What Happened to Previous Most Endangered Sites? - Rich Neck

On Saturday, August 18, 2012, Rich Neck Plantation manor house burned.  No cause has been determined for the fire which completely gutted the interior and allowed the roof to collapse into the structure.  Rich Neck had appeared on our Endangered Sites list for 2011.  The nomination cited concern for the integrity of the house as it had set empty and abandoned for many years and was facing demolition by neglect.  Rich Neck is located in Surry County in the area between Bacon’s Castle and Smith’s Fort. 

The manor house was built around 1800 by the Ruffin family who owned the property until the end of the Civil War. An early example of Dutch Colonial architectural style, Rich Neck was one of only a few antebellum houses remaining in Surry County.  The National Register nomination also noted its early collection of agricultural outbuildings, many of which still remain after the fire, but their condition continues to deteriorate. 

We do not know what the future of the remaining structure will be.  The chimneys continued to stand along with the lower half of the exterior walls when the accompanying photos were taken about eight months after the fire.  We could not gain access to the structure but from the extent of the damage apparent from the public road, it appears all the interior detailing has been lost. 

Unfortunately, not all Endangered Sites have happy endings or futures.  Fire was not a mentioned threat in the nomination but simply accomplished what continued neglect would have done over a much longer period of time. 

By bringing attention to the threatened landmark structures around Virginia, the Endangered Sites List aims to rally local and community support to encourage owners to protect their local communities by preserving the building and landscapes that help define that community.  The threats are real and once a building like Rich Neck is lost, it is lost forever.  Remember, these places matter!

What Happened to Previous Most Endangered Sites? New Market Corridor (Rt. 5)

When the New Market Corridor (Rt. 5) was proposed for the 2012 Virginia’s Most Endangered List, the future looked bleak.   Henrico County had just invested substantial funds in a report that proposed two alternatives to relieve future traffic challenges and make way for development of the region—both called for widening Route 5 to a four-lane divided highway, destroying the character that so defines this gateway to East Richmond.

Why does that matter?  For starters, data – and real-world examples – show that wider roads don’t improve traffic.  Just look at Short Pump.  Nor is residential and commercial development the best – much less only – economic development option for Eastern Henrico.

The New Market Corridor Coalition sees a better way.  The New Market Corridor is the opposite of Short Pump—a tranquil transition from rural Route 5 through the narrow entry point into Shockoe Bottom and the artsy and inventive rehabilitated industrial corridor of restaurants, shops, businesses and residences that make up Shockoe Bottom.  It is where more than 400 years of history played out from Virginia Indian settlements, Revolutionary skirmishes, Civil War battlefields and farms harvesting the rich soil.  The corridor links Jamestown, Williamsburg and Richmond and is distinguished by the plantations and African American neighborhoods that have existed for centuries. Tourism and agriculture are the two largest industries in Virginia.  The Coalition asked, “How can these assets become the guiding principles for the Rt. 5 planning?”

The coalition nominated the New Market Corridor to the 2012 list of Virginia’s Most Endangered Historic Sites.  With dogged determination, the Coalition used the listing as a vehicle to gain attention for an alternative to the insensitive widening plan.  They met with property owners.  They educated decision makers in the County and in the City of Richmond as to the benefits of exploring alternatives that leveraged the existing agricultural, heritage tourism and recreational assets of the corridor.  They posited that in the long run, investing in resolving the traffic problem by exploring traffic calming solutions, alternative routes and bus transportation would effectively resolve any anticipated traffic increases, maintain the unique character and attract residents and businesses more effectively. 

The compelling and hard fought argument for why the alternatives should be voted down by the Metropolitan Planning Organization (MPO) became a reality in December.  The MPO voted to table both alternatives—providing a three year respite to explore alternative plans.  The Coalition could have declared victory.  Instead it organized for the long run—to be a partner with Henrico County and support pro-preservation, pro-agriculture, pro-heritage tourism planning. 

 The Coalition expanded and now includes interested parties from Greater Fulton Hill Neighborhood Center, Church Hill Neighborhood Association, ROOT Henrico, Varina Beautification Committee, Henrico Preservation Association, Historic Richmond Foundation, Scenic Virginia, Virginia Conservation Network, Civil War Trust, and Coalition for Smarter Growth and the Partnership for Smarter Growth.  They formed five standing committees to actively explore tools that support agriculture, tourism, easements, and special character protection design and community transportation alternatives.  The New Market Corridor Coalition is in it for the long haul. 

Preservation Virginia is proud to be a partner in the Coalition.  Looks for updates—we have a feeling this group is going to make history! 

What Happened to Previous Most Endangered Sites? Wilderness Battlefield

After the Orange County Board of Supervisors approved a controversial special use permit to allow construction of a Wal-Mart Supercenter on the Wilderness Battlefield in 2009, many individuals and organizations including the Friends of Wilderness Battlefield, Piedmont Environmental Council, Preservation Virginia, National Trust for Historic Preservation, National Parks Conservation Association, National Coalition for History and the Civil War Trust; began fighting to protect this site where one of the most significant battles of the CivilWar occurred and some 30,000 people died. 

Map by Civil War Trust

The battlefield was listed on Preservation Virginia’s Most Endangered Historic Sites List in 2009 and on the National Trust for Historic Preservation’s 11 Most Endangered Historic Places in 2010.

In 2011, after over two years of strategy and legal challenges, Wal-Mart announced that it had abandoned plans to pursue construction of the supercenter at the battlefield. The store was later relocated farther west along Route 3 near Germanna Community College’s Locust Grove campus.

Members of Wilderness Battlefield Coalition

After Wal-Mart made the decision to relocate the store, preservationists and local leaders came together to forge a new vision for the region and began the Wilderness Battlefield Gateway Study which recommended low-impact, historically and environmentally sensitive development to create a pleasant place for tourists to stay and shop when they visited the Wilderness Battlefield and nearby Chancellorsville Battlefield, Fredericksburg & Spotsylvania National Military Park as well as Native American sites and the 18th-century Germanna Ford settlement.  The study reached a consensus last November.

In the eyes of many in the preservation community, this victory was one of the most important to ever occur in Virginia. The final outcome not only protected the site, it also brought opposing sides together to create the Wilderness Gateway Study to further protect this historically important area. Preservation Virginia’s endangered sites listing hopefully played an important part in this positive conclusion.


Painting of the Battle of the Wilderness

What Happened? Updates on Past Endangered Sites Listings

The Ladies Pool at Warm Springs, Virginia

Posting Bill Lohmann’s great Sunday article on Belmead inspired us at Preservation Virginia.  Why not use the upcoming weeks to revisit some of the sites listed on previous Virginia’s Most Endangered Lists?  It is an opportunity for a progress report or sometimes the lack of progress.  It might also be a way to reengage and renew awareness of the sites and issues that threaten historic places.  Spotlighting some of the strategies and efforts that are making a difference across Virginia may inspire others.  

The blogs will lead up to our May  13th announcement of 2013 Virginia’s Most Endangered Historic Sites.  With each post, we will provide contact info so you are able to get in touch with the people leading the efforts to save these places.   We plan on posting on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays.  Be on the lookout and let’s get started—

Recently several members of the staff attended the Virginia Association of Museums Conference in Hot Spring—yes someone had to make the sacrifice!  All of us were frustrated to see the condition of the Warm Springs Pools. (Frustrated is a nice word for being really disappointed and distressed.)

Listed in 2010, the group organized to save the Pools has come a long way.  Taking the long view that there are other historic resources in Bath County, Preservation Bath formed with the priority of gaining ownership of the Pools and the associated structures from the Homestead and to be positioned to support the preservation of other Bath County sites.  The group successfully advocated for the Homestead to undertake an engineering study of the structures.  Preservation Bath now is positioned to begin fundraising to undertake a Historic Structures Report to guide the restoration and maintenance of the two structures. 

Sounds good, right?  There are still two major hurdles—1)  obtaining the 501 c 3 status so that Preservation Bath can undertake the major fundraising effort needed and 2)  working out a deal to transfer the ownership of the Warm Spring Pools from the Homestead and its parent company KSL.  Want to learn more and keep up with the latest?  Visit http://friendsofthepools.org

By the way, Preservation Bath has nominated the Warm Springs Pools to the National Trust’s Endangered List due out in June.  Keep listening for updates.

 

Tobacco Farm Remembered

 

Preservation Virginia began the Tobacco Barns Protection Project in 2012. From the beginning, the project has received a lot of great support. Currently Preservation Virginia staff, with the assistance of volunteers, have been surveying tobacco barns in Pittsylvania County. One of the volunteers, Hal Cauthen, wrote the below article about his memories of his uncle's tobacco farm. For more information on the project, contact Sonja Ingram at

434-770-1209 or singram@preservationvirginia.org 

*****

       My uncle had a tobacco allotment, as was done in those days. If you didn't have an allotment, you weren't allowed to grow tobacco to sell. Tobacco was the cash crop, though he grew corn, and vegetables, and raised hogs and cattle. But tobacco was how they made their money.

When it came time to pick and string and hang up the sticks, I used to love to go out there and stay for a few days. I was probably 10 years old or so, and there are several things I remember vividly. One was driving the sled!

A mule was hitched to what was literally a sled; it slid on runners -- 2 X 4's, as I recall. And had a frame which was lined with burlap, and came up a little more than waist high on a man. It looked more or less like this:

The job was to drive the sled up and down the rows, so the cropers (more on them later) could put the leaves they'd picked into the sled. That way, they'd empty their arms, and could keep on cropping. Away I'd go -- actually sort of just holding on to the reins, because - truth be known - the mules knew better than I did where to go and what to do.

When I'd collected a load, I'd tug the rein, turn the mules, and go back to the barn, where the stringers and hanger were working.

The stringers were women, mostly African-Americans. They almost all wore what I thought of as an odd costume. Overall's usually, sometimes jeans or other work pants, but over them they wore a dress or a skirt. Their hair was usually braided into tight cornrows, but hidden under a bandana, over which they often wore a big brimmed straw hat.

"Why the skirt?", I asked.

"So you can tells we are women" was the answer. Which when you thought about it made sense.

 When the sticks were full they'd be handed into the barn, then up into the rafters where the men aloft took them and placed them, just so, such that they were not too close and not too far apart --

... just enough distance so that night, when the fires were lit, the hot dry air from the smoking fires could waft up and thru them, and dry them to a rich golden patina.

Early on the curing process was done by hand stoken fires, one on each corner of the barn. And another fond memory was being allowed to stay up with the men, who sat around telling stories all through the night, occasionally go into the barn to check the temperture, and feel the leaves to judge the degree of dryness.

So my visit to the barns in southern Virginia was, in a sense, a visit to my childhood.

by Hal Cauthen

Historic African-American Cemeteries

Mr. Robertson standing in front of his family cemetery

I recently visited a historic African-American cemetery and met with the cemetery’s owner and caretaker, Mr. Langston Robertson. The cemetery dates from the mid 1800s to the 20^th century and I would estimate at least 100 people are buried there including many of Mr. Robertson’s family members, some of whom were enslaved.  

Mr. Robertson has brought students to the cemetery to teach them about history. He often brings  the original deeds with him and discusses how the cemetery has stayed in the family for many generations.  



Shells, glass and pottery from the cemetery



In cleaning up the cemetery, Mr. Robertson has found numerous pieces of broken glass, pottery, shells, and other items. After researching African-American cemeteries and taking trips to West Africa, he was able to identify these items as being objects, sometimes used or owned by the deceased, placed on graves for various reasons.

A statue from Africa guards the cemetery

In many rural graveyards, African- Americans have marked the final resting places of loved ones in this distinctive manner. Despite the massive conversion of Africans to Christian faiths, many retained former rituals associated with the respect for the dead including placing shells, stones or personal property of the deceased on graves. The practice of placing shells on graves has been traced back to West African beliefs that sea shells enclose the soul's immortal presence.

For more information on African-American burial practices and customs in Virginia, please visit Dr. Lynn Rainville’s website. Rainville, a professor at Sweetbriar College, has been researching African-American cemeteries for years. Currently, she is working on a book tentatively titled, African-American Mortuary Variability: Historic Gravestones and Cemeteries in the Virginia Piedmont.

Tobacco Barns Workshop a Success



Preservation Virginia held a workshop last week about maintaining and repairing barns and log buildings as part of out Tobacco Barns Preservation Project. Over fifty people attended to hear updates on the tobacco barn survey and to hear a great presentation by Luke Ramsey of Ramsey Restoration Inc.



Luke Ramsey giving his presentation



Books on tobacco heritage and log buildings



Historic woodworking tools on display



Ramsey, a Nelson County resident, is a specialist in log building repair and restoration. He showed slides from several projects where log structures in poor condition were completely restored. Ramsey also brought an array of historic wood working tools to display.

Casey Sparks and Kayla Keen with their winning posters

Winners of the middle school poster contest “Preserve our Barns so they a more than a Memory” were also in attendance. More workshops are planned later this year.