About the Walt Whitman Birthplace Association
History of WWBA •History of the Birthplace •Chronology •
Mission Statement •Volunteer Opportunities •Donations
The History of the Walt Whitman Birthplace Association:
In 1819, Walt Whitman, widely recognized as America’s greatest poet, was born in a small farmhouse in the rural Long Island community of West Hills in the town of Huntington. Whitman’s writings are treasured for capturing the nation’s spirit during the nineteenth century and examining some of the era’s most significant events including westward expansion, immigration, slavery, and the Civil War.
Despite Whitman’s national prominence, during the twentieth century his family’s farmhouse in West Hills faced the continual threat of suburban encroachment. In 1949 the Walt Whitman Birthplace Association (WWBA) was established to preserve his birthplace. Poets, authors, professors, businesspeople, and concerned citizens were among its founding members. To help raise awareness and funds to protect the farmhouse and its one-acre site, the WWBA appealed to Alicia Patterson, then owner and publisher of Long Island’s newspaper Newsday. Patterson featured Whitman and the plight of his farmhouse on the cover of the newspaper and launched a fundraising campaign that inspired students across Long Island to collect pennies, nickels, and dimes for the cause. After three months and with widespread support, the Association purchased the property. Later, in 1957, the WWBA was successful in its petition to Governor W. Averell Harriman to designate the birthplace a New York State Historic Site. In 1985, the property was listed on the New York State and National Registers of Historic Places. Today, the site is operated by the WWBA in partnership with the New York State Office of Parks, Recreation and Historic Preservation (OPRHP).
Up until 1986 the WWBA managed the site on a small scale with limited visitation and public programming. That year Barbara Mazor Bart, the WWBA’s new executive director, convinced the Association’s board to promote the site as a center of learning and to make it more accessible to the public. The site’s educational programs were inaugurated in 1987. Since then attendance has risen from 1,000 to more than 16,500 annually. Almost one-third of the site’s visitors are students in grades 3-12. Among its various offerings, one of the site’s most successful initiatives is the annual student poetry contest, which receives 5,000 entries each year. The contest culminates at the Walt Whitman Birthday Celebration which is held on the weekend closest to the poet’s May 31 birthday.
Each year the WWBA’s Board of Trustees selects a nationally recognized poet to be its Poet-in-Residence. From public readings of his or her own poetry to teaching master writing classes, these guest poets are helping to instruct and inspire the next generation of writers. The WWBA also holds monthly poetry readings, including, every few years, a marathon reading of Whitman’s masterwork “Leaves of Grass.” Other community outreach programs include the Walt Whitman Heritage Lectures, the Long Island School of Poetry series, Walt Whitman Family programs, and the Walt Whitman Walk which follows local trails that Whitman explored as a boy. The Association also collaborates with the Long Island Poetry Collective on expanding regional writing opportunities. The WWBA maintains a 600 volume library at the site that focuses on the poetry and life of Walt Whitman and includes an original edition of Leaves of Grass.
In the 1990s to help accommodate the site’s increased visitation and expanding programs, the Association in partnership with OPRHP, planned an Interpretive Center at the site. Through the auspices of the 5th Senate District, Senator Ralph J. Marino introduced a member item in the state budget to fund the construction project. The center opened in 1997 and provides much needed space for a classroom, library, offices, a gift shop, and collections storage as well as providing handicapped accessible bathrooms. With the relocation of site operations and exhibits to the new center, the WWBA was able to focus its attention of restoring and refurnishing the farmhouse. Through the initiative of WWBA and the leadership of OPRHP Commissioner Bernadette Castro, a comprehensive restoration of the birthplace was undertaken for the first time in forty-three years. With technical assistance provided by the Long Island State Park Region and the Peebles Island Resource Center (PIRC), the house’s exterior was re-sheathed with smooth-finished, face-nailed cedar shingles, based on a surviving original shingle, and its nineteenth-century porch and shutters were reconstructed based on a 1890 photograph. The restoration was completed in 2000.
In addition, PIRC staff developed a new furnishing plan for the house in collaboration with WWBA Curator Richard Ryan. The plan reflects the agrarian lifestyle of the Whitman family between 1816 and 1823. Almost half of the site’s collection (about 200 objects) is on display in the house. Rehabilitating the site’s historic barn is the Association’s next priority. The proposed plan is to convert the barn’s first floor into an environmental education classroom and use the second floor for storage.
Over the past decade the Association’s outreach efforts have been particularly effective in attracting national and international media attention. The site was featured in the December 1994 issue of National Geographic magazine, and its restoration was highlighted on a July 4, 2000 national television special hosted by Bob Vila. The birthplace has been a frequent subject on CSPAN, and also in The New York Times and Newsday which highlighted the poet and his birthplace in its publication, Long Island: Our Story. More recently, the site has been designated an “Official Project” under the national Save America’s Treasures program helping to further recognize the property’s significance as well as offer fundraising opportunities.
Thanks to the commitment, hard work, and enthusiasm of the WWBA, the encouragement and support of New York State Senator Carl L. Marcellino, as well as a flourishing partnership with OPRHP, the preservation and interpretation of the birthplace is helping visitors, writers, scholars, and especially children better understand and appreciate the life and work of Walt Whitman.
We encourage everyone to visit his birthplace and learn about one of the nation’s literary giants. For more information, contact the Walt Whitman Birthplace State Historic Site, 246 Old Walt Whitman Road, South Huntington, NY 11746-4148. (631) 427-5240. E-mail - wwba@optonline.net
Cynthia Shor
Executive Director
Walt Whitman Birthplace Association
New York State Preservationist
Vol. 7 No. 1
Spring/Summer 2003
Postscript: The Barn (The Gathering Place) was dedicated in November of 2005. It is being utilized as an environmental education classroom, temporary exhibit space, and as an area for small meetings. The second floor is being used for storage.
