Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: TUESDAY, April 27, 1993 TAG: 9304270181
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: C1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: SANDRA BROWN KELLY STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: COPPER HILL LENGTH: Medium
David Wood and Michael Maiolo plan to open Bent Mountain Lodge on Saturday, finally putting to use a building that has been under construction for a decade.
Maiolo, the resident innkeeper, is a former high school English teacher who knows William Faulkner well enough to read him without his glasses. He named the house dog Lena Grove after a Faulkner character.
Wood has been a teacher, a textbook salesman and director of food services for the Texas Rangers baseball club. Now he's a real estate agent who writes literature for young people.
The boyhood buddies met again at a high school reunion where Wood told Maiolo about the inn project and invited him in. Since he quit full-time teaching in 1985, Maiolo has been writing and trout fishing.
Wood is president of Bent Mountain Lodge Inc., the name the facility will operate under.
The property overlooks the Blue Ridge Parkway at milepost 140, about 20 miles from Roanoke in Floyd County. At 3,200 feet, it offers a view of mountains and of a tiny patch of Smith Mountain Lake.
It was an ideal midlife project, said previous owner Norman Milligan.
In a 1990 interview, Milligan, a Richmond contractor, referred to the property as the "boat" that many men buy near retirement age. He traveled central Virginia as a regional administrator for Little League football and softball, and every chance he could he visited his mountaintop.
The building was begun in the early 1980s as a private home. Much of the stone used to build it is from the nearby Little River, and some of the timbers were cut on the site.
When Milligan bought the lodge for $200,000 in 1987, the 8,500-square-foot building had been framed in and covered with felt paper. He added shingles and other outside finish and completed some of the interior, including installing a rock fountain in the foyer.
Three years later, Milligan put the property up for sale for $785,000 and hired a Charlottesville company to market it nationally. However, it was a bad time for real estate and the property went unsold until last fall.
It was bought by Sweet Annie Investments Inc., an Irish corporation, for $350,000. Sweet Annie is made up of foreign investors - a couple of Pakistanis, some Saudi Arabians - and Wood's brother, Michael Wood. Most of the investors work with Michael Wood at the French Bank in Saudi Arabia, David Wood said.
Wood - who has been refinishing floors and furniture at the lodge - has tried to keep the project as close to home as possible. The construction crew, headed by musician Curtis Hassell, is from Floyd County. The unfinished furniture was bought from Barewood, which is owned by Floyd resident Jerry Helms.
Construction is continuing. One of the last projects has been adding an old bar from the former Floyd Mercantile store to the lower-level lounge.
Wood and Maiolo said they will be cooks, cleaners and general staff, hiring others as business requires it.
Jenny West Medley, a Salem teacher and antiques dealer, will serve as an innkeeper during the summer.
Antiques and Virginia-made products will be sold at the lodge, which Wood also hopes will become a center for a variety of informal music concerts.
The lodge has five guest rooms and one two-room suite. Room rates are expected to start around $50 a night and will include breakfast.
The lodge also will serve lunch and dinner, offering a changing menu of such items as pot roast, chili and steak. The dining room can seat 48 guests.
Wood said the lodge will be marketed as a site for conferences and small meetings as well as a quiet place for individuals.
The first group event will be the Bent Mountain Writers Conference, which has been scheduled for May 15-16. It will be led by writers George Garrett of the University of Virginia; Fred Chappell, from the University of North Carolina at Greensboro; Heather Ross Miller, English professor from Washington and Lee University; and Joseph Maiolo, who is a professor of English at the University of Minnesota and Michael Maiolo's brother.
Maiolo said reservations for the writing event have come in slowly. Conference fees are $75 for people who want to audit the classes and $150 for those who want to submit works for critique.
by CNB