensured the perpetuation of those values when he shifted from public service to academia through his advocacy of the NPS Historic American Landscape Survey, twenty years before it was authorized, and his significant role building the new program at UVA.

Howland spent his early years in the glaciated, rural landscape of upstate New York. He was born on January 28, 1923 in Saratoga Springs, New York, and grew up in Tonawanda, a small town outside of Buffalo. After high school, Howland worked in the CCC managing forests in Almond, until he was old enough to enlist in the military. In February 1941, before America entered World War II, Howland joined the U.S. Marines, an institution that was formative in shaping Howland’s personal and professional character—his sense of duty, discipline and love of his country. During the war, Howland served in the South Pacific fighting at Guadalcanal with Edson’s Raiders, the First Marine Raider Battalion, “the most decorated unit in Marine history.” This experience honed several skills that were central to Howland’s success as a landscape architect, including his keen ability to read the “lay of the land” in the field and through maps. After the war, he applied these skills to his studies at Syracuse’s College of Forestry where, in 1950, he took a B.S. in Landscape Architecture. Howland’s decision to join the NPS was fitting given his dedication to public service and Syracuse’s commitment to educating public as well as private practitioners.

In 1971, Howland was asked about his “career highlights” working in three NPS regions, the Washington, D.C. office (National Capital Region and Eastern Service Center 1952-55, 1962-1970), the Western San Francisco office (1955-1961), and the Eastern Philadelphia office (1961-1962). Howland recalled his leadership in the master plans for three national seashores—Point Reyes, CA, Cape Cod, MA and Assateague, VA—each one completed while working in a different region of the country, as well as numerous large parks in the west. But, it is telling that half the projects he included were in the Washington, D.C. metropolitan region. They ranged from significant historic sites, such as the White House grounds, to complex, engineered landscapes, such as the Baltmore-Washington Parkway. He was particularly proud of his lead role in the first major park planning initiative for the Anacostia River since the Olmsted. Jr.’s proposals in the McMillan Commission report, a project that Howland guided for almost a decade.

Howland’s impact on the planning and design of federal lands around Washington, D.C. cannot be understated, for in addition to the projects noted above, Howland contributed to the design of the Old Stone House garden in Georgetown, the Iwo Jima Memorial Grounds, the Washington Monument site improvements that translated Robert Mill’s unrealized plans for a peristyle base into a ring of 50 American flags, the preliminary alignment of the George Washington Memorial Parkway north and west of Spout Run, the Master Plan for the National Capital Parks System, the Initial Task Force for the Potomac River basin, and the proposed alignment of the interstate highway adjacent to the monumental core. Many of his contributions were behind the scenes but influential, setting the conceptual plans and programs for consulting landscape architects such as Gilmore Clarke (G.W. Parkway), Horace Peaslee (Iwo Jima Memorial), Ian McHarg (the Potomac Basin) and Lawrence Halprin (Anacostia Master Plan). By the time of his retirement, Howland was supervising the architecture, engineering, landscape architecture, ecological services and historic architecture programs in the National Capital Region. His concern for both historic landscapes and the wilderness, as well as his capabilities from planning to design detailing and construction transcended the boundaries between these five disciplines responsible for stewarding the federal city’s landscape.

For Howland, national parks were placed where people simultaneously experienced and protected their great source of cultural and natural history, the land. In a 1982 lecture Howland explained his professional ethics underscoring his conception that public landscape architecture was tied to the particularities of American culture and national identity. He concluded with a tenet that applied this public mission to the act of design and planning: “With that statement of purpose, daily judgments are made clearer: the Parks belong to The People.” Howland’s social commitment was especially evident in his last major project, the Anacostia River, that was long neglected in D.C. park planning. During this project, Howland moved his design team from the Regional office into a maintenance building closer to the African-American neighborhoods served by the urban waterfront park. There, he believed he could better “serve as the pencil” for his clients during the planning process. This “bottom-up” method of programming and design, was not yet characteristic of standard landscape architecture practice and was one of Howland’s many contributions to national park master planning.

Howland’s vast experience and excellent reputation made him a welcome addition to the new UVA landscape architecture program. Harry W. Porter, Jr. Chair of the new program, was also a Syracuse alumnus and had known Howland since they were both in the NPS Western region office twenty years earlier. These two professors became the intellectual and ethical foundation of the UVA program. From 1975-1983, Howland taught construction courses including, a “Park Roads and Parkways” course, and master planning studios often addressing public landscapes such as Assateague Island, Pamunkey Indian Reservation, and Brandy Station Battlefield. Howland’s course “Historic Sites” that researched and documented cultural landscapes, such as the Barboursville estate and Jefferson’s Rivanna River mill and canal, was a popular course for students interested in landscape preservation. Porter’s ambition for this new Department was well served by Howland’s incredible passion for teaching the knowledge and values gleaned from a quarter century of professional practice. As in his NPS tenure when he was known for putting in long, unpaid, evening hours rendering beautiful landscape tableaus for master planning document cover sheets, Howland inspired those who worked with him through example. He was often in the design studio late at night—accompanied by a big thermos of coffee, a pipe, and an encouraging word.

Ben Howland died on June 24, 1983 just as his reputation as an inspiring and dedicated professor was emerging. On UVA Founder’s Day in 1984, at a memorial tree planting ceremony, Will Rieley, a former student, read the following to a gathering of over 100 colleagues and former students “ ... Ben was one of those rare people of enormous talent and genius, and also of great humility. He was a man of intense loyalty and devotion to his country, his religion, his friends and colleagues, and to the students who were fortunate enough to study under his guidance. His dedication was infectious.” Howland’s fine character was matched by his exemplary works on large recreational and infrastructural landscapes—extending the McMillan Commission’s legacy east to the Anacostia, creating dignified entrance corridors into the Monumental city along parkways, and preserving the nation’s fragile seashores for future generations. Uninterested in leaving a recognizable mark or form on the land, Howland is best remembered for the ethical obligation he expected of himself and instilled in his colleagues and students. This is not to discount the power of the parks he built and preserved. Still, their power has more to do with experiences people have in them and the connections they reinforce between those people and their public lands. Ben Howland’s legacy endures in those ongoing re-connections as well as in his works and words.

Citations

Benjamin Howland Obituary, Daily Progress (Sunday June 26, 1983)

“A Great Park Man Retires,” The National Park Courier 22:8 (August 1975), 3.

Howland, Benjamin C. “Park Roads and Parkways.” (1982) Unpublished lecture notes. Available as an electronic book on the University of Virginia’s on-line catalog, VIRGO.

Parker, Don. “Howland Elected ASLA Fellow.” ASLAVA Virginia Landscape Architect Newsletter
(Fall 1981), 1, 5.

Department Alumni Archives, Faculty of Landscape Architecture, School of Environmental Sciences and Forestry, State University of New York, Syracuse
(Correspondence with faculty from 1950-1960s, as well as seventeen drawings by BCH)

Department of Landscape Architecture Records, University of Virginia Alderman Library Archives. (Howland’s correspondence and related course files, 1975-1982).

National Park Service, Regional Office Project Files, National Archives

	Home > Faculty > Endowed Lectureships > Howland Memorial Lecture > Biography Benjamin C. Howland, Jr., FASLA 1923–1983 Professor of Landscape Architecture 1975–1977, 1978–1983 by Elizabeth K. Meyer, FASLA Benjamin Cregan Howland, Jr.’s career with the National Park Service (NPS) was the core of his life-long commitment to public service. Beginning with the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) and the U.S. Marine Corps, and culminating on the University of Virginia (UVA) Landscape Architecture faculty, Howland dedicated his career to stewarding the nation’s cultural and natural resources. The NPS afforded Howland extraordinary opportunities to design new visitor centers and experiences within renown older parks as well as to develop master plans for new types of parks, such as national seashores and urban recreation areas. While much of this work was realized under Director Conrad Wirth’s "Mission 66," a ten-year, $670 million park program to improve visitor services leading up to the NPS’s 50 th anniversary in 1966, his sustained efforts over a quarter century were focused on the design and planning of his beloved the nation’s capital, Washington, D.C. For his superior accomplishments as a park planner and designer, Howland was made a Fellow of the ASLA (1981) and received a Department of Interior Meritorious Service Award (1966) and a Citation for Distinguished Service (1971). Those awards stated “ ... .Mr. Howland’s creativity, sincerity and untiring ambition led him to be recognized as one of the foremost landscape architects in the National Park Service” and commended him for “those unusual qualities of initiative, drive, and dedication ... ” as well as “his technical excellence, sincerity of purpose and unselfish contribution.” Howland ensured the perpetuation of those values when he shifted from public service to academia through his advocacy of the NPS Historic American Landscape Survey, twenty years before it was authorized, and his significant role building the new program at UVA. Howland spent his early years in the glaciated, rural landscape of upstate New York. He was born on January 28, 1923 in Saratoga Springs, New York, and grew up in Tonawanda, a small town outside of Buffalo. After high school, Howland worked in the CCC managing forests in Almond, until he was old enough to enlist in the military. In February 1941, before America entered World War II, Howland joined the U.S. Marines, an institution that was formative in shaping Howland’s personal and professional character—his sense of duty, discipline and love of his country. During the war, Howland served in the South Pacific fighting at Guadalcanal with Edson’s Raiders, the First Marine Raider Battalion, “the most decorated unit in Marine history.” This experience honed several skills that were central to Howland’s success as a landscape architect, including his keen ability to read the “lay of the land” in the field and through maps. After the war, he applied these skills to his studies at Syracuse’s College of Forestry where, in 1950, he took a B.S. in Landscape Architecture. Howland’s decision to join the NPS was fitting given his dedication to public service and Syracuse’s commitment to educating public as well as private practitioners. In 1971, Howland was asked about his “career highlights” working in three NPS regions, the Washington, D.C. office (National Capital Region and Eastern Service Center 1952-55, 1962-1970), the Western San Francisco office (1955-1961), and the Eastern Philadelphia office (1961-1962). Howland recalled his leadership in the master plans for three national seashores—Point Reyes, CA, Cape Cod, MA and Assateague, VA—each one completed while working in a different region of the country, as well as numerous large parks in the west. But, it is telling that half the projects he included were in the Washington, D.C. metropolitan region. They ranged from significant historic sites, such as the White House grounds, to complex, engineered landscapes, such as the Baltmore-Washington Parkway. He was particularly proud of his lead role in the first major park planning initiative for the Anacostia River since the Olmsted. Jr.’s proposals in the McMillan Commission report, a project that Howland guided for almost a decade. Howland’s impact on the planning and design of federal lands around Washington, D.C. cannot be understated, for in addition to the projects noted above, Howland contributed to the design of the Old Stone House garden in Georgetown, the Iwo Jima Memorial Grounds, the Washington Monument site improvements that translated Robert Mill’s unrealized plans for a peristyle base into a ring of 50 American flags, the preliminary alignment of the George Washington Memorial Parkway north and west of Spout Run, the Master Plan for the National Capital Parks System, the Initial Task Force for the Potomac River basin, and the proposed alignment of the interstate highway adjacent to the monumental core. Many of his contributions were behind the scenes but influential, setting the conceptual plans and programs for consulting landscape architects such as Gilmore Clarke (G.W. Parkway), Horace Peaslee (Iwo Jima Memorial), Ian McHarg (the Potomac Basin) and Lawrence Halprin (Anacostia Master Plan). By the time of his retirement, Howland was supervising the architecture, engineering, landscape architecture, ecological services and historic architecture programs in the National Capital Region. His concern for both historic landscapes and the wilderness, as well as his capabilities from planning to design detailing and construction transcended the boundaries between these five disciplines responsible for stewarding the federal city’s landscape. For Howland, national parks were placed where people simultaneously experienced and protected their great source of cultural and natural history, the land. In a 1982 lecture Howland explained his professional ethics underscoring his conception that public landscape architecture was tied to the particularities of American culture and national identity. He concluded with a tenet that applied this public mission to the act of design and planning: “With that statement of purpose, daily judgments are made clearer: the Parks belong to The People.” Howland’s social commitment was especially evident in his last major project, the Anacostia River, that was long neglected in D.C. park planning. During this project, Howland moved his design team from the Regional office into a maintenance building closer to the African-American neighborhoods served by the urban waterfront park. There, he believed he could better “serve as the pencil” for his clients during the planning process. This “bottom-up” method of programming and design, was not yet characteristic of standard landscape architecture practice and was one of Howland’s many contributions to national park master planning. Howland’s vast experience and excellent reputation made him a welcome addition to the new UVA landscape architecture program. Harry W. Porter, Jr. Chair of the new program, was also a Syracuse alumnus and had known Howland since they were both in the NPS Western region office twenty years earlier. These two professors became the intellectual and ethical foundation of the UVA program. From 1975-1983, Howland taught construction courses including, a “Park Roads and Parkways” course, and master planning studios often addressing public landscapes such as Assateague Island, Pamunkey Indian Reservation, and Brandy Station Battlefield. Howland’s course “Historic Sites” that researched and documented cultural landscapes, such as the Barboursville estate and Jefferson’s Rivanna River mill and canal, was a popular course for students interested in landscape preservation. Porter’s ambition for this new Department was well served by Howland’s incredible passion for teaching the knowledge and values gleaned from a quarter century of professional practice. As in his NPS tenure when he was known for putting in long, unpaid, evening hours rendering beautiful landscape tableaus for master planning document cover sheets, Howland inspired those who worked with him through example. He was often in the design studio late at night—accompanied by a big thermos of coffee, a pipe, and an encouraging word. Ben Howland died on June 24, 1983 just as his reputation as an inspiring and dedicated professor was emerging. On UVA Founder’s Day in 1984, at a memorial tree planting ceremony, Will Rieley, a former student, read the following to a gathering of over 100 colleagues and former students “ ... Ben was one of those rare people of enormous talent and genius, and also of great humility. He was a man of intense loyalty and devotion to his country, his religion, his friends and colleagues, and to the students who were fortunate enough to study under his guidance. His dedication was infectious.” Howland’s fine character was matched by his exemplary works on large recreational and infrastructural landscapes—extending the McMillan Commission’s legacy east to the Anacostia, creating dignified entrance corridors into the Monumental city along parkways, and preserving the nation’s fragile seashores for future generations. Uninterested in leaving a recognizable mark or form on the land, Howland is best remembered for the ethical obligation he expected of himself and instilled in his colleagues and students. This is not to discount the power of the parks he built and preserved. Still, their power has more to do with experiences people have in them and the connections they reinforce between those people and their public lands. Ben Howland’s legacy endures in those ongoing re-connections as well as in his works and words. Citations Benjamin Howland Obituary, Daily Progress (Sunday June 26, 1983) “A Great Park Man Retires,” The National Park Courier 22:8 (August 1975), 3. Howland, Benjamin C. “Park Roads and Parkways.” (1982) Unpublished lecture notes. Available as an electronic book on the University of Virginia’s on-line catalog, VIRGO. Parker, Don. “Howland Elected ASLA Fellow.” ASLAVA Virginia Landscape Architect Newsletter (Fall 1981), 1, 5. Department Alumni Archives, Faculty of Landscape Architecture, School of Environmental Sciences and Forestry, State University of New York, Syracuse (Correspondence with faculty from 1950-1960s, as well as seventeen drawings by BCH) Department of Landscape Architecture Records, University of Virginia Alderman Library Archives. (Howland’s correspondence and related course files, 1975-1982). 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