Gum Springs celebrating 185th anniversary on Saturday

The parade will start at 11 a.m. at the corner of Fordson Road and Richmond Highway.

Gum Springs will be celebrating its 185th anniversary on Saturday with a parade and other festivities.

The Gum Springs Community Day & Parade kicks off at 11 a.m with the parade, which will start at the intersection of Richmond Highway and Fordson Road. The parade route will go down Fordson and finish at the Martin Luther King Jr. Community Park (see map). The celebration will then continue there until 5 p.m.

The grand marshal for Saturday’s parade is 98-year-old Ada Singletary, who is believed to be the oldest Gum Springs resident actually born and raised in the community. Singletary recently sat down for an interview about her life, which can be viewed on the New Gum Springs Civic Association’s website.

Ada Singletary

The civic association is expecting a number of politicians to attend Gum Springs Community Day, including the following:

• U.S. Rep. Don Beyer
• ​Board of Supervisors Chairman Sharon Bulova
• Lee District Supervisor Jeff McKay
• ​Tim Sargeant, At-Large Planning Commissioner
• Mount Vernon District school board representitive Karen Corbett Sanders
• At-large school board representative Karen Keys-Gamarra
• At-large school board member Ilryong Moon

Gum Springs is the oldest African American community in Fairfax County. It was founded in 1833 by West Ford, a freed slave who lived and worked on the Mount Vernon plantation. Gum Springs became a safe haven for freed and runaway slaves, who made a living in the then-rural community as farmers, lumber workers and tradesmen.