Interpreting Jamestown

In 1934, the National Park Service acquired 1,500 acres of Jamestown Island, including New Towne, and since then it has used different methods to present the town to visitors. After archaeologists unearthed numerous structures with brick foundations and cellars, the excavations were left open for visitors to see, but the buildings were not rebuilt on site because reconstruction might damage fragile archaeological evidence and no one could say for sure what the original buildings looked like. When the exposed foundations suffered from the elements, they had to be reburied. To prepare for the 350th anniversary in 1957, archaeologist J. C. Harrington proposed capping the excavated and reburied foundations with a layer of concrete and building them up above ground level with old brick from the Jamestown excavation, while landscaping the whole town site to create a feeling of openness under trees. Originally painted white to signify that they replicated footings below ground, these reconstructed foundations later caused confusion as the paint faded. The present landscape, like earlier ones, will likely give way to new efforts to help visitors better understand 17th-century Jamestown.

Virginia · United States