ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Sunday, October 13, 1996 TAG: 9610140005
SECTION: CURRENT PAGE: NRV-27 EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY
DATELINE: STEELES TAVERN
SOURCE: BLAIR LOVERN THE NEWS-VIRGINIAN
A RESTORATION project is nearing completion at the Shenandoah Valley farm of inventor Cyrus McCormick
The gristmill at Cyrus McCormick's Walnut Grove farm is nearing the final stages of a $100,000 facelift.
The wooden and mortar building on the 634-acre farm owned by Virginia Tech is undergoing a complete makeover, inside and out.
Work on the mill is expected to be completed by the end of October, said Maxine Benson, secretary of the Tech's Shenandoah Valley Agricultural Research and Extension Center, which has owned the Augusta County farm since 1954.
When finished, it will be a working mill, but only for demonstration purposes, Ms. Benson said.
McCormick was 22 in 1831 when he showed off his famous invention - the first successful mechanical reaper. He moved to Chicago in 1847 to serve farmers on the vast Midwestern fields of grain, and soon after he became a world celebrity.
Members of his family supplied all the money for the restoration, Ms. Benson said.
``There had to be 16 logs replaced that were totally rotten,'' said Bob Leaf of Olde Log and Stone of Raphine, which is doing the work. Three people have been restoring the building for the past three months: Leaf, Glen Wilson and Pete Davis.
Wilson, owner of Olde Log and Stone, was responsible for working with the state on getting the project completed. However, the McCormick family donated the money because there were no funds from Virginia to do the work, Leaf said.
Originally it took more than a dozen men a year and a half to build the mill, which burned down in the 1880s. Only the stone foundation remained. It was soon rebuilt and has been restored some over the years.
``We had to jack up the building to help fix some things,'' Leaf said of the current overhaul. ``At one point we had three sides of the building sitting on six jacks. And then came Hurricane Bertha.
``At that point it was probably at its weakest point. But everything seemed to be fine. When Fran came through, there was a mad rush of water. But it turned out OK.
``The reconstruction has been going pretty well,'' he said.
Leaf said that during the summer, several people approached him and the other two restorers with strange questions.
``One guy came up and asked where they were selling cantaloupes, because he saw the sign that said `McCormick's farm.' And a lady came by and asked where she could get some wholesale spices, as in McCormick spices.
``There also was one gentleman all the way from England who came here because he had grown up on a farm that had an original McCormick reaper, which must have come from Chicago.
``He said he used to pull the reaper by horse, but then bought a tractor and hooked it up to that. Then it fell apart. They weren't made to be pulled by a tractor.''
Leaf said he has taken rolls of film to record all stages of the restoration.
``We've tried to put everything back exactly like it was,'' he said.
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