Rising Seas Now Threaten Jamestown, Founded in 1607
Archaeologists at Jamestown, Virginia are digging faster than ever. Rising seas and accelerating coastal erosion are eating away at the land beneath America’s first permanent English settlement, and researchers say the race to recover artifacts is not abstract: what isn’t excavated soon may be gone permanently.
Jamestown was founded in 1607. Without it, Sean Romo, director of archaeology for Jamestown Rediscovery, says there is no modern United States. The site is where America’s first representative assembly convened, where the first enslaved Africans were brought ashore by English colonists, and where the original fort stood for centuries before its ruins were discovered in 1994.
“You can’t put a shovel in the ground without finding something.”
Sean Romo, Director of Archaeology, Jamestown Rediscovery, July 3, 2026
The density of finds makes the threat sharper. Every inch of shoreline lost to erosion destroys archaeological context that cannot be reconstructed once it washes into the James River.
Virginia’s Coast Is Sinking While the Water Rises
The Chesapeake Bay region faces a double threat. Sea levels are rising due to climate change, and the land itself is subsiding, a combination that makes Virginia’s tidal shorelines among the fastest-disappearing in the eastern United States. The result is that historically significant ground is not just flooding periodically; it is being permanently reclaimed by water.
America’s 250th anniversary year arrives as the landscape where that history happened is actively destabilizing. Romo’s team at Jamestown Rediscovery is working to document and recover what they can before the next erosion cycle takes more of the site.
Federal Investment in Preservation Is at Risk
Historic site preservation funding runs through the National Park Service and the Historic Preservation Fund. Both have faced budget pressure under ongoing federal spending cuts. The National Park Service deferred billions in maintenance before recent budget cycles, and climate adaptation funding for coastal sites remains inconsistent from year to year.
Jamestown is not alone. Coastal historic sites from St. Augustine, Florida to colonial-era properties along the Carolina Lowcountry face the same slow-moving threat with no coordinated federal response scaled to the problem.
What You Can Do Now
-
Call your House representative at (202) 225-3121 and ask them to restore Historic Preservation Fund appropriations to at least $150 million annually. The fund, which supports state preservation offices and threatened sites, has been targeted in budget reconciliation talks this year.
-
Contact your two senators at (202) 224-3121 and ask them to oppose any cuts to the National Park Service’s climate resilience and coastal erosion programs. Name Jamestown specifically; it is a federal site under NPS management.
-
Submit a comment to the Advisory Council on Historic Preservation (achp.gov/about/contact-us) urging the agency to issue formal climate vulnerability guidance for all National Historic Landmark sites with coastal exposure. The council sets preservation policy for federal agencies.
-
Contact Virginia’s congressional delegation directly. Sens. Tim Kaine and Mark Warner both sit on committees with jurisdiction over federal land and infrastructure spending. Tell them Virginia’s own historic shoreline is eroding and federal funding gaps are accelerating the loss.
Sources
- Opinion: When it comes to sharing the Colorado River, Lower Basin states must step up and make hard decisions — Colorado Sun (2026-07-07)
PBS NewsHour: How Climate Change and Rising Seas Endanger Historic Sites Like Jamestown NOAA: Sea Level Rise and Chesapeake Bay Regional Projections National Park Service: Deferred Maintenance at Federal Historic Sites Climate Central: Land Subsidence and Sea Level Rise Along the Atlantic Coast Preservation Virginia: Jamestown Rediscovery Project Background