Alexandria, Mt. Vernon, and Accotink Turnpike

The Virginia General Assembly incorporated the Alexandria, Mt. Vernon, and Accotink Turnpike Company in March 1856. The road passed here on its roughly nine-mile route from Alexandria to Accotink Creek. Its founders included local slaveholders as well as antislavery Quakers who had established a free-labor community for black and white families nearby. The turnpike facilitated travel to Mount Vernon and improved farmers' access to urban markets. During World War I the U.S. Army paved a portion of the road to accommodate heavy traffic to Camp A. A. Humphreys (later Fort Belvoir). A segment of the old turnpike became part of U.S Route 1.