Late last month, the Land Trust of Virginia (LTV), a non-profit land trust based in Middleburg, and Rose Marie Bogley, owner of the 365-acre Bollingbrook estate property near Upperville, agreed on a conservation easement that protects the estate's extraordinary scenic open space and other conservation values.

The LTV conservation easement on the Bollingbrook property represents another key piece in the effort to protect Upperville, one of Virginia's most beautiful and historic villages. The property's spectacular scenery can be viewed from Delaplane Grade Road, a Virginia Byway in northern Fauquier County.

LTV's conservation easement also protects the historic character of this classic Virginia estate. According to Audrey Windsor Bergner, author of Plantations and Historic Homes around Middleburg, Virginia, "Single-handedly, Rose Marie Bogley bought and restored Bollingbrook. Horses again graze on the green hills, busts of ancient Romans surround a sunny pool, and old schoolhouse (that) now serves as a spacious guest house. All four hundred acres are again a working horse and cattle farm and offer shelter to abused animals of all descriptions. The old cannery, overseer's cottage, stables, stone barn, blacksmith shop, scale house, and an in-ground silo (the oldest in Virginia), still stand at Bollingbrook. But of all the old outbuildings, surely the most interesting is the old slave church, for it tells a story. Dating back to the early 1800s, its stuccoed stone and Gothic design features arched windows now covered by vines."

According to Don Owen, LTV's executive director, the organization now has protected more than 100 properties and 10,000 acres of land in Virginia, which have been goals of the organization since its inception more than ten years ago. Both objectives were achieved in a two-week period, with the organization's 100th easement being protected in Loudoun County and the 10,000th acre being protected in Rappahannock County.

Reflecting on those achievements, LTV Chairman Turner T. Smith said, "We are proud and pleased with the job that we are doing to protect our heritage. As a result of the foresight and generosity of landowners such as Rose Marie Bogley, these beautiful landscapes surrounding our communities will be here hundreds of years from now, and our children and grandchildren will be able to enjoy them much the way we do today. LTV's contributors and easement donors deserve all the credit for making the LTVs conservation easement program so successful."