Workhouse Historical Markers Dedicated to Irma Clifton, Harry Lattimore

Two historical markers were unveiled Wednesday at the , and they are dedicated to two Lorton Legends: One to lifelong resident Irma Clifton, who worked at the Lorton Reformatory for 26 years, and the other to the memory of Lorton historian Harry Lattimore, the founder of the Lorton Heritage Society.  

"Irma was the first president of the Lorton Arts Foundation, and if it wasn't for Irma and her fellow cohorts we would not have the Workhouse today," said Laura McKie, chair of the Workhouse Prison Museum. 

Clifton's marker details the development of the area from 1908, when a penal commission recommended federal acquisition of the site, all the way to present day. The prison, which closed in 2001 after 90 years in operation, was bought by Fairfax County for $4.2 million in 2004, and the Workhouse Arts Center opened in 2008 on 55 acres of the former prison site. 

"I love Lorton. It has everything you need at your doorstep," said Clifton, who lives in the house her parents bought in 1944. "Lorton has always been the underdog in the county, because we had the prison, the dump, the sewer plant - all of these negatives the county and the government chose to put here. But I think it bonded people and made them much more involved in how decisions by the county impacted their lives, as opposed to other parts of the county that didn't have such negatives to face."    

Clifton is currently treasurer of the South County Federation, president of the Lorton Heritage Society, member of the Fairfax County History Commission, chair of the Workhouse Prison Museum Operating Committee and occasional writer for Lorton Patch. 

"Irma really is the matriarch of Lorton," said Conrad Mehan of EnviroSolutions, which donated the marker. "We also felt this was a very necessary investment as far as the future of the Workhouse Museum goes."  

The second marker is dedicated to Harry Lattimore (1926 – 2004), who was the first branch manager of the Lorton Library, founded the Lorton Heritage Society, chaired the Lorton Task Force, was a charter member of the Federation of Lorton Communities and was an adviser for the Fairfax County History Commission. The markers cost approximately $2,000 apiece. 

"The first prisoners of the Workhouse were men who had been arrested and jailed for public drunkenness, petty theft, simple assault and non-support. Women were sentenced for soliciting, prostitution, disorderly conduct, vagrancy and intoxication," it reads.  

Lattimore's marker notes the imprisonment (but not mistreatment) of 72 members of the National Women's Party in 1917, who were arrested for picketing outside the White House. Their story is credited with compelling Congress to pass the 19th Amendment, which gave women the right to vote. 

The marker also details the career of Snowden Ashford, the municipal architect for the District of Columbia, who designed the prison. "The style, known as Colonial Revival, was chosen, according to Snowden to 'dispel suggestion of a penal institution,'" it reads. "The symmetrical facade of the long rectangular brick dormitory buildings, with the arched porticos along the covered arcade, exemplified dignity, simplicity and good taste."