The Preston Medal

Last week I attended an event about Greenfield, a former plantation in my county that is now an industrial park.

The Botetourt Center at Greenfield is a 922 acre site the county purchased for $4.5 million in 1995.  The land was divided into an industrial area, a parks and recreation area, and a school area.  The county built Greenfield Elementary School and the Greenfield Education and Training Center in 2000.  The county completed a couple of ball fields and built a $3 million sports complex at the Recreation Center at Greenfield.  Two industries located in the industrial area; one left, that building has now become a brewery. There is also a "pad-ready" site that a business could build a structure upon. It was available for several years with no takers. Supposedly a company from Italy is going to build there, but the last time I was by there - about six weeks ago - no construction was underway.

In late 2015 there was a big brouhaha over the supervisors decision to move historic structures on the property to a place they deemed more appropriate for a historic/visitors center area. One of the arguments they used to justify moving these structures was traffic. People shouldn't be moving through an industrial park, they said. Interestingly, the new brewery, which purchased an empty building not long after the historic structures were moved, is going to have 300-seat restaurant. So I guess that having people driving in and out of an industrial park really wasn't the reason.

When the supervisors' efforts to remove the historic structures became known, a group calling themselves the Friends of Greenfield/Preston Plantation sprang up. I was a part of that in a peripheral way. First I wrote letters to the editor of the local weekly to keep it in the public eye, and once people finally woke up and realized they needed to move, I set up a Facebook page and managed it for a short time. I also made monetary donations and took photos.



The slave quarters at Greenfield,
being prepped for moving. Photo taken December 30, 2015.

The slave quarters at Greenfield. Photo taken December 30, 2015.

Greenfield was once owned by Colonel William Preston, a Botetourt County statesman and a Revolutionary War hero. The structures that the supervisors moved despite public opposition were pre-Civil War and included a slave dwelling and kitchen.

The farm was called Greenfield Plantation, named so in 1761. William Preston moved from Greenfield to Drapers Meadows in 1774. He represented Botetourt County in Virginia’s House of Burgess in the 1760s, before there was a United States.  He was a pioneer and a soldier who defended the Virginia frontier during the Revolutionary War.

Preston's son, John, also a Revolutionary War soldier and a Botetourt County statesman, became owner of the Greenfield farm after William Preston and his wife died. The Preston family owned Greenfield through seven generations and sold the land in the late 20th century.

The Greenfield mansion burned in 1959, and it is thought that part of the original log structure existed until that time.

The Friends of Greenfield last week showed off some of the more than 13,000 artifacts that archeologists and volunteers dug up during a hurried three-week dig last year.

I'm not sure what these things are but the archeologists have been busy cataloging this stuff. The hope is that eventually there will be some kind of museum at Greenfield. I am not holding my breath.

Lisa Farmer was one of the group leaders.

Danny Kyle, who I later found out is my cousin, was
also one of the group leaders.

Rupert Cutler, a well-known Roanoker, is working on the
supervisor-appointed Greenfield Commission.

After remarks and discussion, some of which included financial concerns as there are still bills to pay for the archeology study, the group handed out medals they had made to folks who had played at role in attempting to preserve Greenfield's history.

They very kindly gave me one.

The fate of the historic area at Greenfield lies in the hands of the Greenfield Commission appointed by the supervisors, and the supervisors, of course. I do not know if the community has the will to push to have this historic preservation area funded and placed. We have lots of folks who are always yelling about taxes and what they consider to be unimportant expenditures, so I guess it will depend upon who screams the loudest.

Belching on a Federal Holiday

A little weather "inversion" showing off the smoke from the local industry at 7:35 a.m. this morning.

(It's 7:59 a.m. now and the smoke is still rolling out of the stacks.)

Exit 150

Exit 150 off of Interstate 81 in Virginia is one of the busiest interchanges in the state. At this intersection, US 11 and US 220 also intersect, and not far down the road is US 460.

As such, this area has always had a lot of traffic.

For the majority of my life, there was a big truckstop at the exit, but the state purchased the structure and removed the business in 2015. This, in my opinion, was all that needed to be done, aside from maybe a lane for the Pilot station across the street which became the "new" undesignated truck stop for those long-haulers who needed to make a pit stop.

I remember when the exit was a nightmare. Botetourt County was then more of a bedroom community to the city, and commuters would sometimes be caught in a miles-long backup of traffic come 5 p.m. At times, traffic wanting to get off at Exit 150 backed up to the weighing scales. That's because there was only one exit area on the northbound side, and in order for people to head to Fincastle, they had to make a left turn.

In the 1980s, the state took steps to improve the intersection, but did only a half-way job of it. They added a second exit. The work resolved some, but not all, of the problems. Truckers tended to still use the first exit and then attempt to make a left-hand turn at the stop light, often blocking three lands of traffic as they did so (had they gone a bit further to the "B" exit at 150, they would not have done this, but apparently many of them ignored signs).

By the 1990s there was talk of a "flyover" interchange that would dump traffic out about where Food Lion is today. That plan never saw the light of day, and as the state wound through its money issues with do-nothing delegates (much like the federal government), projects such as Exit 150 improvements were moved back.

But now it is underway, and last night the county held an "open house" forum to introduce the public to the concept of an Urban Development Area zoning designation. The supervisors want to designate the Exit 150 as a UDA, and they also want to apply this designation to the Daleville Town Center area.


What the Daleville Town Center was
supposed to look like as of 2008,
 prior to proffer changes.

My husband and I are skeptics about the ability of the county to accomplish anything of substance, and unfortunately our "rulers" such as they are, tend to listen only to the moneyed folks. Daleville Town Center looks nothing like its initial premise. We knew when the county passed it that the developers would soon be back whining that certain proffers (things they promised to do) would cost too much and they would ask for exceptions.

This they did, have done, and I suppose will continue to do, unless the supervisors have given them a blank check to develop the property in whatever manner the moneyed folks see fit. That is what it looks like from this side of the road, anyway.

The supervisors want to see Exit 150 built up as "walkable district with a mix of new housing, shops, offices, and hotels." Daleville Town Center was supposed to be a planned community with that type of thing, but it has turned instead into a mish-mash of buildings and apartments, with no design coherency. The developers take whatever they can get and build it.

I don't see why Exit 150 would be any different. This is especially true since the owner of one 22-acre parcel is most unhappy with state's eminent domain usurpation of his property in order to create the thru-lane from Alternate US 220 to US 11, a little bypass around the stoplight. The state said his land was worth about $900,000; he's in court this week asking for $3.8 million, according to a story in today's daily paper.

You can read the state's version of what it is doing at Exit 150 at the VDOT website at this link.

Exit 150 is an eyesore and has been for a very long time. I do not dispute that. It has been a traffic hazard for most of my life. The county had no zoning to speak of until the late 1990s, and this allowed gas stations, hotels, and restaurants to spring up in a piece mill fashion. Some of the older structures are dilapidated and worthless - they need bulldozing, if anything. But the property is prime, right there on US 220, and the owners have high price tags on purchases.

The open house forum last night was well attended but poorly explained. I could never get close enough to actually see the plans, and in all honestly, I am not sure what the focus of the event was. I think it was just to say they had something for the public.



This appeared to be the main plan.

 

This was as close as I could get; I never took a good look.
 



This describes what an Urban Development area is -
"a planning tool ... to create great places by
focusing capital investments on target growth areas."  Government bureaucratic speak at its finest.

 

At least somebody did take down comments if
 you stood there and talked to him long enough.

 
 


Nobody looked at this map. I don't think
 anyone understood it.

 

This man was taking pictures. I know him
 but I will be nice and not name him.

 

Some of the comments concerned affordable
 housing, the fact that Daleville Town Center did not
 become what was promised, the need for
 restaurants, and quality of development.

Will this "vision" come to pass? Will Exit 150 be a beautiful space in my lifetime? I seriously doubt it. As one person said to me, we lack the will as a community, as well as the money.

Driving might improve - although more than a few us think an ambulance may as well take a permanent spot in that round-about because we think it is going to cause lots of wrecks - but if Daleville Town Center is any indication of the way this county goes about creating "planned communities," Exit 150 will be another hodge-podge mix of uses, with no thought for anything except who can get the biggest amount of money for what.

*I am no longer a news reporter, but I still have an interest in my community. This is not a news report, this is my opinion on something the county is doing.*

The New Fear in Town

Today I did something in my supermarket parking lot that I've never done before.

I locked the car doors as soon as I could get myself into my seat.

My county is, by and large, a small community. The county as a whole has about 33,000 people. I don't know them all, of course, but there is seldom a time when I go to the local market and do not see someone I know.

After a while, especially if you go around the same time and day, you tend to see the same people over and over. You may not be friends, but there is a sense of security in the sameness.

That's why today, when I left the store and noticed people I did not recognize accosting folks in the parking lot, showing them a flyer and pointing, and watching as the people tried vainly to be polite and get away, and then noticed other people who did not seem to be long wandering around trying indiscreetly to check door handles on vehicles, I hurriedly unloaded my groceries in the trunk, praying that I would draw no attention to myself. I was parked in a handicapped spot and had my cane in my hand, but still. I was feeling terrible and not having a good day.

So as soon as I could, I fled to my car (which means I limped to the car), and I locked the doors.

In my little county. Where I know probably 10 percent of the 33,000 people who live here by virtue of my former work as a news reporter. And if I don't know you, I probably know your friend.

City folk are probably thinking, so what? I imagine they always lock their car doors. Maybe they always walk to their vehicle with their pepper spray at the ready. I don't know. I grew up in a rural area and I've never been overly concerned about my safety, even though I was attacked at Winn Dixie a very long time ago. The person who did that was not from these parts.

And neither, I suspect, were the people patrolling the supermarket parking lot today. They did not look they belonged here. Their dress was off. Their movements were wrong. They were prowling, and we don't prowl.

I started to call the sheriff's office, but wondered what I would report. Strange looking folks in the parking lot? We have a lot of strange-looking people wander through the area anyway as we're on the Appalachian Trail. But these people weren't hikers. I know what the hikers look like. These people were scammers or something.

Rumors of folks accosting others at local parking lots have been flying around for a while now. Sometimes someone asks for money for a cab. Sometimes they ask for a ride. Some time ago, I was asked if I wanted to buy "really good steaks, cheap" out of the back of a freezer truck. I politely declined and hurried away.

One asked my mother-in-law to help her, and my mother-in-law told her to go in and talk to the store management. That was smart thinking for a woman over 80.

Scams obviously work - someone sometimes gives these people money or rides or whatever it is they are after, or they wouldn't continue to haunt parking lots and other places where they shouldn't be.

Generally I am not afraid of much. I don't worry about who I see in parking lots. Today, maybe simply because I wasn't feeling well, I noticed more than I normally do. I felt the fear that I know is running rampant around the nation, the fear that is bringing out the worst in my fellow human beings.

All it brought out in me was a desire to lock my doors and go home.

Thursday Thirteen: Canning Companies

Back in the late 1800s and early 1900s, local farmers had canneries. At one time in my area there were nearly 200 canneries. Most of them put up tomatoes. Around 1919, this area was the second-largest tomato-production area in the nation (a county in Maryland was first).

A blight came through and killed much of the tomato crop, and in so doing made the ground unproductive for tomatoes (even today it is hard to grow tomatoes here). The blight crushed the industry, and those who survived the blight then suffered after World War II from government regulations as big farming and packaging companies took over and put the smaller farming industries out of business.




The Blue Ridge Institute and Museum in Ferrum, VA currently has a display of labels from these many companies. Each little cannery had it's own label for cans and packing crates. These labels are all from my little part of the world.
  


 

The labels were very colorful and unique.

 

Each farmer created his own design and brand.

 

Many of these family names can still be found in the area today.

 

The labels described the product as "mountain grown"
or used some other descriptive advertisement.

 


This explains how the canneries grew and then collapsed.



Farmers also grew and canned apples, sweet potatoes, and
 other fruits and vegetables.

 

This is what a cannery looked like. Many of these old buildings can still be found in the area.

 

These labels were used on packing crates.

 

A tree of cans with the labels still attached. Each one is different.

 

Three local cans from my community.

 


The collection is on display courtesy of Mr. Charlie Woods, who has generously donated his collection
to the Blue Ridge Institute.

 

Many of the labels were made in nearby Bedford by the Piedmont Label Company. It is
still in business under another name.

Putting Humpty Back Together Again

The Botetourt Board of Supervisors this week moved the historic structures at Greenfield from their original location to the little historic "park" they have been planning to build for the last 20 years. Articles and video of the move can be seen at these links:

http://wtvr.com/2016/02/25/this-is-living-history-says-group-fighting-to-keep-historic-slave-homes-in-place/

http://www.roanoke.com/news/local/botetourt_county/relocation-of-historic-slave-buildings-in-botetourt-county-completed/article_02979c67-174e-5c8e-bfad-78317f0d141e.html#.VtASBDlPKcg.facebook

http://www.wdbj7.com/news/local/second-greenfield-slave-home-moved-to-new-location/38195702

http://wsls.com/ap/relocation-of-2-historic-slave-buildings-completed/

http://wsls.com/2016/02/26/botetourt-historic-slave-kitchen-moved-county-board-responds-to-complaints/

Below are the last photos I took of the structures while they were still on the hill. In these pictures, the integrity of the structures was already compromised, and had been since about mid-December, at least from a historian's point of view. I am not a historian but I know that when you raise a building off its foundation, it's not the way it was before it was moved. That is when I stopped writing letters to the editor, asking the supervisors to slow down their plans, because I knew the cause was lost. You can read those two letters here, and here. I don't believe they were incendiary or otherwise inappropriate.

 

 

 

 

 

 

My concern now is not these structures. They are moved, the deed is done, the county is moving forward with what it wants regardless of public outcry. I will support whatever happens next, just like I did when the county purchased Greenfield initially even though I objected to that 20 years ago.

 

If you want one supervisor's take on the issue, you can read his responses to some questions from a retired journalist at the blog, fromtheeditr. The supervisor in his comments is rather unhappy with those who attempted to keep these structures intact and in place, calling them "white radical historical preservationist [who] played the race card," and "arm chair white intelligentsia" and saying "Everybody loves a messy story, especially if someone screams unresponsive big government and racist. I confess to being a little surprised at the single-minded unrelenting opposition of a talented small minority." 

 

I'll let you make your own judgment about what that says about the supervisor, and you can read the rest of his comments for yourself at the link.

 

What I want now is for everyone to take a deep breath and play nice. There have been multiple letters to the editor about this issue, but I did not perceive any of them to be mean, more like a pleading for the supervisors to stop and think that there might be other ways to accomplish the same goals. I do not know what conversations have been held in private, between individuals. I've been sick the whole month of February, so I have no idea what rumors have been spread.

 

What I do know is that the supervisors moved forward and never actually had a dialogue with the public about this issue. Listening to someone speak for three minutes and then thanking them, without engaging in a conversation, is not dialogue. Whatever happened 20 years ago doesn't count, either. That was a generation ago.

 

In my letter to the editor early when the story broke back in October (I wasn't writing for any paper then, so felt free to do that), I suggested the supervisors slow down to give the public more time to digest this project. They did not. They held one open meeting in late October, and it did not go well.

 

I wish the supervisors had then set up a public information session to better explain themselves, but they did not, and their lack of communication has been perceived as pigheadedness. I know it frustrated me, as someone who had sat in their meetings for two years and knew that something wasn't right here. The secretiveness felt wrong.

 

They forgot that nothing has been done to Greenfield in 15 years except for recreational fields, the sports complex, and the Cherry Blossom trail. This 20-year-old bond referendum the supervisors have referenced on occasion means nothing to anybody younger than 45. Many people who have moved to Botetourt did not even know Greenfield was an industrial park. Of course this move to relocate historic structures surprised those folks. They considered it a county park, not an industrial ground.

 

I initially supported the "talented minority," but backed off in early February. I felt that some of their rhetoric seemed out of control and as a (former) news reporter I refused to be a part of that. I was asked to be involved initially but my involvement was peripheral (I created the initial Facebook page because no one else knew how). The leaders of the "talented minority" asked no more of me and I did not volunteer more. By early February, I was out of it entirely. I did not attend a single one of their meetings. I do not know if any of the supervisors think I was a part of that, but I was not.

 

I remain disappointed in the board's lack of communication with the public, and I feel the supervisor's response at the fromtheeditr blog were somewhat slippery. I think many people wanted a public dialogue, and the supervisors refused to do that. That allowed the opposition to make a lot of noise, so the supervisors hold some blame for this negative publicity for Botetourt. My opinion, of course. I suppose I am one of those "arm chair intelligentsia" people.

 

Some of the statements in the fromtheeditr blog are not exactly true - in 2006 I wrote an article for the local paper and the structures ended up on the national register of endangered places as a result. These structures were county-owned and county officials had promised to care for them, one way or the other, so why should the historical societies have thought otherwise, or stepped in? The county did not ask for their help, and had long ago indicated they would take the lead on restoration. In 2006 the county did take some steps to shore up the structures after they were placed on the endangered list. They did not ask for help from the historical societies then, either, that I am aware of.

 

In 2012  the supervisors at that time, which included three different men, informally promised that these structures would be left on the hill top. I was at the meetings when they discussed it. However, they never made a resolution to that point. Many preservationists, though, thought that their comments were an official decision. So that is why, when word got out in October that these buildings would be removed and the hill leveled, people were surprised. Three years ago they had been promised otherwise, in their mind.

 

Regarding the "race card," I wanted these structures preserved where they were because they were old. Anything pre-Civil War deserves to be studied and looked at before it is bulldozed or torn down or moved or whatever. These were on public property and there had been no hurry for 20 years. It made no difference to me if they were slave quarters or a settler's shack. I just knew they were old and relevant to historical studies. I didn't see why another six months mattered. That would have been time for a more thorough archeological look.

 

Personally, I do not know if slaves are buried near the manor house. They could have been buried a good 30-minute walk away on a 3,000 acre plantation (which it was in the late 1700s - early 1800s). Those graves may have been bulldozed over when the county built the sports complex for all we know. The historic park should have a little monument to "unknown people who may have been buried on these grounds" or something.

 

The hill itself has significance because it has terraced Jeffersonian gardens on it. There may be heirloom plants there. It should be studied before the dirt is carted off. I doubt it will be.

 

Regardless of how the supervisors feel about this, as leaders I do think it is their responsibility now to mitigate this issue and create a better sense of harmony here between the county and the preservationists.

 

If they were to ask me (which they won't), I would advise some kind of open information session. The supervisors wouldn't even have to be there - let the county administrator and the deputy county administrator take the heat. Show what this historic "park" could look like, show what the shell building will look like, show what they plan or hope to do with the other 550 acres. I think it would be worth the $10,000 it would take for a few architectural drawings to restore community trust and harmony.

 

To many, this project seems to have taken place and been decided in secret. Get rid of that perception and it will go a long way to putting Botetourt County back together again.

 

Crocodiles After Rats

The events happening at Greenfield today (the moving of historic structures to make way for a shell building) are no more than I expected, but I am extremely disappointed in the way the county Board of Supervisors handled this.

I have never seen such a lack of communication and what appears to be a disrepect for citizen concerns as I have during this total breakdown in communication. This has not been handled well from the beginning, and the supervisors should never have thought that a 20-year-old plan would be remembered by anybody younger than 45 years old.

In the last 15 years, the people of Botetourt have thought of Greenfield more as a recreational area than an industrial park, and the county has only itself to blame for that, what with its sports complex and trails, etc. For people to react to what in their mind is a dispoiling of greenspace they care for should not have been unexpected.

This situation could have been mitigated with a little cooperation from those who should have lead but instead chose to bully their way across public opinion. I know the supervisors believe they are doing the right thing, and I hope their efforts are fruitful, but I also know that many people believe that their shell building is a pipe dream, and this proposed $100 milllion/500 jobs will be nothing more than another Koyo, a corporation that takes state and county incentives and then runs.

The supervisors have done nothing to address concerns but instead have chosen to remain silent and move forward with what they want like crocodiles after rats in the swamp. I expected better than that. I hope it all turns out well, in the end, but the discord created will be a long time healing. I hope it will have been worth it.

 

 

Now On Wheels

This is a historic structure at Greenfield, a kitchen circa 1830 or so, that is in the process of being moved about 3/4 mile away to a new "historic area" the county supervisors have set aside. They could have torn them down, so I am grateful that they at least recognized that these structures should be moved and not simply flattened.

Hard Heads and Unhappy Hearts

There was an article The Roanoke Times this morning that indicated that two historic structures owned by Botetourt County would not be moved, and work to remove them from their site to a "historic park" area would halt.

Apparently someone misread the paperwork. I took these photos between 5 p.m. and 5:40 p.m. today, Tuesday, February 2, 2016.

Does this look like halted work to you?

This is turning into one of the most divisive issues I've ever seen in Botetourt. But Greenfield has always been an issue ever since the county purchased it back in 1995. Looks like that will continue for some time.