ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Sunday, June 30, 1996 TAG: 9607010004
SECTION: CURRENT PAGE: NRV-3 EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY
DATELINE: DUBLIN
SOURCE: PAUL DELLINGER STAFF WRITER
Why would members of a family pulling down some $90,000 a year in Charlotte, N.C., quit their jobs and get a loan to buy a deteriorating mobile home campground in a rural corner of Pulaski County?
"We really had it made, to be honest with you," said Mike McGuire, who, with his wife, Sherry, bought what is now the McGuire Family Campground on State Park Road leading to Claytor Lake. "I mean, we were almost completely out of debt. Some people said we were crazy."
The McGuires grew up in this area, and remembered the glory days of the campground several incarnations ago when it had upwards of 70 trailer locations. That number had dwindled to 39 when they saw it on one of their visits back home.
"That shows you how let go it had been," Mike said. Also, a fire had gutted one of its buildings. The level of occupants had dropped and the place was falling apart.
"When we found this spot here, we knew it was going to be a real challenge," Mike said. Sherry puts it another way: "It's a God-meant thing for us to make the move back."
They spotted the "For Sale" sign on a weekend visit. Sherry landed a job at Wolverine Gasket and Manufacturing Co. in Blacksburg after responding to a newspaper advertisement for a supervisor. Things just worked out, she said.
They have already made the campground a bluegrass music center from 7 to 10 p.m. each Saturday. Mike and Jason, their son, both play, and Mike recalled complaints from other New River Valley musicians that they had no place to get together. "So I told Sherry, 'If we ever move back there, I'm going to find a place for these people to play,'" Mike said.
Now he has a building just for that. The Saturday playing and dancing had to stop for a time when rebuilding took priority, but a special gathering is planned for July 4 and the Saturday sessions will then resume.
"We expect a real big crowd here on the Fourth," Mike said. "And it's a clean-type deal. We don't allow any alcohol. ... It's a place where people can bring the kids or the grandkids and listen to music the way it used to be played."
Mike had seen many of Charlotte's high-rise buildings over the years up close from a scaffold, installing their windows from outside. Sherry had worked for 17 years in management with a manufacturing firm. "But we wanted more," Mike said.
For some time, they had been dissatisfied with city life. They wanted a better environment for their children, Jason, 18, who just graduated from Pulaski County High School and will attend Radford University this year, and Jennifer, 13. And they wanted to be closer to other family members.
They had tried for six years to find work, visiting on weekends and sending in applications. "They had such a waiting list from around here, they're not going to hire anyone from out of state," Mike said. He told Sherry that, if they were ever going to come back, they were going to have to create their own business.
"And that's what we did."
They ran into paperwork obstacles. "It was enough to drive you away, it really was," Mike said. They convinced loan officers at the First National Bank of Radford that they could make the campground functional again.
Jason and Jennifer moved up last year to stay with other family members in time to enter Pulaski County schools. "It was the first time in our lives we'd ever been separated," Sherry said. The parents joined them after the sale of their Charlotte home and other matters had been taken care of.
Part of the campground manager's home had been damaged by the fire. The McGuires had to work on their own quarters even as they lived in them. Sherry likened its looks to a haunted house. "A kitchen, dining room and three bedrooms, that's what we had," Mike said, before they rebuilt.
Once open, they had visitors from Maine to California, not to mention Canada and even Germany. "They were some super-nice people," Mike said of the four German families. "I mean, we couldn't even speak the same language, and we got along fine with them."
Sherry's uncle, Edgar "Pug" Akers, helped them with rewiring and new plumbing. Assistance has also come from her mother, Alberta Akers, and brothers Butch Akers and Billy Akers and Mike's cousin, Garland Harris, among others.
Jason and Jennifer also help, from mowing (it takes two days a week just for that) to planting flowers and keeping up the 18-hole miniature golf course. They work in shifts to get everything done, which leaves no leisure time, Jason said. "It's just that this place requires 24 hours of attention."
It is shaping up enough now for neighbors to come by and thank the McGuires for getting rid of the eyesore it had been. "They know that we're trying to improve the environment that they live in," Sherry said.
Mike has 55 trailer hookups upgraded and is readying 10 more. The bath house has been cleaned up. There are facilities for horseshoes, basketball and plans for a general store.
"We've done a lot of work. We've got a lot of people who have moved into the campground who are very nice people," Sherry said, including nine full-time occupants. "We've cleaned up truckloads of trash. ... You really do have to love it to do it."
McGuire's Family Campground is located about 11/2 miles off Interstate 81 Exit 101 (telephone 674-4245).
LENGTH: Medium: 100 lines ILLUSTRATION: PHOTO: PAUL DELLINGER/Staff. When Mike and Sherry McGuire foundby CNBthe campground, they "knew it was going to be a real challenge." Or
as Sherry put it: "It's a God-meant thing for us to make the move
back." At left is their son Jason. color.