Hayfield Farm 16-Sided Barn (Site)

These coordinates mark the exact site where the sixteen-sided barn (also known as a hexadecagon) stood. No visible remains exist.


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Here follows the inscription written on this trailside historical marker on a pedestal in the middle of nearby Hayfield Park's central pavilion:

Hayfield
In 1785, shortly after the Revolutionary War, George Washington deeded 460 acres of his Dogue Run Farm to Lund Washington, a third cousin and the "faithful and trusted manager" of the General's Mount Vernon estate. The tract was named "Hayfield" and a brick dwelling house, completed in 1784 by Lund in anticipation of General Washington's return home, was the site's only substantial structure during Lund Washington's ownership. Upon his death, the farm was conveyed to Lund's widow, Elizabeth Foote. Thereafter Hayfield was used by various owners as a school, cattle farm and residence.

Perhaps the most unique feature of Hayfield was its Round Barn, built for William Clarke between 1874 and 1887. Clarke's "Big Red Barn" stood 100 feet high, 100 feet in diameter as a 16-sided, double octagonal shaped barn. Damaged by fire in 1892, Clarke quickly improved the building with an open circular threshing floor, a 250-ton silo at the center, and 200 steps leading to a cupola which topped the new roof. Farm manager J.H. Shertzer boasted that the enormous barn could store 400 tons of provender (hay) and that a wagon and team of six horses might drive around the inside with ease. The structure was indeed a "large and commodious barn" adorned with gutters, downspouts and cast iron ornaments in which the initials "W.E.C." were the central design.

Lund Washington's brick house was destroyed by fire in 1917. Hayfield's second Round Barn outlasted successive changes in ownership until it too was lost in a fire on September 22, 1967.

Erected by Fairfax County Park Authority Resource Management Division


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Here follows an excerpt from Donald Hakenson's "This Forgotten Land" tour guide:

The Hayfield farm belonged to Lund Washington. George Washington sold 460 acres of Mount Vernon to Lund Washington for overseeing Mount Vernon while he was away fighting in the Revolutionary War. The house was destroyed by fire in October 1916. The circular sixteen sided barn patterned after the original barn built by George Washington was built in 1893 and was destroyed by arson in the late 1960's.


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Here follows an article from the Connection newspapers written by Mike Salmon on April 10, 2020:

A Burning Barn was Part of Hayfield Farm’s Past
The second of three articles exploring historic Telegraph Road in southern Fairfax County.

Heading north from Mount Air, past several gated entrances to Fort Belvoir, is Hayfield Farm, a development that was built in the 1960s in an area that was considered country at that time. Now there is the community of Hayfield Farm, as well as a shopping center, elementary and high school, and a connecting townhouse community up the hill called Hayfield View.

In 1761, George Washington bought the land to grow hay on for his livestock, which was how it first got the name Hayfield. After the Revolutionary War, Washington sold the land and mansion to his cousin Lund Washington in 1785 for managing the Mount Vernon plantation and mansion at Mount Vernon while he was away in the war.

Lund Washington and Elizabeth Foote lived in the manor until her death in 1812, and was buried in a boxwood garden area, according to an old Hayfield Citizens Association newsletter. Her remains were later transported to the Pohick Cemetery at Pohick Church in Lorton.

The land was used for raising cattle in the 1950s until it was purchased by Wills and Van Metre in 1963, and the first house was built in 1965. When the community was built, there was a 16-sided barn on the property, and local lore had the barn belonging to George Washington himself. In reality, the barn was built in 1893 by William Clark, who modeled it after another barn that Washington did build on the Mount Vernon plantation a few miles away. There was a manor house on the Hayfield land near the current park, that was built by Washington himself, but it burned down in 1916.

Barnyard Blues

County officials were considering using the barn for a theater, until Sept. 22, 1967, when the barn was destroyed in a fire. One of the children that lived in the newly built community of Hayfield was playing with matches that started the fire. There were legal wranglings in the aftermath, just before the statute of limitations expired.

The 16-sided barn was 100 feet in diameter and 100 feet high. The middle ceiling was supported by a spiral staircase that led to the cupola. There was talk of turning the barn into a theater of sorts by the county, but those plans were dashed after the fire.

At one time, Hayfield Secondary School was one of the largest schools around, and the gym was used for many activities besides basketball games and school graduations. In the 1970s the Baltimore-Washington Cats roller derby team had a match there, the Harlem Globetrotters put on a show, and after the Washington Redskins played in their first Super Bowl in 1972, the players were part of a presentation in the gym.

Hayfield Farm has a flood plain that backed up to the woods of Fort Belvoir, and during the Vietnam War, soldiers trained in those woods and the gun shots and explosions could be heard by the residents of Hayfield.

North of Hayfield on Telegraph Road is a Coast Guard station that’s been at that location since 1941. It was originally a radio transmitting station that moved over from a location in Fort Hunt, where it had been since 1934. Currently the Coast Guard Honor Guard is stationed at this small station.


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Here follows an excerpt from the Fall 2018 edition of the "Franconia Legacies" newsletter published by the Franconia Museum:

The Hayfield Citizen's Association presented an original chalk drawing of the Hayfield six-sided barn to the Franconia Museum at its May 2018 meeting. The drawing shows a conceptual use of the historic barn as a gathering place/dinner theater as part of a commercial development plan for the area with the barn as its centerpiece in the early 1960s. The current residential community was under construction when the barn burned in 1967. The drawing was presented to then Planning Commissioner Glenn Overvik and preserved by Hayfield resident Ronald Downer, who was helping Overvik prepare to leave the area in 2013. Downer later gave the rendering to the Hayfield Citizen's Association, which in turn presented it to the Franconia Museum in recognition of the drawings historic significance.

Pictured after the presentation are (left to right) Hayfield Citizen's Association President Jim Fogarty, HCA Treasurer John Millikin, Museum Board member Mary Smith, Museum President Carl Sell and Ron Downer, who has lived in Hayfield since 1975. The drawing and informational documents are on display at the Museum. The Hayfield barn was a replica of the one at Mount Vernon.