The Trustees of Reservations
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The Trustees of Reservations (TTOR) is a non-profit land conservation and historic preservation organization dedicated to preserving natural and historical places in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. TTOR is the oldest regional land trust in the world and has about 42,000 dues-paying members.
TTOR has 96 properties in Massachusetts, all of which are open to the public. Two of its best know reservations are Cape Poge Wildlife Refuge on Martha's Vineyard and World's End in Hingham. East Over Reservation in Rochester and Little Tom Mountain in Holyoke are some of its most recent acquisitions.
The organization has offices in Beverly, Leominster and Sharon. In June 2006, TTOR received a gold level certification from the US Green Building Council for its Doyle Conservation Center in Leominster.
On September 16, 2006, The Trustees of Reservations announced its permanent affiliation with the Boston Natural Areas Network.
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[edit] Mission
The mission statement of The Trustees is to "preserve, for public use and enjoyment, properties of exceptional scenic, historic, and ecological value in Massachusetts."
[edit] Properties
As of September 2006, The Trustees own 96 sites outright with 23,697 acres (96 km²), and aided by other means in the conservation of a further 431 sites with approximately 30,000 acres (121 km²). Sixteen of the properties contain historic buildings, including nine historic house museums and two lighthouses open to the public.
In addition, the Trustees of Reservations manages the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Tully Lake Campground in Royalston. They also manage the Norton Point Beach in Edgartown, which is owned by the county government of Dukes County.
[edit] History
The history of the Trustees is traced to 1890 when the New England periodical Garden and Forest published a letter by young landscape architect Charles Eliot entitled "The Waverly Oaks". Eliot's letter proposed the immediate preservation of "special bits of scenery" still remaining "within ten miles (16 km) of the State House which possess uncommon beauty and more than usual refreshing power". To this end, Eliot proposed that legislation be enacted to create a non-profit corporation to hold land for the public to enjoy "just as a Public Library holds books and an Art Museum holds pictures."
In the spring of 1891, the Massachusetts Legislature established The Trustees of Public Reservations "for the purposes of acquiring, holding, maintaining and opening to the public beautiful and historic places within the Commonwealth." The act was signed into law by Governor William E. Russell on May 21, 1891. The word "Public" was dropped from the organization's name in 1954 to avoid confusion with government-owned land.
Virginia Woods in Stoneham was the first property acquired by the Trustees. This property was conveyed to the Metropolitan District Commission in 1923 as is now a part of the Middlesex Fells Reservation. Waverly Oaks itself was included in the Beaver Brook Reservation, in Belmont, established in 1893.
In 1925, the Trustees joined with the Appalachian Mountain Club, Massachusetts Audubon Society, and the Society for the Preservation of New England Antiquities to organize a conference on "The Needs and Uses of Open Spaces". This conference led to a 1929 report emphasizing the need to protect the state's rural character and countryside and the importance of identifying and describing the qualities and characteristics of specific sites which should be preserved. Today, nearly every site listed in the report is protected by a government or non-profit conservation agency.
[edit] See also
[edit] References
- http://www.thetrustees.org/ Accessed June 29, 2006.
