The Olmsted Society
Leadership giving for rock creek
Why Olmsted Society Members Lead the Way
Rock Creek Park is one of America's great urban parks—a sanctuary of forests, streams, wildlife, trails, and historic places that serves millions of visitors each year. Protecting this extraordinary landscape requires more than public funding alone. It requires visionary community leadership.
That is the role of the Olmsted Society.
Named for landscape architect Frederick Law Olmsted, the Society recognizes Rock Creek Conservancy's leadership donors whose annual generosity provides the flexible support needed to protect and improve the park. While grants often fund specific projects, leadership gifts allow the Conservancy to respond to emerging needs, restore natural habitats, improve trails, preserve historic landmarks, advocate for the park's future, and nurture a new generation of stewards to love the park.
Olmsted Society members make possible much of the work visitors never see but everyone benefits from: restoring native forests, protecting streams, monitoring environmental threats, building partnerships, educating the public, and ensuring that Rock Creek Park remains healthy and resilient in the heart of a growing city.
Their leadership extends beyond financial support. By making a significant annual investment, Olmsted Society members demonstrate that this remarkable national park is worthy of sustained private philanthropy. Their commitment inspires others—including foundations, corporations, and fellow park supporters—to invest in Rock Creek's future.
Great parks do not remain great by chance. They thrive because people choose to care for them across generations. Through their leadership, Olmsted Society members are helping ensure that Rock Creek Park remains a place where nature, history, recreation, and community continue to enrich the lives of all who visit.
Join the Olmsted Society
Leadership Giving for Rock Creek
Olmsted Society members enjoy these benefits:
Special updates from the Conservancy's Executive Director
Invitations to exclusive Olmsted Society events
Opportunities to see “behind the scenes” of Rock Creek Park
“Twelve people in a room with an idea to create a group supporting the Rock Creek watershed. Over 20 years later the vision remains – to protect and restore Rock Creek and its parklands as a natural oasis for all people to appreciate and protect.
I continue to donate to the Conservancy because of the importance of the health of the Rock Creek watershed and the continuing need for Conservancy activities and advocacy, from educating park visitors, training volunteers to become park stewards and restoring the land around the creek to advocating for the watershed with local governments.
Watching the organization grow from that dozen people to the organization it is today has been one of the joys of my life.”
Barbara Elkus
Member.
Olmsted Society
The Olmsted Society:
A Rich History
The Olmsted Society is named for Frederick Law Olmsted, the first person to use landscape architect as a professional title. He believed that large urban parks offered beautiful and restorative scenery to counteract the stress of urban life.
The Olmsted Brothers prepared plans in 1918 to improve the layout of Rock Creek Park. They published a report regarding the park’s general management to encourage the “permanent preservation of its natural beauty, and the making of the beauty accessible to the people without spoiling the scenery in the process.” The report noted “the recreative value of its natural qualities – large stretches of forest, the river valley, dark ravines, steep and rolling hills and occasional meadow lands – and no use or exploitation or development of any sort can ever be right that is not based upon this fundamental conception.”
The landscape became one of the first National Parks in the United States and was incorporated by the government in 1890.