John Moss wanted a statement. In 1784, the prominent local founder built a solid, two-story brick farmhouse on his three-hundred-acre property. Enslaved laborers did the grueling work of planting and harvesting tobacco. But the soil wore out. So, the owners shifted to dairy farming. The house stood through the Civil War, watching Union and Confederate troops skirmish nearby. It survived. The house represents the gritty transition of Northern Virginia from slave-reliant tobacco fields to a diversified dairy hub.
In 1942, Michael Straight bought the place. He edited The New Republic and, decades later, confessed to spying for the Soviet Union during his youth. But before his espionage shook Washington, he and his wife, Belinda, wanted a modern country estate. They hired Beatrix Farrand, the legendary garden designer. She was a true pioneer. Actually, she was the only female charter member of the national professional association for garden architects. For Green Spring, she created distinct outdoor "rooms" by mixing formal brick paths with unstructured plantings. A masterclass in design. This is her only surviving project in Virginia.
They did not keep it. In 1970, the Straights gifted the house and eighteen acres to the local government. This saved the property from the suburban sprawl that devoured almost every other historic farm in Fairfax County. Strip malls replaced historic sites. Green Spring escaped the bulldozers, though. Now, visitors walk the very paths Farrand laid out. A quiet survival story.
