BUILDING A YEAR-LONG
CELEBRATION
Condon was instrumental in brainstorming with MVCC members Patti Davidson and Lindsay Hutter, who co-chair the club’ s year-long America250 celebration and worked on a committee to build a full calendar of member events.
We knew we didn’ t want to just celebrate July 4th and be done with it. We wanted to bring meaning and education to the membership, and we decided to build out a 2026 calendar to focus on land and nature, education, culinary events, and golf.
LEFT: MVCC president Drew Smith poses with a plaque outside his home, noting the historical significance of it being located on a George Washington original farm.
BELOW: Grounds crew ready red, white, and blue flowers for the celebration.
— Patti Davidson, MVCC club member since 1998
The club’ s committee also sought guidance from members Drew Smith, MVCC president, and Dr. Doug Bradburn, president and CEO of George Washington’ s Mount Vernon. Both Smith and Bradburn live on Alexandria properties that were once part of Washington’ s original five farms.
“ There’ s a real sense of pride from our members having our property so closely connected to George Washington’ s historical farms, and that prompted the idea of getting more deliberate and engaged around the national America250 initiatives,” said Smith.
One of the first things the club’ s planning committee did was to print and frame a large map of George Washington’ s five farms, hang it in the club’ s foyer, and encourage members to place a pin on the map where their homes are located. Residents living on one of Washington’ s five farms also could obtain commemorative plaques for their homes.
In February, for Washington’ s birthday, one of the region’ s most formidable George Washington interpreters came to the club for a birthday party complete with birthday cake, cherry-pie-making activities for the kids, beer tasting for the adults, and colonial-type culinary offerings, such as hoecakes. The visiting president even autographed his likeness on $ 1 bills.
The club also introduced to members“ Flat George,” a cutout likeness of Washington that could be folded for travel and taken on vacation and to golf tournaments. And in late April, members welcomed guest speaker Anita McBride, who served as chief of staff to first lady Laura Bush and whose expertise spans first ladies and White House history.
This spring, MVCC members have spent time with the club’ s lead horticulturist to learn how to plant flower beds with red, white, and blue blooms. That patriotic color scheme will decorate the club’ s grounds this year.
And a whiskey tasting was scheduled for June with a nod to Washington’ s own distillery at his Mount Vernon estate, which was the largest documented whiskey distillery in the nation in the 18th century, producing 11,000 gallons in 1799.
“ We rebuilt the Mount Vernon distillery in 2006 on the site of the original distillery and have been producing whiskey since 2008,” said Bradburn.“ We regularly make George Washington’ s rye whiskey from his own recipe.”
MOUNT VERNON COUNTRY CLUB
16 V IRGINIA G OLFER | J U LY / A UGUST 2026 vsga. org