Sherry L. Hodges laid four pieces of brightly-colored fabric on the podium at Saturday morning’s dedication ceremony for Woodville Park.

They were given to her by her mother, Arline Lanciano, the last of many such pieces of raw material Lanciano had brought back for her daughter over the years from trips abroad. Each time, the gifts were accompanied with a simple instruction: Make something out of it.

Hodges looks at her late mother’s gift of 100 acres to Gloucester County, and the seed money that accompanied it, in much the same fashion.

“Mom gave you this park as raw material to do with as you need and as you want,” Hodges told the family members and local dignitaries who gathered at the park on this beautiful morning, with the sounds of young children playing soccer in the distance.

While much has been made of this gift (such as the Baystars soccer fields right near the temporary stage for Saturday’s ceremony), much still remains to be done. “This 100 acres has a ways to go,” Hodges said. Only a portion of the initial plan has been constructed, and work by volunteers is being done almost every weekend to clear the rest of the property and convert it into athletic fields and other attractions.

“There’s a lot of work in what she expects from her children,” Hodges said of her mother, who died in 2009. That expectation now extends to everyone else in the community.

“This park belongs to all of you,” Hodges said, encouraging everyone to take pride in ownership, to help with the ongoing work and to contribute financially to its continued development.

As a child growing up in Grand Island, Neb., Lanciano and her brother would spend “most of the daylight hours” at a nearby park. In 1991, she visited this park with her daughter and grandson—and the seed of an idea began to take root.

That park was named for Grand Island native Grace Abbott (1878-1939), a child welfare advocate who was the first woman to be nominated for a presidential cabinet position. Having found some success in her life, Abbott made the park a gift to her hometown.

Lanciano, who had accumulated property over the course of a successful 30-year career in real estate, decided to do the same thing.

Unfortunately, Lanciano was unable to see children at play in the park she helped create, although she is remembered in its Memorial Garden. Hodges said they borrowed a line from Abbott’s memorial to honor her mother—”A life well lived; An existence well-used”—saying it was perfectly fitting for both women.

Carter Borden, chairman of the Gloucester Board of Supervisors, began Saturday’s ceremony with his own memories of “Miss Arline.” He told the story of when Lanciano had come to his father’s sawmill to pick up some wood. Borden’s father kept loading up the vehicle. “Mother said, ‘She’s so good looking, he’ll give her the whole pile,’” Borden said.

Borden said that Claude and Arline Lanciano were also the first ones in the neighborhood to have a TV in the early ’50s. When the Lancianos got a bigger set, Borden and his family got their old one.

The two families remained close throughout the years. Borden said that he visited Mrs. Lanciano shortly before she died. On her dresser, he said, was a picture of Borden’s mother, “which makes me cry to this day.”

Warren Deal, a member of the Gloucester County Historical Society, spoke about the history of Woodville. Dressed as Joel Hayes, who owned the land in the 1850s, Deal recounted the rich past of this property that was once home to Chief Powhatan and his people. The property was part of a land grant in 1642 to Augustine Warner (of Warner Hall fame), nine years before Gloucester County was established.

Members of Lazun’s Legion, he said, likely passed through this area on their way to face Tarleton at the Battle of the Hook in 1781. Woodville was subdivided from Warner’s extensive holdings and eventually became the property of Richard Coke and then Hayes.

The land was also the home of slaves, who worked the land until Union troops burned Woodville Plantation after a daughter of Hayes took a shot at a passing soldier, Deal said. After the war, Woodville was further subdivided to pay off debts.

Eventually, the Lancianos acquired the property and “their vision and their generosity,” combined with thousands of hours of volunteer time has helped “to make this park dream a reality,” he said.

Everyone who went before—from the native Americans, colonial patriots, slaves, and others—made this property what it is today. “This land is a testimony to them,” Deal said.

Don Sandridge, chairman of the Gloucester Parks and Recreation Advisory Committee, singled out some of the other key players who helped create this park. In particular, he cited the work of Chris Clifford, chairman of Park Partners, who has put in much of the physical labor in converting this land into Woodville Park.

“He joins Arline in leaving a legacy … he’s one in a million,” Sandridge said of Clifford. He also praised Parks, Recreation and Tourism Director Carol Steele for all her hard work.

Clifford, who had spent the morning clearing land for football fields for the Gloucester Youth Football Association, said that, earlier in the day, when he heard the shouts of children and whistles being blown, “I just started to cry.”

Children, he said, “are the biggest investment we make in our lives. And, if we do it well, they stay here.”

Clifford said he’s touched by the willingness of the community to step up and help, from the Rotary Club to volunteers from Susanna Wesley UMC and the Baystars … the list went on and on. “It’s been built by the people of Gloucester,” he said.

He urged everyone to keep contributing time and money to complete this park. “It’s an opportunity to take Arline’s fabric and keep building,” Clifford said. “Thank you, Arline. There’s a lot of smiles in heaven right now.”