Karen Dillon

Karen writes about the people and places of Smith Mountain Lake in "Shorelines," published bi-weekly.

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Booker T. Washington National Monument, the national park that strives to preserve the past, has gone high-tech. The park recently began offering information about its buildings, plant life and other features of the park to visitors via cellphone.

Currently, there are five stops along the tour that offer details about the park's reconstructed kitchen cabin, the birthplace site, the tobacco field, tobacco barn and Gills Creek. More information will be added to the tour by next spring. But that's not all.

The park also plans to add audio and video podcasts to its Web site in the near future, and has replaced its movie screen in the park's auditorium with an ActivBoard, an interactive white board that typically is found in school classrooms.

As for using cellphones on the tour, Tim Sinclair, park ranger, said:"People are sometimes shy about being with a park ranger on a tour. People like it when we give them the information they want and they can go at their own pace."

One potential drawback to this new way of touring the park is the lack of personal interaction between visitors and park rangers, especially if visitors have questions while on tour.

"Even though it's interactive, it never replaces the questions you have," said Sinclair. "The interaction with a park ranger goes into more topics."

Each audio component on the cellphone tour lasts no more than 90 seconds. During the tour stops, visitors can listen to segments again, pause or fast forward through the information. Visitors also are encouraged to leave comments.

"This is just a cheaper way of getting people this information," said Sinclair. "The only cost to the general public is the minutes [used during the phone call]."

Sinclair said he hopes the cellphone tours, like the regular tours, will encourage visitors to seek out more information after their visit.

"We want to protect and preserve the site by getting people to think about the site," he said.

This is not the park's first foray into new media. About four years ago, the park added an interactive computer to its Visitor Center. It allows visitors to take virtual tours of the plantation, view a map of the park and a timeline of history, and learn more about the park's namesake.

The virtual tours offered on the computer at the Visitor Center are what will eventually become video podcasts on the park's Web site. And because more schools are electing not to take children on field trips, the video podcasts "will increase our distance learning," said Sinclair.

Other national parks across the country have offered cellphone tours. According to the National Parks Service Web site, those include Valley Forge National Park in Pennsylvania, The Harry S. Truman National Historic Site in Independence, Mo., and Homestead National Monument near Lincoln, Neb.

Booker T. Washington National Monument also has beefed up its educational programming by adding three science programs to its repertoire. The Standards Of Learning-based programs will be implemented soon and like the video podcasts, are designed to enhance the learning experience, said Sinclair.

"We want to make sure every student has the opportunity to learn about Booker T. Washington," he said.

There are other learning opportunities, too. Saturday at 2 p.m., the park will host "Firin Der Tobacco," where visitors can learn about the curing process and how people's lives were affected by tobacco as a cash crop in the 1850s. And on Saturday, Dec. 6 from 3 until 8 p.m., visitors can learn about Christmas on the plantation in 1860.

Next year, the park plans to host its annual programs including Juneteenth and Harvest Time Festival. Also planned is a Plow Days festival, where there will be demonstrations of how the fields were plowed in the 1800s. And there's the possibility the park will host a Confederate encampment at the park in April, said Sinclair.

For more information on Booker T. Washington National Monument, call (540) 721-2094 or visit the park Web site at www.nps.gov/bowa.