Poplar Forest gets $10K tourism grant Thomas Jeffersonâs Poplar Forest has received $10,000 from the Virginia Tourism Corporationâs Recovery Marketing Leverage Program. According to a news release from Poplar Forest, the program is âdesigned to help local and regional tourism entities attract more visitors by leveraging limited local marketing dollars through a local match of the state grant funds.â âPoplar Forest will use the VTC Recovery Marketing Leverage grant funds to reach out to visitors throughout the Central Virginia region (Lynchburg, Charlottesville, Roanoke and Richmond) and inspire them to plan an excursion to Thomas Jeffersonâs private retreat and other historic tours and locations in Bedford and Lynchburg, promoting architectural history tours at Poplar Forest and the downtown architectural walking tour, and the ongoing landscape restoration at Poplar Forest with the garden and retreat at the Anne Spencer House & Garden Museum. These experiences illustrate the historical significance and richness of these themes from Jeffersonâs era through the 1960s civil rights era,â the news release states.