ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1995, Roanoke Times
DATE: Wednesday, December 6, 1995 TAG: 9512060024
SECTION: EXTRA PAGE: 1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: MATT CHITTUM STAFF WRITER
You folks see the mountain over to your left? That's Tinker Mountain. One man owns that mountain. And he has one house sitting up on top of that mountain ... Mr. Lee Hartman Jr. of Lee Hartman & Sons Electronics lives up there. He's had that house there for 21 years.
The bus driver's voice is honest and clean. So clean every word he speaks seems undeniably true.
He has both hands on the big wheel and one big black patent leather shoe bearing down on the accelerator. A toothpick is tucked behind his right ear. A Dixie cup of water rides on the dash board.
The nose of the bus bobs lethargically with the imperfect contours of Interstate 81 north, like a schooner crashing effortlessly through a choppy sea.
You see a tree tree kind of standing there by itself, with a little clear spot on each side of it? Keep your eye on that clear spot and you'll be able to see a huge A-frame house .... If you'll look closely, you can just see part of that A-Frame showing up now.
``Your Operator: H.L. Messimer. Safe - Reliable - Courteous,'' says a sign at the front of the bus.
No one tells Salem's Harry Messimer to give his tour of not-so-important landmarks along I-81 and U.S. 220. But that's what every person who boards his shuttlebus to meet the Amtrak train at Clifton Forge gets. Same for those who get off the train and ride with Messimer back to Roanoke.
He can't seem to help himself. That big windshield before him is like a view screen on the world, and he'll talk about nearly anything that crosses it. He did it for 31 years as a driver for Greyhound, and he's done it on every trip since he took this part time job six years ago.
``Some of the drivers, they kind of made fun of me,'' he says. ``They'd say `What do you do that for?' Said, `We don't get paid for sightseeing.' But it makes the day pass fast for me, so I'll do what I want to do. I never did stop.''
Messimer's voice is deep, almost anchorman-like. But certain words betray his Tennessee upbringing. Like when he says, ``The train never made it past Cincinattah.''
That is in fact the case on this cool, blue Friday before Thanksgiving. Messimer doesn't know why, but the Amtrak train from Chicago to New York via Virginia is held up in Ohio. So he has to make his usual one-hour run from Roanoke to Clifton Forge to pick up anyone who was waiting for the train, and then take everyone to meet the train in Washington, D.C. He'll get home at about 2 a.m.
It's a task he does not relish.
``Lord, it's traffic around that place,'' he says. ``Being around it again, oh Lord, your hands get a little sweatty.''
Later, he spurs his confidence. ``These things are so easy to drive,'' he says. ``I can get by in Washington, D.C. I'd rather drive the bus than my car.''
Back at the Sheraton Inn near the Roanoke airport, from where the bus departs, the six or seven passengers groaned when Messimer told them they'd be on the bus all the way to Washington. But once boarded, they settled in for the ride. Some women in sorority sweatshirts talk and laugh in the back of the bus. Up front, Pat Cobb of Salem and her brother, Thomas Phelps, lean forward in their seats to hear Messimer.
You folks ever heard of the Appalachian trail? It's a hiking trail that runs from the state of Maine to the state of Georgia. And it crosses this road we're on now. This is where they come in off the trail and get 'em a hamburger or a pizza and spend the night or take a shower.... There's a little gravel driveway behind that guard rail to your left, that's the trail going south to the state of Georgia ...To your right up here behind the third No Parking sign there's a little clay path up in the woods. That's the trail going north to the state of Maine. Over 2,000 miles on the trail.
Some landmarks, Messimer just knows about. Other times, something moves across his windshield and he can't resist finding out what it's all about.
That's how he learned of Lee Harman Jr.'s house. He had seen it for years, riding high in the saddle of Tinker Mountain. He knew who it belonged to, but that was all.
``I finally got nerve enough three summers ago to ask him if I could come up and see the place. I went to his office on Hershberger Road.''
Hartman invited him to the house and gave him a tour. ``Nicest fellow you ever met,'' Messimer says.
Do you all see this big farmhouse dead ahead of us up on top of the hill? What's that little thing on top of that farmhouse? ... It's a widow's walk ... They have those along the coastline, especially in the New England states, the fishing towns...I asked people about it. I'd say, ``What's it doin' out here in this part of the country?'' They'd say ``I don't know. What do you think?'' I think some dedicated seaman bought the house and had it put on to make him feel at home ... One little lady the other day, she said, ``No, that's not right.'' She said the lady had it put on so she could watch him out in the cornfields working.
Messimer, 65, retired from Greyhound to avoid getting caught up in the national strike a few years back.
But retired or not, he just couldn't quite let go of the wheel. After about two weeks, he went back to driving charters for Abbott Bus Tours.
He's been driving the shuttle to the Amtrak stop for six years now. Currently, he works for Chesapeake & Northern Transportation. They are the fourth company to hold this shuttle contract with Amtrak. When one company leaves, Messimer signs on with the next.
``It's a little change for me to spend,'' he says.
Buses, it seems, are his life. He could wear what he wants to work, but he still straps on his patent leather shoes, slacks and a tie.
Messimer grew up in the Stoney Creek area of Tennessee. He drove a city bus in nearby Eliza-bethton before he enlisted in the navy. When he got out he started with Greyhound.
He still collects about anything with the image of a greyhound on it. Resting behind the silver handle that opens the bus door is a wallet-sized album with pictures of his more than 200 Greyhound bus models.
Outside the window, the hilly terrain drops off on one side of the road to flat, riverbottom land. A field of bleached corn stubble stretches across to a tiny ridge rising above it like a ridge on a relief map.
Now this railroad track off to your left, that's the James River line. Now they were smart back in those days when they built the railroad beside the river from Clifton Forge to Newport News, that way you didn't have to go across any mountains, did you? That was to haul the coal down to Norfolk to put in on ships headed out all over the world and bring the empty cars back. So that was good thinking. There's been smart people in this world since it began.
The bus winds past the headwaters of the James River, where the Jackson River meets the Cowpasture River. Then through tiny Iron Gate.
``You have a lot of good people who live in Iron Gate,'' Messimer says, ``because you have six churches within two blocks.''
As the bus comes into Clifton Forge, a man with a garbage bag smiles and waves to Messimer.
``There's old Richard out there,'' Messimer says. ``He collects cans. I give him a few every once in a while.''
Almost exactly an hour after leaving Roanoke, the bus pulls into the train station lot.
During the 20-minute wait before he heads out again, a pale, timid-looking woman in a crocheted red beret and red coat approaches Messimer. She is going to Alexandria, and wants to know if the train is on time.
When Messimer explains that the train is four and a half hours late, and that she will have to ride the bus with him into Washington and take the subway back to Alexandria, she looks pained.
``Or you can wait for the train. It's up to you.''
A few minutes later, the man from Stoney Creek, Tenn. is on his way to Washington. As he pulls the bus onto Ridgeway Street, he passes the woman in the red coat. She has a suitcase in each hand, and her delicate steps are leading her away from the station.
LENGTH: Long : 143 lines ILLUSTRATION: PHOTO: Roger Hart. 1. Harry Messimer, a retired Greyhound busby CNBdriver, makes sure the jaunt to Clifton Forge is interesting for his
passengers. 2. Messimer has an extensive collection of Greyhound
memorabilia. color.