Fred Bright splits tobacco stalks so they can be cured. The volunteer, 69, tends livestock, cultivates crops, builds farm facilities and educates visitors to the park. msn View More Images from this story Visit the Photo Place

BEST MAN FOR THE JOB

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King George man wins national award for his work on farm at Washington's Birthplace

ROB HEDELT •   Rob Hedelt's archive •   E-mail Rob Hedelt

Date published: 8/12/2004

By ROB HEDELT

FRED BRIGHT of King George County learned plenty of life lessons aplenty early in high school when he left his comfortable home in Princeton, N.J., to live and work on a nearby farm.

Getting up to help milk 120 cows a morning before school, then back at it from afternoon 'til long after dark, Bright quickly got an appreciation for hard work and dedication.

He also realized he has a natural rapport with animals--"I'd tell them something, and they looked like they understood what I wanted."

Near the end of high school, Bright's job even taught him the perils of mixing work and girl friends.

The 69-year-old Pennsylvania native smiles remembering a cattle sale one afternoon when a pretty face put him in a jam.

"I was looking across the ring and waved my arm at a girl I knew standing by the rail," Bright said, smiling. "My boss from work looked at me and said 'I hope you wanted that heifer in the ring, because you just bought her.'"

When Bright unloaded the heifer back at the farm, it walked off the trailer and right into the barn, blind as a bat.

"But she was a good milker and eventually learned to follow the other cows in and out," said Bright, "so it all worked out."

Bright would grow up to put in a career as a welder, for the last 20 years of it on the Navy base at Dahlgren. But it was those early experiences on the barn that led to a recent award from the National Park Service for the King George man.

For volunteering as a farm worker at George Washington Birthplace National Monument in Westmoreland County, Bright was singled out as the Volunteer of the Year from the federal agency's Northeast Region.

Chosen from a pool of thousands of volunteers serving in 92 park facilities from Maine to Virginia, Bright received hearty congratulations, a plaque and a round of applause from the Birthplace staff.

Dick Lahey, who manages the living-history farm at George Washington Birthplace, said that since signing on as a volunteer in 2001, Bright has become a critical part of the farm team.

Date published: 8/12/2004