Pioneer Information
Born in Saratoga Springs and raised in Tonawanda, New York, Howland joined the Civilian Conservation Corps in 1940. The following year he enlisted in the U.S. Marine Corps, serving in the South Pacific with the First Marine Raider Battalion, during World War II. Returning to the United States, he enrolled in the State University College of Forestry at Syracuse University (now SUNY College of Environmental Science and Forestry), earning a BS in Landscape Architecture (1950). Howland then joined the National Park Service (NPS), where he was based in Washington, D.C., (1950–1955; 1963–1978), San Francisco (1955–1962), and Philadelphia (1962–1963).
At NPS, Howland designed new visitors’ centers within established national parks (as part of the Mission 66 program) and prepared several master plans, including those for the National Capital Parks System and three national seashores—Point Reyes, California; Cape Cod, Massachusetts; and Assateague, Virginia. As the National Capital Region’s first associate regional director of professional services (1970–1978) Howland supervised the design and construction of a range of landscape architecture, architecture, and engineering initiatives.
His Washington, D.C.-area projects ranged from historic sites (at the White House he served as the restoration landscape construction supervisor, 1952) to engineered landscapes (such as the Baltimore-Washington Parkway and the George Washington Memorial Parkway). He led the rehabilitation of the Anacostia River waterfront and contributed to the design of the Iwo Jima Memorial grounds (now U.S. Marine Corps War Memorial) and the Washington Monument, translating Robert Mills’s unrealized plans for a colonnaded base into a ring of fifty American flags.
From 1975 to 1977 Howland was visiting professor of landscape architecture at the University of Virginia (UVA), achieving tenure in 1978. He was elected a Fellow of the American Society of Landscape Architects in 1981. Howland passed away at the age of 60 and is commemorated at UVA through annual programs, including a traveling fellowship and symposium.
