SEARCH SITE

VIRGINIA LAW PORTAL

SEARCHABLE DATABASES

ACROSS SESSIONS

Developed and maintained by the Division of Legislative Automated Systems.

2000 SESSION

006753828
HOUSE JOINT RESOLUTION NO. 421
Offered February 14, 2000
Celebrating the life of James Mathers Rowley.
----------
Patron-- May
Senate Patron-- Mims
----------

WHEREAS, James M. Rowley, a farmer and innovative land conservationist, passed away on February 1, 2000, at his Middleburg home; and

WHEREAS, James Rowley's endeavors to preserve the Northern Virginia Piedmont area included a campaign to establish transferable development rights for landowners, an initiative thought by many land use experts to have been ahead of its time; and

WHEREAS, born in Greenville, Pennsylvania, in 1926, James Rowley attended Culver Military Academy and the United States Merchant Marine Academy at Kings Point, New York, and studied industrial engineering at Yale University, graduating in 1951; and

WHEREAS, James Rowley was the long-standing leader and director of the Piedmont Environmental Council, a lifetime member of the Catoctin Farmer's Club, director of the Loudoun Soil and Water Conservation District, founding director of the Goose Creek Association, and a former member of the board of directors of the Hill School of Middleburg, Virginia; and

WHEREAS, a self-taught architect, James Rowley built a succession of unique family homes that reflected his sensitivity to the natural and cultural history of the rural Virginia landscape; and

WHEREAS, James Rowley was a lifelong sailor who designed and built a 65-foot sailing catamaran in which he circumnavigated the globe with his family; and

WHEREAS, an avid skier, Jim Rowley logged more than one million vertical feet of descents from the rugged mountain peaks of the Canadian Rockies while helicopter skiing; and

WHEREAS, James Rowley was a vital, concerned, and thoughtful member of his community and was greatly loved by his wife of 48 years, Polly Pack Rowley, his son and daughter, and his two grandchildren; now, therefore, be it

RESOLVED by the House of Delegates, the Senate concurring, That the General Assembly celebrate the life and many accomplishments of James Mathers Rowley and express its appreciation for his decades of work toward preserving rural Virginia farmland; and, be it

RESOLVED FURTHER, That the Clerk of the House of Delegates prepare a copy of this resolution for presentation to Polly Pack Rowley as an expression of the esteem in which his memory is held.