Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, July 8, 1990 TAG: 9007080079
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: C1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: BEN BEAGLE STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: SWEET CHALYBEATE LENGTH: Long
If they were alive, they wouldn't have a place to stay in what is left of the old Sweet Chalybeate (pronounced Ka-LEE-bee-it) resort along Virginia 311 in Alleghany County.
There is enough left, though, for Myron Pierson to have faith it can be restored.
Pierson, a 37-year-old part-time lawyer with flecks of paint on his jogging shoes, hopes to restore at least 18 rooms in the surviving south bay of the old hotel.
The original hotel had its brightest days before the Civil War ruined a lot of lowland Southerners. It was one of a series of spas sprinkled along the mountains. The survivors are giants today - the Greenbrier at White Sulphur Springs, W.Va., and the Homestead at Hot Springs.
Pierson's part of the hotel is falling into ruin - the process hurried by an ancient elm that fell on it during Tropical Storm Hugo last year.
Pierson has applied for a $35,000 grant from the Virginia Department of Historic Resources. The money is available to historic buildings that are "threatened."
Clearly, the two-story south bay is in trouble. Pierson said contractors have estimated it would cost $300,000 to bring back the south bay - including 20th-century niceties like running water and sanitary sewage facilities.
If that can be done, he said, he expects to use the 18 rooms as a bed-and-breakfast operation.
Pierson estimated he has spent $18,000 of his own money so far in restoring parts of the resort. If he gets the state money, he said, he will use it to save the old hotel wing and will make later applications for money to restore it.
Like a surprisingly large number of people in the high country where Virginia and West Virginia meet, Pierson has childhood memories of the Sweet Chalybeate pool, still fed by the same spring water that drew the rich to the hotel in pre-Civil War days.
Pierson was born in Clifton Forge, grew up in Lewisburg, W.Va., and eventually practiced law in Atlanta.
In the mid-1980s, he took a trip back to the mountains for what he calls "a respite" that was to have lasted two or three weeks.
He stayed on, a happy bachelor who spends most of his time taking care of the 10 acres of history that he now owns.
Pierson is not getting rich on his rates. There is a $2 membership that entitles adults to a swim for $1 and children for 30 cents. There is a $30 season ticket.
"It's not a profitable thing to do," says Sandra Cook, whose parents once ran the pool. "He is doing it for the benefit of the people."
With childhood memories, Cook said, "My main concern is the fact that the pool doesn't fall in."
The hotel used to stretch for a quarter of a mile just off Virginia 311 - including the now non-existent dining hall and ballroom.
The bourbon distillery that eased stress for the antebellum guests is no more. But the spring water still comes out of the caves at the rate of 800 gallons per minute at the exact temperature of 72 degrees Fahrenheit.
Pierson's piece of the old resort was almost gone when when he recently bought the remaining 10 acres of the resort from the Presbyterian church.
And things got worse.
Before the elm fell, the flood of 1985 destroyed the ancient wall that stood along the pool of Sweet Chalybeate water.
Five years ago, the broad lawn with the circular drive was covered with junked cars, telephone booths and toilets. The junk had encircled the old south bay.
Now the junk is gone and the lawn is neatly cut. Pierson, using a small riding mower with teeth painted on its front, has cut green swaths all around the old south bay.
Pierson rebuilt the pool wall - with "enough blocks to have built three pyramids" - and put 35 gallons of white paint and a case of caulking cartridges into fixing up the old dressing rooms by the pool.
He painted the ancient gazebo that stands above the pool - a trademark of the great spring resorts in the 19th century.
There is a large brick house above the pool. Pierson has almost finished renovating it. He lives in one of the small resort cottages that survive.
The bold waters of Sweet Springs Creek rush over stones and boulders near the houses.
The pool, built with separate sections for men and women, is open seven days a week. Purists lament that a wall that segregated the sexes was torn down some time ago.
Time has not eroded discussions of the qualities of Sweet Chalybeate water and its healthful properties.
Once, the water was said to be a cure for sterility, among other afflictions. Today's claims are less exotic.
Pierson said, for example, that before he came to Sweet Chalybeate from Atlanta, he suffered from migraine headaches.
Doctors didn't do much good. One day, Pierson said, "I knocked down a quart of the water and knocked the headache out the window."
Pierson was careful to say that a lack of stress in Sweet Chalybeate and proper eating habits may have had something to do with the cure - if that is what it was.
Cook, who learned to swim in the pool at Sweet Chalybeate, said she has a cousin with a "severe kidney disease" who keeps the ailment under control by drinking Sweet Chalybeate water.
She says the red mud in the stream bottom is good for facials. There are claims so ancient they have become legend.
There is the long-ago matter of George Washington's horse. It is said a rattlesnake bit Washington's horse on the leg and it looked rather bad there for a while.
Washington camped for the night near Sweet Chalybeate springs. The horse waded into the water and the next morning it was cured.
Earnest Snyder, who owns another, more stable part of the old hotel, told a reporter before Pierson bought his portion of history that restoration didn't seem hopeless - "Not if somebody would do it right away."
He said recently he hopes Pierson succeeds.
"I hate to see these old places go down," he said.
by CNB