Richard Moe announces his retirement. (National Trust)

National Trust for Historic Preservation president Richard Moe announced today that he will retire in the spring of 2010. Moe, 72, is the longest-serving president in the organization’s 60-year history. The legacy of his 17-year tenure will likely be his push to bring historic preservation into the mainstream by revitalizing urban historic districts and promoting the environmental importance of saving aging buildings and structures.

“It has been an enormous privilege to be associated with the National Trust over these years,” Moe said in a statement on the National Trust’s website. “It has been the most fulfilling professional experience I have ever had.” Moe went on to say that his departure will present an opportunity for the Trust to seek a generational change at a time when its financial base and its programming are on solid ground.

Richard Moe receives the Vincent Scully Prize in December 2007. (National Building Museum)

Among his proudest achievements as president, Moe listed the organization’s role in preventing construction of a Disney theme park in the historic Northern Piedmont region of Virginia, its 2003 purchase of Mies van der Rohe’s Farnsworth House, and the action it has taken in New Orleans since Hurricane Katrina.

Trust chairman Cliff Hudson has established national search committee to find Moe’s replacement.