SHE'S GOT ALL THE ANSWERS IN VINTON

                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: THURSDAY, February 6, 1992                   TAG: 9202060600
SECTION: NEIGHBORS                    PAGE: E-5   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: Wendi Gibson
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium
SHE'S GOT ALL THE ANSWERS IN VINTON
Maybe you were the one who called the Vinton Town Hall and asked what was going on in the City of Salem that weekend.
Carolyn Ross may have answered the phone and politely said she didn't know.
If you had wanted to know something about Vinton, though, Ross could have told you.
As town clerk and the town manager's administrative assistant, Ross frequently answers telephones in addition to attending all council meetings. She also screens her boss's calls and visitors, handles town employees' benefits, and does "anything that anybody doesn't know what to do with."
Seated at the town manager's conference table, Ross, a 17-year Vinton employee, became more than an unknown face or the voice on the other end of the line.
\ Full name: Carolyn Setzer Ross
\ Birth date: Aug. 19, 1942
\ Hometown: Vinton. Graduate of William Byrd High School.
\ Family: Married to Lynnwood "Bud" Ross, with three children - Chris, Sam and Teresa, ages 19-23.
\ Job: Secretary with the Vinton Recreation Department for four years; became secretary to Town Manager Ron Miller in 1978.
\ Worst job: "I never really had a bad job, I guess. [Working for the town manager] is not a job that you dread getting up for in the morning; it's almost like a family here - of course I see more of these people than my own family!"
She and her husband lived in Richmond for six years, but she says she didn't feel that sense of family as with Vinton, the "small town with small-town atmosphere."
"Definitely, I like Vinton better, yes."
\ Those were the days: "I'd like to go back to my school years. You wish you were back there when you get to be my age."
\ Spare time: Ross quilts, gardens and has the patience for cross-stitch, too. But, "my job gets in the way of my hobbies sometimes. I do woodworking: coffee tables, end tables, cabinets, a piano, a sideboard, an old sewing machine - it works better than my new one. You can prop your feet on [my furniture]; it's just good junk. My son told me he didn't know of any other mom who wants tools for Christmas."
\ Ten years from now: "Retire."

by Bhavesh Jinadra by CNB