Willard (also known as Willard Crossroads) was an
unincorporated community
An unincorporated area is a parcel of land that is not governed by a local general-purpose municipal corporation. (At p. 178.) They may be governed or serviced by an encompassing unit (such as a county) or another branch of the state (such as th ...
located in what is now a part of
Washington Dulles International Airport in the
U.S. state of
Virginia
Virginia, officially the Commonwealth of Virginia, is a U.S. state, state in the Southeastern United States, Southeastern and Mid-Atlantic (United States), Mid-Atlantic regions of the United States between the East Coast of the United States ...
.
The village was named after
Joseph Edward Willard, a delegate to the
Virginia General Assembly from 1893 to 1901, then
Lieutenant Governor of Virginia. Although Willard lived in
Loudoun County
Loudoun County () is in the northern part of the Virginia, Commonwealth of Virginia in the United States. In 2020, the census returned a population of 420,959, making it Virginia's third-most populous county. The county seat is Leesburg, Virgi ...
, he represented
Fairfax County, because the village was only from the county border. Willard owned a estate in
Fairfax. His father was Joseph Clapp Willard, the owner of the famed
Willard Hotel in
Washington, D.C.
Willard was at the intersection of Willard Road (now Stonecroft Boulevard) and the old Sterling Road. Willard was surrounded by extensive farmland, housing, schools, places of worship, the Willard store (until 1907), and Blue Ridge Airfield (1938–1951). Willard stood west of
Floris, north of Pleasant Valley, and south of Farmwell (now
Ashburn). Willard was regarded as a crossroads and a distinctive community until construction of Washington Dulles International Airport began in 1958.
Approximately of Virginia land from Willard,
Chantilly, Pleasant Valley,
Sterling, and Ashburn was bought for construction. By the airport's completion, all remains of civilization before 1958 on this land had virtually disappeared, except a stretch of Willard Rd (used as a service road), and three storage outbuildings between Runways 1C/19C and 1R/19L.
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Former populated places in Virginia
Geography of Loudoun County, Virginia
Populated places demolished to make room for airports
{{LoudounCountyVA-geo-stub