Abingdon Plantation
Metro Stop: Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport
- Blue Line
- Yellow Line
Ruins of Abingdon Plantation with National Airport parking garage and terminal in the distance. (Credit: y Rolfmueller, licensed via Creative Commons SA 4.0)
Before becoming D.C.’s most metro accessible airport, the land just a few hundred feet from the north terminal of National was the site of the Abingdon Plantation. It was originally built in 1695 by the Alexander family (as in the namesake for Alexandria, Virginia), but was purchased years later by George Washington’s adopted stepson, John Parke Custis. It was supposedly around this time that the first weeping willow in America was planted at Abingdon. During the Civil War, the property was abandoned when its then owners, the Hunter family, fled south. Today, the ruins of Abingdon are open to the public in a little park behind the airport.