The Great Dismal Swamp has long been a subject of local and national fascination. The sprawling ecosystem not only provides critical wildlife habitat but also contains thousands of years of history.
The National Park Service is now studying how the swamp could potentially serve as the epicenter for a National Heritage Area.
These areas “highlight natural, cultural, historic and scenic resources that, when combined, tell a cohesive, nationally distinctive story of our country,” said Julie Bell, cultural resource project manager for the Park Service based in Denver.
“They're represented through the physical features and the traditions that evolved around them.”
The Great Dismal Swamp’s distinctive story, for example, includes Indigenous tribes that thrived there for centuries; a lucrative logging industry jump-started by George Washington; and enslaved people seeking freedom who created “maroon communities.”
About 113,000 acres of the Great Dismal are part of a National Wildlife Refuge under the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.
It’s the last vestige of a swamp that once covered more than a million acres, including almost all of Hampton Roads and stretching south to North Carolina’s Albemarle Sound.
Bell said while the refuge protects the current swampland, a heritage area would have a much wider reach, including cities and sites that are part of the swamp’s history.
“It’s to include a lot of communities that helped make the national refuge area what it is today,” she said.
For now, the list of localities includes Chesapeake, Norfolk, Portsmouth, Suffolk and Isle of Wight County in Virginia, as well as the North Carolina counties of Camden, Currituck, Gates and Pasquotank.
NPS is now in the public engagement stage of the feasibility study, which Congress approved in early 2023.
Since then, Bell said the team has worked to gather information about the region, reach out to stakeholders and look for an organization that could serve as a coordinating entity for the heritage area. (The Park Service technically manages these areas and provides limited funding, but does not manage operations on the ground.)
There are 62 NHAs throughout the country, commemorating things such as Civil War landmarks in Tennessee, Spanish Pueblo culture in the Southwest and the Northern Plains in North Dakota. The Journey Through Hallowed Ground National Heritage Area includes Thomas Jefferson’s Monticello in Charlottesville.
The Great Dismal would be the first to highlight a swamp.
Bell said the general goal is to promote economic development to the area, spur community connections and open up opportunities for education and conservation.
“It just brings a little bit more of a tourism focus to the area,” she said.
A 2015 analysis funded by the nonprofit Heritage Development Partnership estimated the annual economic benefit of all NHA sites – then numbering 49 — to be about $13 billion, including boosts to local hotels, transportation and museums.
The Park Service is seeking feedback to gauge local interest and get ideas for who and what should be included.
Officials plan to finish the study next spring. Then, Congress would decide whether to proceed with a Great Dismal Swamp National Heritage Area.
The National Park Service is holding three virtual public information sessions about the swamp feasibility study this week: Tuesday at 4 p.m., Wednesday at noon and Wednesday at 6 p.m. Find more details and the meeting links on the project website.
Public comments will be accepted through May 19 online or via snail mail to the NPS’ Denver Service Center. Find more details on the project website.
