As the United States faces a list of crisis-level challenges–among them income inequality, environmental degradation, and a dearth of affordable housing–the National Trust for Historic Preservation wants to be acknowledged as a player in the solutions. “When people hear ‘historic preservation,’ they often think it means ‘keep things just as they are,’ instead of all the things that preservation creates—experiences, jobs, revitalized neighborhoods,” claimed president and CEO Carol Quillen. “Preservation can be a tool to address national environmental, economic and social challenges. We want to shift the narrative from what stays the same to what can be.”
The National Trust was created by Congressional charter in 1949. It is a privately funded nonprofit organization which supports historic preservation through education, granting, and advocacy. Its granting programs include the African American Cultural Heritage Action Fund (AACHAF) and the National Fund for Sacred Places.
Powel House at 244 S. 3rd Street in Society Hill is included in the National Trust’s Distinctive Destinations program. | Photo: Michael Bixler
The organization has different ways to interact with sites. Here in Philadelphia, it owns and operate Cliveden, the historic estate in Germantown, while Joe Frazier’s gym on North Broad Street receives technical assistance through the National Trust’s AACHAF. Two other local sites that it has added to its Distinctive Destinations program illustrate the National Trust’s wide reaching interest in America’s history: Powel House, the 18th century home of early Philadelphia mayor Samuel Powel and his wife Elizabeth, both of whom had significant influence on the founders of the nation, and Philadelphia’s Magic Gardens, which houses many of the exuberant 20th century mosaics of Isaiah Zagar.
Since 1988, the National Trust has published an annual list, America’s 11 Most Endangered Historic Places. “The selection is based on the urgency of the threat and the viability of the plan the community has to save it,” Quillen explained. Local sites on the list have included Philadelphia’s Chinatown in 2023, Azikiwe-Nkrumah Hall at Lincoln University in 2016, Joe Frazier’s Gym in 2012, the Boyd Theater in 2008 (demolished in 2015), Valley Forge National Historical Park in 2000, and Independence National Historical Park in 1991 and 1992.
Joe Frazier’s Boxing Gym was placed on the National Register and the Philadelphia Register of Historic Places in 2013. Advocates working to preserve the local Black landmark at 2917 N. Broad Street receive technical assistance from the National Trust’s African American Cultural Heritage Action Fund. | Photo: Peter Woodall
Like most preservation advocates, staff of the National Trust envision new uses for historic buildings. “How should we talk to non-preservationists about preservation? We have to talk about what it creates,” Quillen said. In particular, she sees the nation’s supply of historic buildings as an economical asset to address housing needs. “The first question should be, ‘How do we use what we have instead of tearing it down?’ We’re working hard at the National Trust with our partners to create the right policy, with incentives to think about converting vacant or underused buildings into affordable housing. When you consider the cost of demolition and disposal, the greenest building is the one that already exists.”
However, she acknowledges that preservation can sometimes exacerbate gentrification. “The key is working with the local community to have their input on development. Preservation is about giving people who live in a community a say in what happens there.” That can be seen as rather optimistic, to suggest residents have much power with zoning codes and private developers.
Willow Street Steam Generation Plant’s new owner worked to have the building placed on the National Register in 2024. The long-abandoned site was added to the list in January 2025. The developer will partially finance the residential conversion of Willow Steam with federal historic tax credits. | Photo: Michael Bixler
A popular and effective incentive has been the Federal Historic Tax Credit, administered by the National Park Service and the Internal Revenue Service and applauded by preservationists. The program provides a 20 percent federal tax credit on qualified expenses incurred in the rehabilitation of historic commercial or income-producing properties. Since its creation in 1976, it has assisted in the rehabilitation of more than 50,000 historic properties nationwide. “Both federal and state historic tax programs are crucial. It’s important for how it creates jobs and leverages private investment. It’s often what makes the deal possible,” Quillen noted. “There is a lot of support in Congress for the Historic Tax Credit and possibly strengthening it.”
As a tax credit, it doesn’t involve the outlay of federal dollars, so it is not on the Trump administration’s list of programs to be reduced or eliminated. However, the Historic Preservation Fund, which supports several grant programs as well as the federally-mandated preservation offices in every state and territory, is slated to have its $158M annual appropriation removed from next year’s federal budget.
Quillen is earnest and upbeat when discussing the economic and social benefits of historic preservation. When the conversation shifts to their other advocacy focuses, like history and public lands, she is more circumspect, in the face of an administration that often has a hostile view of them.
The National Trust owns and operates the Cliveden, the historic 18th century estate at 6401 Germantown Avenue. | Photo courtesy of Historic American Buildings Survey, Library of Congress
Perhaps the work of the National Trust that is most fraught today is their advocacy of the country’s historical record, with the current administration pushing hard to elevate its narrative of U.S. history and to eliminate other stories, events, and figures that might contradict it.
A historian with a Ph.D. from Princeton University, Quillen affirmed the importance of acknowledging history, but when we spoke over the summer she avoided commenting on recent actions such as the removal of Native names or the restoration of the Confederate names of military bases. In early September, however, the National Trust’s Cliveden joined 43 other Philadelphia institutions—including Hidden City–in a letter to Doug Burgum, the Secretary of the Interior, expressing opposition to the President Trump’s Executive Order to remove “descriptions, depictions, or other content that inappropriately disparage Americans past or living (including persons living in colonial times), and instead focus on the greatness of the achievements and progress of the American people or, with respect to natural features, the beauty, abundance, and grandeur of the American landscape,” and which specifically cited the President’s House in Independence National Historical Park.
“We’re committed to telling the full American story. Even places that hold the most complicated stories, we need to confront them, not erase them,” Quillen stated. “We want to honor the people who fought for what we have—freedom, equality. All Americans deserve to see their history in their built environment. Preservation can create a sense of belonging for all of our people.”
