ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Monday, May 27, 1996 TAG: 9605280069
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: B-1 EDITION: HOLIDAY
DATELINE: HALES FORD
SOURCE: JENNIFER MILLER STAFF WRITER
FOR DR. WARREN MOORMAN JR., the history of the property is family lore, and he plans to return the Hook-Powell-Moorman farmhouse to its original glory.
Dr. Warren Moorman Jr. points to the scattered grease spots on the bedroom ceiling.
They come from the attic where Llewellyn Powell's wife hid her hams to keep Union soldiers from stealing them while they looted her farmhouse, Moorman says. The spring heat in April 1865 must have caused the hams to sweat their grease, which saturated the ceiling plaster.
But the soldiers never noticed the spots and only took food and valuables from the rooms downstairs.
According to Civil War historian Gary Walker, the Union soldiers entered Franklin County's back country, soon after Robert E. Lee surrendered, to arrest Confederate Gen. Jubal Anderson Early for treason. But Early slipped away to Mexico.
Since then, the Hook-Powell-Moorman farmhouse has deteriorated. Two separate buildings beside the main house, which was once Dr. John Moorman's office building and John Hook's store, are also falling apart. The mud mortar foundation shows through cracks in the walls and sections of the floors are missing.
But Warren Moorman Jr. plans to change all that. Now that the property has received state historic status, Moorman plans to restore the buildings so they're still around in another 200 years.
"I have done very little with the farm since I inherited it," Moorman said. "I needed to do something special with it."
The farm, in Hales Ford in northeast Franklin County, dates to about 1784, when merchant John Hook opened his store on the north side of what is now Virginia 122. One of only a dozen or so 18th century business dwellings still standing in Virginia, the Georgian-style store sold everything from tobacco pipes and expensive European fabrics to muskets and Dutch ovens.
Hook's loyalty to Britain during the Revolutionary War made him unpopular among local authorities. In the "Beef Case," Hook tried to make the state reimburse him for two steers that army troops took during the war. Patrick Henry defended the state. He laughed Hook out of the courtroom, according to the National Register of Historic Places.
Hook died in 1808 and was buried under a pile of rocks to the east of his store.
Hook's heirs sold the Hales Ford property to Llewellyn Powell, who built the present two-story farmhouse between 1855 and 1856. Powell moved Hook's store behind the main house and used it to house his eight slaves. Tradition has it that former New York Congressman Adam Clayton Powell Jr.'s father was born in the Powell slave quarters in May 1865.
Powell sold the farm to Dr. John Moorman in 1873. He built a medical office to the left of the farmhouse and also raised tobacco, corn, wheat and livestock.
Warren Moorman bought the house after his mother died in 1921 and used it during weekends and holidays. In 1964, the title to the 207-acre Hook-Powell-Moorman farm passed to Dr. Warren Moorman Jr.
The farm has been vacant since Moorman's father died in 1963. A combination of vandalism and age has caused the floorboards, ceilings and wallpaper to deteriorate.
Inside Moorman's grandfather's room, vandals left a penciled inscription on the wall.
"Charlotte, Connie, Linda, Diane Psandra came here on March 19, 1964. Don't worry folks, we're not ghosts."
Vandals also stole a mantel clock from the living room and a photograph of inventor Thomas Edison.
Moorman first tried to repair the house about a decade ago, but stopped after vandals struck again and smashed the ceramic toilet he had just installed.
This time, he's not going to give up. Despite the recent heat wave and no electricity in the main house, the 76-year-old Moorman has worked over the weekends to insulate the attic. The rest of the work he plans to hand over to building contractors.
Moorman is paying for the entire project, even though the property's historic status qualifies it for state grants.
"I want to point out the fact that there is history here in the back country and we ought to preserve it," Moorman said. "We owe our gratitude to the land."
He wouldn't say how much he expects to spend because he doesn't want his wife, Betty, to know.
"I like to tease her," he said.
Moorman said the money is not that important anyway.
"I enjoy doing it myself," he said. "It's like playing 18 holes of golf."
Moorman retired from Lewis-Gale Medical Clinic in 1990. He now splits his time among various volunteer organizations. A few of them include the Salem Historical Society, Franklin County Historical Society, the Rotary Club and Habitat for Humanity.
Helping others is what Moorman says his life is about.
In 1994, Moorman donated 13.9 acres of the Hook-Powell-Moorman farmland to the Trinity Ecumenical Parish for Presbyterians, Lutherans and Episcopalians.
"I needed some brownie points in heaven," Moorman said, and the church needed a place for its congregation.
The gift had only two strings attached. The congregation had to agree to build the church to fit in with its natural surroundings and to maintain the Moorman family cemetery located on the land.
The Rev. Gary Scheidt, pastor of the church, has followed Moorman's requests. He said that the building will be constructed of specially imported "chattum grey" - a light, stone-colored brick imported from Salem. The land has already been cleared for construction and the church is expected to be completed in December.
The church also intends to put a fence around the four-person cemetery and set it aside as a sanctuary.
Apologizing for the weeds that have grown over the graves, Moorman told one of his favorite family stories: how his grandparents met.
His grandfather, Dr. John Addison Moorman, moved to Hales Ford in 1873 to set up his medical practice. He was sitting on the porch of Taylor's General Store when 17-year-old Kate Price galloped in on her horse.
All he saw was her ankles as she trotted in and out of the store. But that was all it took. He jumped up to go ask Taylor if she was spoken for.
"It was an expensive glimpse," Dr. Moorman laughed, ``'cause my grandfather said, `I am going to marry that girl and all I saw was her ankles.'''
There are also two slave cemeteries on the land. The unmarked field stones that mark the graves are hard to find in the thick woods behind the main house.
Moorman has not decided whether he will open his land to the public once the buildings are restored. He said he doesn't want to disturb church-goers at the Trinity Ecumenical Church and that he is not sure he wants a lot of people touring the land.
The farm is about four miles from the Booker T. Washington National Monument on Virginia 122. Park service employees at the monument praised Moorman for restoring the farm, adding it would be great if he opened his property to the public.
"I'm a terrible sentimentalist," Moorman said. "It's been in my family almost 125 years.
"I just want to know that [the farm] will still be standing for many more years. It holds a lot of precious history for me."
LENGTH: Long : 135 lines ILLUSTRATION: PHOTO: CINDY PINKSTON/Staff. Dr. Warren Moorman Jr. standsby CNBunder a ham-stained ceiling in what was once the bedroom of
Llewellyn Powell's wife. The ceiling stains date back to the Civil
War.