Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: THURSDAY, March 26, 1992 TAG: 9203260393
SECTION: NEIGHBORS PAGE: S-17 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: CHARLES STEBBINS WEST CORRESPONDENT
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
A mock orange tree, a sort of monument to the fate of the rail line, grows in what was the right of way on the campus, says Thomas Fisher Jr., retired analyst with the Norfolk and Western Railway.
Fisher and other members of the Virginia Canal & Navigation Society have spent hours, days and weeks finding such spots and chopping away undergrowth.
They have uncovered not only remains of the Valley Railroad but also old river and canal locks, kilns, ancient iron furnaces and springs throughout Roanoke and Botetourt counties.
"All of these places are within 40 minutes or one hour from Roanoke," he said.
Some are right in town.
The Valley Railroad once had big plans but apparently did not have big enough money, so its dreams were derailed. The railroad has been extinct for more than a century.
Fisher said the railroad ran into financial troubles and its planned line from Lexington to Salem never came about.
If the railroad had been successful, its line would have gone through the Hollins campus, crossing Carvin Creek at the spot where a footbridge is now.
Original plans had called for a station, named "Burlington," a little ways to the south in north Roanoke County. That site was close to what is now Burlington Elementary School, which took its name from the proposed station, Fisher said.
While the Valley Railroad was developing its plans between 1867 and 1870, it built a number of culverts and bridges along the right of way.
When the project was abandoned about 1876, all of those structures were left to nature. They became overgrown and tumbling down, and today many of them, or recognizable traces, remain.
Remains of the Valley Railroad's dreams are spotted generally along Peters Creek Road, between Hollins and Salem.
There are stone arches and culverts off Peters Creek near Wood Haven Road, just north of Cove Road; another near Green Ridge Road; and culverts in Salem off Dalewood Avenue and near Stoutamire Road.
In addition to remains of the old railroad, Fisher and his colleagues have uncovered traces of the old kilns, springs, iron furnaces and locks of the Kanawha Canal.
One of his favorites is the Gwynn Lock and Dam, on the James River two miles downstream from Eagle Rock.
"This is the most accessible and best preserved of all the locks," he said.
Fisher has surveyed all the structures of the James River and Kanawha Canal between Buchanan and Eagle Rock - locks, dams, culverts, piers, tunnels and aqueducts that were built but never put into service.
Dotted throughout the area are iron furnaces and lime kilns.
"Iron furnaces were big business," Fisher said. "They were all over this area."
Fisher said he became interested in seeking out these sites when he read an article in The Roanoke Times & World-News several years ago about a lime kiln at Eagle Rock. He visited that kiln and a short time later joined the canal society.
That group was already in the process of clearing some of the sites in preparation for the group's state convention that was held here a few years ago.
Fisher said his work with the canal society has been mostly in Roanoke and Botetourt counties but that there is still much canal and railroad restoration that needs to be done in other counties and along other rivers.
His principal helpers have been Sylvia Brugh of Troutville and Gibson Hobbs of Lynchburg. Fisher's son, Curry Fisher of Roanoke, also went along on some of the clearing expeditions.
Fisher, a former member of the Roanoke County School Board, would like for everyone to visit the sites and see history in the raw. He especially would like for schoolchildren to see local history in its natural setting, and he's dreaming of the day when the sites will be the destinations of class field trips.
Fisher said he has proposed this idea to school officials, but so far, no class trips have come about.
But school officials in Roanoke, Roanoke County and Salem said his dream may come true yet. All of them said field trips originate with the classroom teacher, and several of the teachers have indicated they may contact Fisher this spring.
"I would like for the young people here to see these places," Fisher said. "This is part of our heritage."
He sees the trips as an opportunity to stimulate an interest in studying history and geography which, he said, many people find boring.
Fisher is Scoutmaster of Boy Scout Troop 580 at the Roanoke County Occupational School and takes his Scouts on hikes to some of the sites he has uncovered. He said the trips are all done between 9 a.m. and 1 p.m., sometimes with lunch cooked on the site.
Fisher also has many pictures and a slide program that he will show to schools and other groups.
by CNB