Bill Clinton Boyhood Home Now National Historic Site

FILE - In this March 12, 1999 file photo, President Bill Clinton holds an umbrella under the porch of his childhood home in Hope, Ark. The Clinton First Home Museum in Hope will display the trappings of its new status as a national historic site come the first of the year. The museum opened in 1997 and has been run by a private foundation since then. (AP Photo/Khue Bui, File)

Former President Bill Clinton's boyhood home in Hope, Arkansas is now a national historic site. The National Park Service is in charge of managing the site after the home's deed was transferred to the federal government Tuesday.

Bill Clinton was born in the house on Hervey Street and he spent the first four years of his life there with his widowed mother and grandparents.

A private group called the Clinton Birthplace Foundation opened the home to public tours after restoring it in 1997. Now that group will work alongside the National Park Service to transition the it from a private to a public site.

Speaking about his pride in the official designation of the department's 394th historic site, Interior Secretary Ken Salazar said, "President Clinton spent his first formative years in Hope and credits his family and the community with helping to shape his understanding of the world and influencing his development into the international statesman that he has become."

Congress had previously passed legislation adding the home to the list of National Historic Sites and President Obama signed the bill back in March of 2009, but until the deed transfer was complete, the Park Service couldn't officially establish the site. The site will be officially dedicated sometime in the spring of 2011.