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Light Industrial Park Proposed for Yancey Mills - Crozet Gazette

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INSIDE<br />

the<br />

Land Use Taxes<br />

editorial<br />

page 2<br />

Xela 2008<br />

page 3<br />

Ashley Walker<br />

Fundraiser<br />

page 4<br />

Disappearing Farmers<br />

page 5<br />

JAUNT<br />

page 7<br />

We all scream<br />

<strong>for</strong> Ice cream<br />

page 9<br />

Live fire<br />

page 10<br />

“Little Blessings”<br />

page 11<br />

Tribute to Dr. Laub<br />

page 14<br />

Dealing with<br />

Draught<br />

page 15<br />

High-Speed internet<br />

page 16<br />

Smac Swimming<br />

page 17<br />

Sorry Still Open<br />

page 18<br />

Scouting news<br />

page 20<br />

Gators At JSL<br />

Championships<br />

pages 20<br />

Henley Students at<br />

National young<br />

scholars program<br />

page 21<br />

crossword<br />

page 25<br />

CROZET BOOKWORMS<br />

page 26<br />

july 4TH celebration<br />

page 28<br />

AUGUST 2008 VOL. 3, NO. 3<br />

Family, Friends<br />

and Fellowship<br />

Day at Mt. Salem<br />

Gospel Church<br />

Mt. Salem Baptist Church was built<br />

in 1893 by local black families at what<br />

is now the corner of Old Three Notch’d<br />

Road and Route 240, just east of<br />

<strong>Crozet</strong>’s water treatment plant. In its<br />

115 years it has prospered and it has<br />

struggled. Beginning in the 1980s it<br />

Mt. Salem Baptist Gospel Church<br />

had trouble finding a pastor and by<br />

2003 it was virtually abandoned. The<br />

old frame structure, simple except <strong>for</strong><br />

its pointed arch windows, faced a prospect<br />

of neglect.<br />

Long-time member Ruth Dowell<br />

was in possession of the key and one<br />

day she called pastor Paul E. Colemon,<br />

in Waynesboro, who had been looking<br />

<strong>for</strong> a church building. Would he take<br />

the key? The question was an answer<br />

to prayer. He couldn’t wait. So, on that<br />

day, Mt. Salem’s revival began.<br />

Pastor Colemon had a vision. He<br />

wanted to upgrade the building and<br />

make it com<strong>for</strong>table to be in the pews.<br />

Helped by his son Jon, he built a porch<br />

over the front steps and added a wheelchair<br />

ramp to it. They installed new<br />

front doors. They built a porch over<br />

the back door, too, and installed modern<br />

wiring. That meant they could add<br />

window air-conditioning units and<br />

continued on page 12<br />

crozetgazette.com<br />

Wynter and Carter Morris of <strong>Crozet</strong> have some thrills at the Albemarle County Fair.<br />

<strong>Light</strong> <strong>Industrial</strong> <strong>Park</strong><br />

<strong>Proposed</strong> <strong>for</strong> <strong>Yancey</strong> <strong>Mills</strong><br />

At the Albemarle County Planning Commission’s July 29 meeting about how<br />

to increase the amount of available land zoned <strong>for</strong> light industrial uses, Will<br />

<strong>Yancey</strong>, representing the <strong>Yancey</strong> family, owners of R.A. <strong>Yancey</strong> Lumber Company<br />

in <strong>Yancey</strong> <strong>Mills</strong>, unveiled a proposal to rezone 148 acres south and east of their<br />

lumberyard as PD-IPC (planned development-industrial park).<br />

The proposed parcels are near the southeast corner of the Route 250/Interstate<br />

64 interchange but do not include the immediately adjacent properties or the<br />

lumberyard itself. Access to the proposed area would be achieved by extending<br />

<strong>Yancey</strong> <strong>Mills</strong> Lane through the lumberyard.<br />

continued on page 8<br />

Coming Soon<br />

When Harris Teeter says<br />

their new <strong>Crozet</strong> supermarket<br />

on Rt. 250 will be “Opening<br />

2009” they mean, more specifically,<br />

that they are expecting<br />

to open their doors by<br />

April, according to HT<br />

spokeswoman Catherine<br />

Reuhl. The 43,000-squarefoot<br />

store will be Harris<br />

Teeter’s first LEED-certified<br />

store [LEED is a standard <strong>for</strong> environmentally-sustainable building], and will also<br />

offer home shopping services.


page 2 s AUGUST 2008<br />

from the Editor<br />

Land Use Taxes<br />

The Albemarle County Supervisors wisely stepped back from an action<br />

that would have fractured community solidarity in western Albemarle July 9<br />

when they decided against changing the current land use taxation program.<br />

They did vote to investigate a revalidation program that would require farmers<br />

to affirm that they are farming, perhaps by submitting in<strong>for</strong>mation from<br />

their Schedule F federal income tax <strong>for</strong>m. Fluvanna and Orange Counties<br />

have such recertification requirements.<br />

White Hall District Supervisor Ann Mallek had voted to open discussion<br />

on possibly shifting the program’s terms to what County planners had<br />

dubbed “Option 2,” a proposal that only land that met the state’s definition<br />

of open space, generally speaking that in conservation easements or <strong>for</strong>estal<br />

districts, be eligible <strong>for</strong> the program.<br />

That got her in big trouble with rural residents who assembled at the<br />

White Hall Community Center July 7, at a meeting they organized, to find<br />

out what she was thinking and make sure she knew what they were thinking.<br />

More than 100 alarmed and reasonably well-in<strong>for</strong>med citizens were<br />

jammed into the room. They could not believe she had actually cooperated<br />

with the notion of changing the program. Mallek’s own farm in Earlysville<br />

has been in land use since 1982, she acknowledged, and Samuel Miller<br />

District Supervisor Sally Thomas also participates in the program.<br />

Mallek bravely wore her typically sweet smile throughout the night. “I<br />

feel a kindred spirit with the rural people,” she assured them. But they were<br />

skeptical about that and their message was blunt. “Everything you said you<br />

were gonna do [during the campaign] you’ve gone off sides of,” said one<br />

speaker. “Represent us, Ann!” came a repeated demand from the back of the<br />

room that nearly became a chant.<br />

“[Rio District Supervisor David] Slutsky tells us we own too much,” said<br />

another speaker. “We work from dawn until 10 p.m. to hold our land. What<br />

we own we should be able to keep. Slutsky said he hopes landowners will<br />

give up their rights. You seem to follow his lead.”<br />

“I need to stick with my original instinct on this,” said Mallek, which was<br />

to go <strong>for</strong> a recertification requirement. She said it will require from six to<br />

eight new county employees to administer it. An undetermined fee would<br />

be charged to revalidate as well.<br />

“Are you aware how many farmers depend on the land use tax?” asked<br />

Kathy Rash. “Their livelihood and their heritage are at stake. Farmers are<br />

canceling feed and fertilizer orders out of fear of the Board vote. We’ve put<br />

millions of dollars in our operations and we feel we are being reneged on<br />

and the county is turning its back on us.”<br />

“The county wants us to put our land on the table and tell us how we can<br />

develop,” said another speaker. “If they want to put their stocks and bonds<br />

and 401Ks on the table I’d like to look at them!”<br />

“We’re not picking this fight,” said Hank Martin.<br />

Richard Cogan, a Planning Commission member from 1980 to 1988<br />

who now sits on the county’s three-member Board of Zoning Appeals, said<br />

“It’s another erosion of property rights. Three supervisors are saying what’s<br />

yours is ours. It belongs to the County of Albemarle. We’re not going to<br />

stand <strong>for</strong> it.”<br />

Dirk Haynes reported that 84 percent of local farmers said in a survey<br />

done by the Albemarle Farm Bureau that they would sell out if land use was<br />

ended. If even only part of that possibility were to be realized, four decades<br />

of county growth management policies would implode.<br />

In the end, two hours later, Mallek promised that she would not cast the<br />

fourth vote needed to change the program. “Let’s not let it turn into growth<br />

area versus rural area,” she said. “We’re all in this together.”<br />

A sluice of growth has been turned on to growth areas like <strong>Crozet</strong> and it’s<br />

understandable that growth area residents are frustrated that the infrastructure<br />

and services that growth demands are not being met, except in the<br />

county’s languorous and desultory manner. They mistakenly look at the land<br />

use program as a subsidy of rural life that is depriving them of tax money<br />

they need to cope with growth.<br />

But this is not a tax equity problem. For rural landholders, and farmers<br />

especially, the matter is existential. Without land use they are gone. They<br />

point out that they are taxed the same as suburbanites on their house and<br />

buildings on two acres, which is typically larger than most suburban lots. It’s<br />

<strong>Crozet</strong> gazette<br />

only their crop and pasture lands, which really don’t produce much income<br />

any more, that are taxed at a reduced rate.<br />

It’s been proven many times that the tax dollar paid by a suburban resident<br />

gets him more than one dollar of service and that the dollar paid by a<br />

rural resident gets him less than a dollar’s worth of services. If anybody is<br />

being subsidized, it’s the growth area resident.<br />

This is not a new problem—it can be traced to colonial times—and in<br />

fact the structure of local government in Virginia is designed to recognize it.<br />

Counties are presumed to have agrarian economies and cities are presumed<br />

to have mercantile economies. Because those economies have different<br />

natures, the Virginia constitution gives cities and counties different taxation<br />

powers.<br />

But they are also inextricably linked. Farms feed towns, towns are markets<br />

<strong>for</strong> farms. As the increase in gas price brings home, what we need is to cultivate<br />

and nurture local agriculture. It is appalling that food that could be<br />

available fresh locally is being produced a continent or an ocean away and<br />

shipped here at great cost and loss in nutritional value. Of all the blessings<br />

western Albemarle has, fertile soils and sufficient rainfall are the greatest.<br />

Next is us. We are in this together and we have to appreciate, and respect,<br />

what we have.<br />

The <strong>Gazette</strong> believes growth area residents should look to the lavish<br />

county budget <strong>for</strong> money—schools, the sacred cow, in particular—and push<br />

<strong>for</strong> new spending priorities. The <strong>Gazette</strong> repeats its view, too, that the<br />

revenue-sharing agreement between Albemarle County and the City of<br />

Charlottesville has outlived its usefulness. It should be voided. The City<br />

should annex the “suburban ring” and take responsibility <strong>for</strong> all the urban<br />

area. Let the county boundary retreat to the actual rural area. That would<br />

re-establish the balance designed into our governmental structure and reduce<br />

the political problem of suburban voters dominating the agenda of rural residents.<br />

<strong>Crozet</strong>, and Scottsville, will navigate their needs as market towns<br />

quite satisfactorily in that arrangement. The fundamental issue in Albemarle,<br />

the seemingly eternal one, is fair taxes.


<strong>Crozet</strong> gazette AUGUST 2008 s page 3<br />

to the Editor<br />

CCC BOYS exonerateD<br />

A correction is needed in the July<br />

2008 issue, pg. 8—“CCC’s White<br />

Hall Camp Remembered.”<br />

In the fourth column, second<br />

paragraph, the line reads: “James<br />

speculated that some [fires] were<br />

started by the CCC men because<br />

they got paid <strong>for</strong> putting them<br />

out.”<br />

No. The CCC boys never started<br />

fires. They were paid the same dollar-a-day<br />

wage regardless, and<br />

fought the fires without extra compensation,<br />

even during their “free”<br />

time.<br />

I’m sorry that you [the editor]<br />

misunderstood. I was reading a<br />

direct quote from a letter written to<br />

me by the camp engineer. He was<br />

explaining the different ways that<br />

the fires started, i.e. berry gatherers<br />

clearing undergrowth; moonshiners<br />

burning out their competition; etc.<br />

Without pointing a finger directly<br />

at any place or person, he stated that<br />

there were “some” who could make<br />

extra money <strong>for</strong> fighting fires, insinuating—as<br />

you correctly interpreted—that<br />

someone might have<br />

incentive to start a fire in order to<br />

benefit financially.<br />

Please print a correction/retraction<br />

on this point to exonerate the<br />

CCC boys. They had no incentive<br />

<strong>for</strong> such conduct. Such an un<strong>for</strong>tunate<br />

event was extra duty to the<br />

max, with no extra compensation.<br />

Phil James<br />

White Hall<br />

Ed’s Note: Mea culpa<br />

OLD SCHOOL REUSE<br />

In the July issue of the <strong>Crozet</strong><br />

<strong>Gazette</strong> was a very in<strong>for</strong>mative article<br />

on page 1 that explained the<br />

three-day schedule of meetings that<br />

allowed the citizens of <strong>Crozet</strong> and<br />

Western Albemarle County to<br />

express their opinions and thoughts<br />

on how the Old <strong>Crozet</strong> Elementary<br />

School and grounds could best be<br />

used to benefit the area.<br />

One part of the three days that<br />

did not receive coverage was very<br />

important in collecting ideas. From<br />

9 a.m. until 5:15 p.m. on Friday,<br />

June 20, a table was manned by<br />

members of the Old School Reuse<br />

Committee and Albemarle County<br />

staff. This was done in front of the<br />

<strong>Crozet</strong> Great Valu to ensure that as<br />

many citizens as possible had a<br />

chance to express concerns, opinions<br />

and concepts on how to use the<br />

old school building and grounds.<br />

197 citizens took the time to express<br />

63 unique ideas that would not have<br />

been captured otherwise. As can be<br />

seen from the number of people<br />

that stopped at the table, the reuse<br />

of the old school is very important<br />

to the community and the reuse<br />

committee will certainly make sure<br />

their ideas are studied and discussed<br />

be<strong>for</strong>e any final decision is made. If<br />

any citizen would like to review the<br />

ideas collected that day or during<br />

the entire process they can do so at<br />

www.albemarle.org/oldschool.<br />

We also want to thank Jean<br />

Wagner and the employees at Great<br />

Valu <strong>for</strong> continuing to offer a site in<br />

front of the store <strong>for</strong> groups to<br />

engage the public.<br />

Bill Schrader<br />

Member of the Old School Reuse<br />

Committee<br />

Mountain Plain<br />

Baptist Church<br />

A small, friendly, moderate church invites<br />

you to share your Sunday with us.<br />

Sunday School 10 am<br />

Traditional Worship Service 11 am<br />

Rev. Sam Kellum, Pastor<br />

4297 Old Three Notch’d Road<br />

Travel 2 miles east of the <strong>Crozet</strong> Library on Three<br />

Notch’d Rd. (Rt. 240), turn left onto Old Three Notch’d<br />

Rd., go 0.5 mile to Mountain Plain Baptist Church<br />

More in<strong>for</strong>mation at<br />

www.mountainplain.org or 823.4160<br />

Xela 2008: Western Albemarle Students<br />

Go to Language School in Guatemala<br />

By Margie Shepherd<br />

On June 15, a group of 34 students,<br />

including 28 from Western<br />

Albemarle High School, along with<br />

seven adults, headed to<br />

Quetzeltenango, Guatemala, <strong>for</strong> a<br />

three-week Spanish immersion program.<br />

They lived with families in<br />

Quetzeltenango (also called by its<br />

Mayan name, Xela) and took five<br />

hours of classes each afternoon at<br />

Casa Xelaju. Mornings were filled<br />

with cultural activities and volunteer<br />

projects. They toured the city,<br />

learned about back-strap weaving,<br />

visited schools, took Salsa lessons,<br />

and helped with chocolate production.<br />

They hiked into the dormant<br />

volcano of Chicobal to the edge of<br />

the lake inside. They worked with<br />

children in an afterschool program,<br />

with a temporary shelter, and on<br />

rural houses with Habitat <strong>for</strong><br />

Humanity.<br />

When they visited Escuela Las<br />

Trigales to play basketball and soccer<br />

with the students, they also came<br />

loaded with soccer equipment. Two<br />

boys in the group, Ben and Adam<br />

Schiller, collected balls, shin guards,<br />

shoes, and shirts from Albemarle<br />

students in the SOCA league this<br />

spring. SOCA donated over a hundred<br />

new soccer shirts. There were<br />

enough to outfit many local teams<br />

connected to this school.<br />

One weekend the group headed<br />

to Lake Atitlan, to the beautiful<br />

towns of Panajachel and Santiago,<br />

and then to Chichicastenango, an<br />

enormous market that pre-dates<br />

Columbus’s arrival. The next they<br />

flew to the state of Petan to see the<br />

Mayan ruins at Tikal and a tour of<br />

that ancient city with their guide<br />

Pavlo. And be<strong>for</strong>e heading back,<br />

they spent some time in Antigua,<br />

near Guatemala City.<br />

Students took the Albemarle<br />

County Spanish exam upon returning<br />

home, and those who pass will<br />

receive a full year of Spanish credit.<br />

Spanish immersion not only<br />

included the classwork, but mealtimes,<br />

buying things in the stores<br />

and markets, cafes and ice cream<br />

stands, where they had to practice<br />

with the language to get what they<br />

needed.<br />

They took away with them an<br />

appreciation <strong>for</strong> Guatemalan and<br />

Mayan culture. About sixty percent<br />

of the people of the Western<br />

Highlands, where the students were,<br />

are Mayan, speaking Mum or<br />

Qui’che, or one of the other many<br />

dialects as a first language. The students<br />

came back loaded with<br />

Guatemalan textiles, bags, coffee,<br />

glassware from Copavic, and<br />

wooden masks—and loaded with<br />

stories, new friendships, new experiences,<br />

and many wonderful memories.<br />

Pictures and accounts of the<br />

adventure are at the blog www.<br />

xela2008.blogspot.com.<br />

Participants at Xela 2008 included: Laura Weiss<br />

(mother), Landon Weiss, Max Weiner, Chris Bergin,<br />

Jacob Ball, Colin Williams, Alex Mosolgo-Clark,<br />

Matthew Kochard, Hunter Weiss (Henley), Gabby<br />

DeJanasz, Phoebe Fooks, Katie Van dePol (AHS)<br />

Veronica O’Brien, Diana Stan, Ben Schiller, Adam<br />

Schiller, Alec Shobe (Richmond) Sam Isaacs, Liz<br />

Noonan, Rosemary Shepherd (WAHS‘04), Henry Giles,<br />

Ethan Baruch, Jake <strong>Park</strong>s, Becca Stoner, KellyAbrams,<br />

Paul Charron (NC) Cole Weiss (Meriwether Lewis),<br />

Maggie Borowitz, Sadie Garner, James Webster,<br />

Grant Forsythe (MN), Kristy Mangold (AHS), Suzanne<br />

deJanasz (mother), Margaret Shepherd (Murray<br />

HS ‘06) Anna Brown, Jay LaRue, Margie Shepherd<br />

(Henley teacher), Jennifer Bisguier, Michael Hartman,<br />

Chris Abrams, Diana Garner (mother), and Sandy<br />

Williams mother).


page 4 s AUGUST 2008<br />

<strong>Crozet</strong> gazette<br />

Bands Announced<br />

<strong>for</strong> Rockfish<br />

Bluegrass Festival<br />

The Bluegrass Festival has<br />

announced its full lineup of bands<br />

<strong>for</strong> the September 6 event. Allens<br />

Mill has been added to the list of<br />

bands scheduled to play from 2 to 7<br />

p.m. on Saturday, September 6, at<br />

the Rockfish Valley Volunteer Fire<br />

Department.<br />

Along with Allens Mill, the James<br />

River Cut-Ups, Little Mountain<br />

Boys and In the Tradition will participate<br />

in the festival, which will<br />

raise funds toward the new $300,000<br />

fire truck recently purchased by the<br />

all-volunteer fire department.<br />

In addition to the bands, food<br />

will be available and a 50/50 drawing<br />

will be held. Tickets <strong>for</strong> the<br />

event are $10 <strong>for</strong> adults and $5 <strong>for</strong><br />

children ages 6 to12. Children 5<br />

and under are free. This is a family<br />

event with no alcohol allowed.<br />

For more in<strong>for</strong>mation, call Gary<br />

Nickell at home at (434) 361-1059<br />

or on his cell phone at (434)<br />

962-9558.<br />

Located on Route 151, the<br />

department provides fire and rescue<br />

service <strong>for</strong> Nelson County, Route<br />

250 to the top of Afton Mountain<br />

and parts of western Albemarle<br />

County.<br />

Bonnie and<br />

Friends Concert<br />

Set <strong>for</strong> August 10<br />

The 15th annual Bonnie and<br />

Friends Concert will be held August<br />

10 at 3 p.m. at Gillum Hall in<br />

<strong>Crozet</strong> Baptist Church. Joining<br />

Bonnie Samuel will be soprano<br />

Mary Spols Martin, tenors David<br />

Collyer and Rob Cordero and lyric<br />

tenor Ken Ellis.<br />

Featured music will include<br />

pieces by Offenbach, Tchaikovsky<br />

and Mozart, as well as contemporary<br />

composers, songs from<br />

“Kismet,” “Porgy and Bess,”<br />

“Chicago,” and more. Nancy<br />

Fleischman will accompany on the<br />

piano.<br />

The concert is free and open to<br />

the public. <strong>Crozet</strong> Baptist Church is<br />

at 5804 St. George Avenue in<br />

<strong>Crozet</strong>. For more in<strong>for</strong>mation, call<br />

Ms. Samuel at 540-456-6433.<br />

Fresh Peach<br />

Ice Cream at<br />

Chiles Orchard<br />

The Albemarle – Charlottesville<br />

Pilot Club, a community service<br />

club, will hold its annual homemade<br />

peach ice cream sale at Chiles<br />

Peach Orchard. The sale, the club’s<br />

traditional fundraiser, will be on<br />

August 2 from 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. and<br />

August 3 from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m.,<br />

or until sold out. Chiles Orchard is<br />

at 1351 Greenwood Road between<br />

<strong>Crozet</strong> and Greenwood. For more<br />

in<strong>for</strong>mation, call 295-1783.<br />

Apples <strong>for</strong><br />

Appalachia<br />

Fundraising<br />

Apples <strong>for</strong> Appalachia, a foodsharing<br />

campaign that buys surplus<br />

apples from the <strong>Crozet</strong>-area harvest<br />

<strong>for</strong> distribution to the needy in<br />

southwest Virginia, is collecting<br />

money donations <strong>for</strong> its fall apple<br />

delivery, according to organizer<br />

Wayne Clark.<br />

Clark is customarily at the sales<br />

shed at Henley’s orchard, but since<br />

his wife’s recent heart attack he cannot<br />

be there. Meanwhile, donations<br />

may be sent to Apples <strong>for</strong><br />

Appalachia, P.O. Box 88, <strong>Crozet</strong>,<br />

VA 22932.<br />

Mail the<br />

<strong>Gazette</strong> to your<br />

college student.<br />

editor@crozetgazette.com<br />

(434) 466-8939<br />

Ashley Walton Fundraiser<br />

The largest public turnout at the <strong>Crozet</strong> firehouse that <strong>Crozet</strong> Volunteer<br />

Fire Department President Preston Gentry can remember occurred July 11<br />

<strong>for</strong> the Ashley Walton fundraiser. Walton, age 24, was hit by a drunk driver<br />

on Memorial Day and is now in a rehabilitation center in Atlanta, Georgia,<br />

in a minimal responsive state.<br />

The fundraiser to assist her family was organized by Mt. Moriah United<br />

Methodist Church in White Hall, and more specifically by Wayne Knight.<br />

The church prepared a dinner of baked spaghetti, salad, cakes and drinks <strong>for</strong><br />

500 and all the fire equipment was pulled out of the bays to set up tables<br />

and chairs on the breezy summer evening.<br />

“It does our hearts good,” said Knight. “The community and the individual<br />

response has been phenomenal. This has touched the entire community.”<br />

Raffle tickets were sold <strong>for</strong> prizes donated by local businesses and donation<br />

baskets were generously filled.<br />

Walton’s grandmother Faye Gibson said, “I’d like to thank the church,<br />

the fire department and the whole community. Everyone has shown their<br />

love. It’s been overwhelming.”


<strong>Crozet</strong> gazette AUGUST 2008 s page 5<br />

by Phil James<br />

Farm auctions such as this one held near Mount Fair, too often denote the final passing of another honorable life spent<br />

working the land.<br />

The Disappearing Faces<br />

of Farming<br />

The gentle spirit of young Katie Maupin (1900–1998) was<br />

evident as she milked her family’s cow near Doylesville,<br />

Virginia. [Photo courtesy of Thelma Via Wyant.]<br />

Did you ever want to be a farmer?<br />

There’s nary a town nor village in<br />

Albemarle County that was not built to<br />

serve a surrounding community of farmers. The<br />

scores of discontinued post offices attest to <strong>for</strong>mer<br />

communities where farming families once<br />

gathered to check the mail, share news, and purchase<br />

or trade <strong>for</strong> provisions.<br />

It’s easy today to ignore the reality that the<br />

sprawling estates of old Albemarle, crowned with<br />

their palatial homes, were established as working<br />

farms. During the better years, the farms’ increases<br />

empowered the owners while supplying jobs, sustenance<br />

and housing to the laborers essential to<br />

farm operations.<br />

Colonial-era plantations that once supported a<br />

tobacco-based economy were sub-divided as the<br />

land yielded less of the prized product. Subsequent<br />

generations of land entrepreneurs positioned<br />

themselves <strong>for</strong> an ever-increasing population, paring<br />

down the grand old plantations into numerous<br />

smaller parcels. Land values were prudently<br />

based on the attributes of the soil, and houses<br />

were often relegated to a spot thought less convenient<br />

or profitable <strong>for</strong> tillage.<br />

One of the most obvious absences from the<br />

local real estate scene today is af<strong>for</strong>dable farm<br />

acreage. The Southern Planter magazine in 1893<br />

carried this print ad <strong>for</strong> Albemarle farm land:<br />

“Albemarle County. The great fruit, grain and<br />

stock section of Virginia. Climate healthful and<br />

fine. Scenery beautiful. Near the great markets,<br />

with good transportation facilities… Good soil at<br />

low prices. Sheep protected in this county by a<br />

good dog law.” Improved farmlands were<br />

offered at $9–$10/acre.<br />

An opportunity occasionally available<br />

to the farmer unable to buy land of his<br />

own was to sharecrop the lands of<br />

another. A 1918 Albemarle County<br />

sharecropper’s one-year lease agreement<br />

revealed the following conditions of one<br />

such enterprise: The farm owner received<br />

“one third (1/3rd) of all grain, and crops,<br />

and apples”; retained rights to harvest<br />

firewood and pasture his stock; and had<br />

no responsibility <strong>for</strong> damage his own<br />

stock might do to any crops on the farm.<br />

The leasing sharecropper furnished all<br />

seed and kept the farm in cultivation “as<br />

good husbandry requires”; furnished all<br />

barrels (owner to pay <strong>for</strong> 1/3rd of the<br />

barrels used) and spraying materials;<br />

pruned, tended, and sprayed the<br />

orchard in a proper manner; had the<br />

privilege of cutting and selling chestnut<br />

wood, paying 1/4th of those proceeds<br />

to the owner; had the privilege of using<br />

the horse called “Dan”, plus the use of<br />

a 2-horse wagon, harness and farming<br />

implements—and agreed to feed the horse.<br />

Mount Fair was one of the several estates established<br />

by members of the historic Brown family<br />

in the Brown’s Cove section of western Albemarle<br />

County in the 18th-century. James W. Early<br />

became the owner of this farm estate be<strong>for</strong>e the<br />

turn of the 20th-century. He employed many<br />

local hands in the operations of his farm, grain<br />

A significant shift in labor from agriculture to industry<br />

occurred during the 1950s. <strong>Crozet</strong>’s business community,<br />

however, was still being counted on to serve the farms and<br />

orchards of western Albemarle County.<br />

mill, and general store. One of those laborers<br />

was Laurie Sandridge (1890–1951), whose son,<br />

Homer, recalled some of his father’s experiences<br />

continued on page 6


page 6 s AUGUST 2008<br />

<strong>Crozet</strong> gazette<br />

Farming—continued from page 5<br />

The smile on this young girl’s face reflected the general<br />

mood around <strong>Crozet</strong> during the apple and peach picking<br />

seasons. The bounty of a successful harvest—apples in<br />

this instance—was always a cause to celebrate. [Photo<br />

courtesy of Jimmy Belew.]<br />

working <strong>for</strong> Early.<br />

“This land here all used to be Mount Fair,”<br />

Homer said as he motioned with his hand.<br />

“When I was real small my Daddy worked here.<br />

See where those woods are over yonder? I was<br />

born in a log house on the bank of the [Doyle’s]<br />

river right over there. Between here and<br />

Doylesville is less than a mile. The road just followed<br />

the river. I remember you crossed the<br />

river—you <strong>for</strong>ded the river—three times. That<br />

was a real old house that we lived in. He built a<br />

house down here in the bottom and we moved<br />

Cecil McAllister (1913–1999), youngest child of Jim and Mollie (Via) McAllister, lived his entire life on his family’s farm<br />

adjacent to the first bridge over Moormans River in Sugar Hollow. [Photo courtesy of Cecil McAllister.]<br />

across into that along about nineteen-and-eighteen.<br />

Had a hog lot right over there. And they<br />

would let ‘em out and let ‘em run over the woods.<br />

Most of them were raised <strong>for</strong> the owner’s consumption<br />

and consumption of the people who<br />

worked on the place. Back then when you worked<br />

<strong>for</strong> somebody they furnished you so much. I<br />

remember hearing my Daddy say that during<br />

World War One—he had four children then—<br />

his pay was sixteen dollars a month. Flour was<br />

sold <strong>for</strong> eighteen dollars a barrel during the war.<br />

But he didn’t have to buy any flour. He was furnished<br />

with flour, meal, a couple hogs, a cow to<br />

milk. That’s what came along with all of his compensation.<br />

Then about nineteen-and-twenty-one<br />

we moved to the store. The fellow that owned it,<br />

James Early, died while we were here. He was also<br />

running the store up there at Mount Fair. That<br />

was a part of his estate. Mrs. Early sold that store<br />

up there and about an acre, acre-and-a-half of<br />

land to my father. We moved up there and he<br />

started running the store. That was a big move.”<br />

Whether laboring <strong>for</strong> a subsistence wage,<br />

sharecropping <strong>for</strong> an absentee owner, orcharding<br />

on the mountainsides, or managing great estates<br />

in the fertile bottomlands, Albemarle’s farmers<br />

Each of the businesses adjacent to <strong>Crozet</strong>’s C&O Depot catered to the farmer and orchardist. The background in this 1950s view clearly illustrates the close relationship between farm and<br />

village.


<strong>Crozet</strong> gazette AUGUST 2008 s page 7<br />

contributed significantly to the wealth and welfare<br />

of their county and state. Post-World War II<br />

industrialization and improved transportation<br />

enticed many to depart from the agricultural<br />

labors of their ancestors and take on clock-punching<br />

jobs in town. They exchanged the familiar<br />

rhythms of the seasons <strong>for</strong> the relentless hustle of<br />

industrialized society. Some thrived. Some just<br />

survived. But the social fabric of another agriculturally-based<br />

county was <strong>for</strong>ever altered.<br />

Heaven help us in this day when land assessments<br />

and taxes have precluded the opportunities<br />

of the up-and-coming generation of would-be<br />

farmers. Existing and potential land use restrictions<br />

are squeezing out the remaining full-time<br />

agriculturists. Farmers continually strive to maintain<br />

their land in a productive state. To the recreational<br />

passer-by, the bucolic vistas they enjoy<br />

demand to be “preserved,” <strong>for</strong>cing the overworked<br />

land stewards of today to carve out even more<br />

time to attend public hearings in order to point<br />

out emphatically that these lands are farms, not<br />

parks!<br />

Did you ever want to be a farmer? Or do you<br />

at least hold on to the hope that productive farmlands,<br />

with their aesthetic diversity and beneficial<br />

assets, will continue to grace our local region?<br />

Well, you’d better study-up on the potential<br />

impacts of local zoning and conservation restrictions<br />

affecting the farmers and their farmlands. If<br />

we don’t take better care of the farmers around us<br />

right now, we’d better start learning the best way<br />

to prepare and serve houses. They could be the<br />

last crop harvested on these once highly-prized<br />

and fertile, but rapidly disappearing, farmlands.<br />

Phil James invites contact from those who<br />

would share recollections and old photographs<br />

of life along the Blue Ridge<br />

Mountains of Albemarle County, Virginia.<br />

You may respond to him at: P.O. Box 88,<br />

White Hall, VA 22987 or philjames@firstva.<br />

com. Secrets of the Blue Ridge © 2008 Phil<br />

James<br />

Jaunt Tests<br />

Demand <strong>for</strong><br />

Expanded Service<br />

to <strong>Crozet</strong><br />

With punishing gas prices dramatically raising<br />

the cost of the commute to Charlottesville,<br />

<strong>Crozet</strong> residents have been wondering if public<br />

transportation options could be expanded.<br />

“We just need the money,” said JAUNT director<br />

Donna Shaunesey, when asked if expansion<br />

of their current morning and evening route to<br />

Charlottesville was possible. “Show me the<br />

money and we’ll be there. It’s really expensive.”<br />

JAUNT is a publicly-funded regional transportation<br />

service that operates 64 vans on routes<br />

through Albemarle, Amherst, Buckingham,<br />

Greene, Louisa, Nelson, Orange and Fluvanna<br />

Counties, and it is mainly centered on providing<br />

access to Charlottesville. Its vans hold from 14 to<br />

18 passengers. It has a $5.3 million dollar budget<br />

provided largely by the local governments. Only<br />

$500,000 of its costs is recovered in fare revenues,<br />

Shaunesey said. “We’d be nowhere without government<br />

money. The fare revenue doesn’t amount<br />

to a lot.”<br />

JAUNT ran a three-times-a-day weekday service<br />

between its pick-up spot in the Mountainside<br />

Senior Living parking lot off Carter Street and<br />

U.Va. and the downtown bus center <strong>for</strong> two<br />

years, abandoning it in 2005. “It was a pretty<br />

good service,” Shaunesey said. “We even made it<br />

free. But we averaged only two riders a day.” She<br />

said it would cost JAUNT about $25,000 a year<br />

to provide twice-a-day runs from <strong>Crozet</strong> to<br />

Charlottesville with a $1 fare charged each way.<br />

It currently picks up riders in <strong>Crozet</strong> and delivers<br />

them to locations in Charlottesville, returning<br />

them in the evening <strong>for</strong> $3 each way in what<br />

amounts to a virtual taxi service that means an<br />

unpredictable travel schedule and potentially<br />

long rides <strong>for</strong> some passengers. The service would<br />

not work <strong>for</strong> commuters wanting to get to work<br />

and back home at specific times and with reasonably<br />

direct ride times.<br />

“Our ridership has not gone up with the gas<br />

prices,” Shaunesey noted. “Ride Share is getting<br />

more requests but it hasn’t played out with us<br />

yet.<br />

“A more efficient way [to address the commuting<br />

issue] would be van pools, especially <strong>for</strong> people<br />

going to U.Va.” State Farm runs a successful<br />

van pool to its offices on Pantops, she said.<br />

Because the Albemarle Supervisors would<br />

have to subsidize expanded service, White Hall<br />

District Supervisor Ann Mallek has been soliciting<br />

interest in the idea and so far has had four<br />

responses, said Shaunesey, who has received <strong>for</strong>warded<br />

messages. Each of the four has different<br />

time-of-day needs, she noted. Mallek is collecting<br />

data through August.<br />

“Even if the response is high we would have<br />

concerns,” Shaunesey said. JAUNT responded to<br />

a similar need expressed by residents of Esmont,<br />

she explained, and even though many people said<br />

they would use the vans, after the service was<br />

instituted, few actually did.<br />

“The Esmont experience was that people don’t<br />

follow through,” she said.“Our goal is to make<br />

sure everybody is getting where they need to go.<br />

Personally, I would like to see people drive their<br />

cars less. What we need to know [from <strong>Crozet</strong>ians]<br />

is specific in<strong>for</strong>mation about hours of the day<br />

they need to travel,” Shaunesey said.<br />

www.ridejaunt.org<br />

Rural Demand-Response<br />

For transportation outside the scheduled routes,<br />

JAUNT provides service with fares ranging from<br />

$2.60 to $12.50, depending on the distance and<br />

whether the passenger has a disability or is a senior.<br />

Rural Services within the County<br />

Anyone can ride JAUNT services within Albemarle<br />

County. Service is offered Wednesday to <strong>Crozet</strong> and<br />

Tuesday and Thursday to Scottsville and Esmont.<br />

The fare is $2.00 each way and $1.00 <strong>for</strong> passengers<br />

with disabilities and those 60 years and older.<br />

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We’ve moved<br />

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Please visit us in our beautiful new<br />

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page 8 s AUGUST 2008<br />

<strong>Light</strong> Industial—continued from page 1<br />

The 148 acres include 4 parcels<br />

whose southern boundaries follow<br />

Interstate 64 extensively and also<br />

contact the south side of Western<br />

Albemarle High School. They do<br />

not have any other direct access to<br />

Route 250. Roughly 30 acres of the<br />

land is unbuildable because it is<br />

floodplain covered by water protection<br />

ordinance buffers or has critical<br />

slopes. <strong>Yancey</strong> showed the commissioners<br />

photos of the site, which has<br />

attractive views, and it is presently<br />

cattle pasture watered by Stockton<br />

Creek. <strong>Yancey</strong> said he will submit a<br />

<strong>for</strong>mal request <strong>for</strong> the rezoning to<br />

the county by September 2.<br />

<strong>Yancey</strong> argued that his proposal,<br />

which he called a “preliminary conceptual”<br />

plan, met county criteria<br />

<strong>for</strong> having interstate highway access<br />

and having a 50-acre minimum.<br />

The land would have to have public<br />

water and sewer extended to it,<br />

which he said was possible by connecting<br />

to lines at WAHS. He<br />

acknowledged that it did not con<strong>for</strong>m<br />

with County policies on preserving<br />

rural areas.<br />

“We understand rezoning is at<br />

odds with the Comprehensive Plan,”<br />

he said. “Approval of our proposal<br />

will take some outside-of-the-box<br />

thinking.”<br />

Commissioners had been discussing<br />

a report prepared by county<br />

planning staff that said that only<br />

111 acres of vacant, buildable land<br />

zoned <strong>for</strong> light industrial use is<br />

available in the county. According<br />

to their demand study, the county<br />

needs at least 121 more acres, and if<br />

office use, which is currently allowed<br />

in the zoning, were factored in, the<br />

shortage could be as much as 339<br />

acres. The study took the growth in<br />

county employment from 2000 to<br />

2006, which turns out to be 3.2<br />

percent, and applied standard planning<br />

<strong>for</strong>mulas to it to arrive at their<br />

figures.<br />

A fair percentage of the presently<br />

available light industrial land is in<br />

<strong>Crozet</strong>, including the Barnes<br />

Lumber Company property downtown,<br />

the <strong>for</strong>mer ConAgra complex<br />

that now houses MusicToday and<br />

Starr Hill Brewery, and the <strong>for</strong>mer<br />

Acme Visible property just east that<br />

is presently being remediated <strong>for</strong><br />

environmental damage left by solvents<br />

used to remove grease during<br />

manufacturing processes. It is not<br />

expected to be usable again <strong>for</strong> three<br />

years.<br />

Some commissioners remained<br />

unconvinced of the need to preemptively<br />

rezone land without a specific<br />

applicant and probed the assumptions<br />

made in preparing the report.<br />

White Hall District Commissioner<br />

Tom Loach asked <strong>for</strong> a breakdown<br />

of the employment data to find out<br />

if the growth had been in light<br />

industrial jobs, or if the numbers<br />

perhaps reflected office jobs. Samuel<br />

Miller District Commissioner Eric<br />

Strucko asked if there had been a<br />

spike in jobs in any one year reflecting<br />

a single employer that might<br />

have especially affected the total.<br />

County planner Susan Stimart, who<br />

presented the report, did not have<br />

that in<strong>for</strong>mation.<br />

Nora Gillespie, director of the<br />

Central Virginia Small Business<br />

Development Center, which assists<br />

about 200 young companies every<br />

year, said the Center has about “six<br />

to 10 cases a year” in which growing<br />

companies have trouble finding<br />

af<strong>for</strong>dable light industrial land in<br />

Albemarle and adjoining counties<br />

where they can expand operations.<br />

Those companies have usually<br />

headed to the Valley or toward<br />

Richmond <strong>for</strong> space, she said.<br />

“It may be a regional problem<br />

since they can’t find land in nearby<br />

cssatcrozet@embarqmail.com<br />

counties either,” observed Strucko.<br />

“I’m not convinced we have to go<br />

outside the growth areas,” he said.<br />

“We could rezone, but not proactively.”<br />

Later in the discussion he<br />

insisted that County policy about<br />

increasing light industrial acreage be<br />

strictly limited to land inside growth<br />

areas. He also noted that highway<br />

commercial zoning also allowed<br />

many of the uses available through<br />

LI zoning. “Are we addressing a<br />

problem that’s out there?” he asked.<br />

“If so, we’ll devise a policy to deal<br />

with it.”<br />

“It’s really a subsidy problem,”<br />

said Rio District Commissioner Jon<br />

Cannon, comparing it to the af<strong>for</strong>dable<br />

housing issue. “You’re stacking<br />

the deck competitively [by rezoning<br />

more land to LI].”<br />

“I would like to state up front<br />

that we should not change growth<br />

area boundaries but look at other<br />

mechanisms,” said Strucko.<br />

“I agree that we have to totally<br />

exhaust the growth areas first,” said<br />

Jack Jouett District Commissioner<br />

Bill Edgerton. “But we need some<br />

strength in the Comp Plan to<br />

continued on page 11<br />

<strong>Crozet</strong> gazette<br />

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<strong>Crozet</strong> gazette AUGUST 2008 s page 9<br />

Condon’s Corner: Cooking Made Easy<br />

© Marlene A. Condon<br />

Easy and Better Ice Cream<br />

If you do not own an ice cream machine, you might want to think about<br />

buying one. I got an Oster “Quick-Freeze Ice Cream Maker” several years<br />

ago and I have not ever wanted to buy ice cream at the grocery store again.<br />

Many folks do not realize how good homemade ice cream can be because<br />

people are under the mistaken impression that it should be eaten as soon as<br />

it is made. Indeed, many country fairs and some fruit stands make ice cream<br />

and immediately sell it while it still retains a somewhat liquid or “soft” consistency.<br />

But ice cream is best when it is hardened, just as when you buy it at the<br />

grocer’s. There<strong>for</strong>e the trick to making great ice cream is to use a great recipe<br />

and to allow the ice cream time to harden in the freezer instead of eating it<br />

right away.<br />

I once offered a neighbor a quart of homemade ice cream and he initially<br />

declined, saying he didn’t like homemade ice cream. I convinced him to take<br />

it <strong>for</strong> his kids to try. The next time I saw him, he told me the whole family<br />

thought I should be working <strong>for</strong> the Breyer’s ice cream company! They<br />

thought it was the best vanilla ice cream they had ever had.<br />

Many recipes <strong>for</strong> vanilla ice cream contain eggs which give the ice cream a<br />

creamier (and fattier) consistency. Known as “French” vanilla, these recipes<br />

usually require cooking and cooling of the egg mixture (known as custard)<br />

be<strong>for</strong>e you can even begin to think about making the ice cream.<br />

But my Oster machine came with an egg-less recipe <strong>for</strong> the best vanillaflavored<br />

ice cream that I have ever had. Because I do not have to cook a<br />

custard first and cool it down to go into the ice cream machine, I can easily<br />

whip up a quart and a half of ice cream within an hour of deciding to make<br />

it—assuming I have all of the ingredients at hand, of course!<br />

So I thought I would share with you this wonderful recipe because vanilla<br />

is the basic flavor that goes so well with just about everything. I am also providing<br />

four variations of this recipe that are absolutely yummy after being<br />

allowed time to harden completely. Homemade ice cream will keep very well<br />

<strong>for</strong> a few months inside a “real” freezer if kept tightly sealed. If you have only<br />

a refrigerator freezer, try to use it up within a month.<br />

Easy Vanilla Ice Cream<br />

NOTE: Be<strong>for</strong>e starting to make<br />

the ice cream, get out two clean<br />

plastic freezer containers in a onequart<br />

and a one-pint size. Each container<br />

should have a tight-fitting<br />

snap-on lid. Also make two dated<br />

labels. Place these items on the<br />

counter with a spoonula (a plastic<br />

or rubber spatula with curved edges<br />

that is used like a mixing spoon) or<br />

some other large spoon. It will be<br />

needed to guide the soft ice cream<br />

out of the ice cream machine canister<br />

into the storage freezer containers<br />

as quickly as possible. You may<br />

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spill some of the semi-solid mixture<br />

so you should also have a damp<br />

paper towel available <strong>for</strong> wiping the<br />

plastic containers after filling them.<br />

Be sure to stick dated labels onto<br />

the containers be<strong>for</strong>e placing them<br />

into the freezer.<br />

Put the following ingredients into<br />

your ice cream canister:<br />

2 cups whipping cream<br />

2 cups half and half<br />

(NOT LOW FAT)<br />

1 cup granulated white sugar<br />

1 Tbsp. REAL vanilla extract<br />

(NOT IMITATION)<br />

Stir with a mixing spoon until<br />

the sugar is completely dissolved<br />

(the graininess will disappear).<br />

After thoroughly mixing the<br />

ingredients, I place the canister into<br />

the freezer <strong>for</strong> about 5 minutes to<br />

make sure the ingredients and the<br />

canister are quite cold.<br />

Freeze according to your manufacturer’s<br />

directions. When done,<br />

transfer the soft ice cream into the<br />

freezer containers as quickly as possible.<br />

Be sure to wipe the top edges<br />

(and sides, if necessary) of the containers<br />

with the damp paper towel<br />

and snap the lids on. Place the dated<br />

containers into a freezer <strong>for</strong> several<br />

hours (preferably at least eight) to<br />

completely harden.<br />

Variations:<br />

To make chocolate chip ice<br />

cream, add two-thirds cup of<br />

MINIATURE chocolate chips just<br />

be<strong>for</strong>e the ice cream has reached the<br />

desired consistency (follow your<br />

manufacturer’s directions <strong>for</strong> how to<br />

mix in ingredients).<br />

To make cinnamon ice cream,<br />

which is great <strong>for</strong> use with warm<br />

apple desserts (not <strong>for</strong> eating by<br />

itself), use the same amount of<br />

whipping cream, half and half, and<br />

sugar as <strong>for</strong> the vanilla ice cream.<br />

However, mix in only 1½ tsp.<br />

vanilla extract and add 1 Tbsp.<br />

ground cinnamon.<br />

For really delectable chocolate ice<br />

cream, you need to first combine<br />

the following ingredients in a<br />

blender set to a LOW speed until it<br />

is smooth: 2 cups whipping cream,<br />

2 cups half and half, 1 tsp. vanilla<br />

extract, 1½ cups sugar, and ½ cup<br />

unsweetened cocoa powder. Freeze<br />

as directed by the manufacturer.<br />

For superb strawberry ice cream,<br />

place 2 cups fresh or frozen strawberries<br />

into a blender or food processor<br />

fitted with a blade. Cover and<br />

process at a LOW speed until<br />

chopped. Pour into the canister in<br />

which you have thoroughly mixed<br />

(until the sugar is dissolved) 2 cups<br />

whipping cream, 1 cup half and<br />

half, 1 cup sugar, and 2 tsp. vanilla<br />

extract. Freeze as directed by the<br />

manufacturer of your ice cream<br />

machine. IMPORTANT NOTE:<br />

Strawberries from your own garden,<br />

a nearby farm, or a farmer’s market<br />

are preferable to those available at<br />

most grocers. However, if you must<br />

purchase them at the grocery store,<br />

buy a package from the freezer section.<br />

These fruits tend to be of better<br />

quality in terms of ripeness—<br />

and thus tastiness—than the practically<br />

unripe fresh strawberries<br />

shipped in from who-knows-where.<br />

Enjoy!


page 10 s AUGUST 2008<br />

<strong>Crozet</strong> gazette<br />

A New York Yankee in Chief Bubba and Hubba’s<br />

Firehouse<br />

Live Fire Training<br />

By Tom Loach<br />

I<br />

thought I’d share with you some<br />

interesting data about the challenges<br />

faced by the fire service in<br />

the U. S. The data is from 2006 and<br />

shows that nationwide there were<br />

1,642,500 fires, an increase of 2.5%<br />

from 2005. There were 278,000<br />

fires in vehicles and every 19 seconds<br />

a fire department responded to<br />

a fire emergency. A fire occurred in<br />

a structure every 60 seconds and a<br />

residential fire occurred every 78<br />

seconds, with a vehicle fire starting<br />

every 113 seconds.<br />

The really dreary figure is the fact<br />

that someone dies in a fire every 62<br />

minutes and someone is injured by<br />

fire every 32 minutes. The fires that<br />

firefighters face today are becoming<br />

increasingly dangerous.<br />

Part of the problem is the materials<br />

we now have in our homes,<br />

including increasing amounts of<br />

plastic and composite materials.<br />

When these burn, they produce not<br />

only more smoke, but more toxins.<br />

In an article about the dangers of<br />

burning plastics, the author wrote<br />

the following: “While the flammability<br />

of a plastic product depends<br />

on its <strong>for</strong>m, plastics generally create<br />

hotter fires and are there<strong>for</strong>e more<br />

dangerous to firefighters than burning<br />

wood, paper or cloth. One<br />

pound of polystyrene plastic can<br />

give off 18,000 Btu, whereas wood<br />

or paper will only give off 7,000 to<br />

8,000 Btu. Furthermore, the smoke<br />

given off by plastics is dense and<br />

black, creating a greater obscuration<br />

hazard than wood or paper smoke.”<br />

Odd as it may seem, one way the<br />

<strong>Crozet</strong> Volunteer Fire Department<br />

prepares to fight fires is to start<br />

them. It’s called live fire training and<br />

it provides invaluable experience <strong>for</strong><br />

preparing <strong>for</strong> the next structure fire.<br />

The opportunity usually starts when<br />

we get a call from someone in the<br />

community who has a building they<br />

want to demolish and offers it to the<br />

fire department to burn down.<br />

Here in <strong>Crozet</strong>, the expert in setting<br />

up these live fire training sessions<br />

is Battalion Chief Mike<br />

Walton, who has organized and<br />

burned at least 10 buildings. The<br />

planning <strong>for</strong> a live burn has to be<br />

meticulous because the reality is<br />

that there’s always an element of<br />

danger when you deal with a burning<br />

building. Because these live<br />

burns are such a valuable learning<br />

tool, we usually invite members<br />

from other departments to take<br />

part. Chief Walton and his “burn<br />

team” will review the building to see<br />

how many different types of fire scenarios<br />

they can come up with to<br />

give firefighters a chance to use as<br />

many fire suppression techniques as<br />

possible.<br />

Once they have their plan set out,<br />

they make sure all of the firefighters<br />

know what’s expected of them and<br />

how each fire evolution is expected<br />

to play out. To ensure safety, each<br />

team that goes into the building will<br />

have a back up team ready and waiting.<br />

Perhaps the hardest working team<br />

at any live burn are the firefighters<br />

assigned as “fire starters.” It’s the fire<br />

starters who actually put the torch<br />

to the building, then sit there until<br />

they feel the fire is of sufficient size<br />

be<strong>for</strong>e calling in the team to put the<br />

fire out. Being a fire starter is a<br />

tough job because they take a beating<br />

with each fire they start.<br />

There is nothing that I know of<br />

that prepares you to go into a burning<br />

building. Even under training<br />

conditions, facing a live fire can be a<br />

very scary experience, crawling<br />

through the smoke toward an ever<br />

increasing glow, feeling the heat of<br />

the fire start to penetrate your fire<br />

gear while the fire roars overhead.<br />

This type of training is especially<br />

important <strong>for</strong> new members who<br />

have to learn to work as a team and<br />

trust themselves and their equipment<br />

if they’re ever to become effective<br />

firefighters. Live burns allow the<br />

more experienced members to<br />

sharpen their skills and give our officers<br />

the chance to practice their<br />

leadership skills.<br />

Because we invite other departments,<br />

we get to work as a combined<br />

unit and get exposure to other<br />

departments’ techniques and equipment<br />

while improving cross department<br />

communications. At our last<br />

live burn, Chief Walton was able to<br />

give the other department that took<br />

part an opportunity to work with<br />

the foam system on our trucks.<br />

Even the final act of letting the<br />

building burn to the ground is used<br />

to observe and teach fire behavior,<br />

because it’s just as important to<br />

know when not to go into a burning<br />

building as when to go into one.<br />

When the day is done the exercise is<br />

reviewed to see what went well and<br />

what needs improvement.<br />

Executing a good live burn takes<br />

considerable time and ef<strong>for</strong>t, but<br />

giving firefighters this type of real<br />

life experience is the best way <strong>for</strong><br />

the <strong>Crozet</strong> Volunteer Fire<br />

Department to prepare <strong>for</strong> a call<br />

that’s the real thing.


<strong>Crozet</strong> gazette AUGUST 2008 s page 11<br />

Did you know that …<br />

IT’S NOT JUST OUR COOKING<br />

THAT’S COOKIN’<br />

Saturday, August 2, 1 - 5 p.m.<br />

Wine tasting featuring mid-priced<br />

selections from South America, Australia<br />

and New Zealand. Music by Mary Gordon<br />

Hall and Billy Hunter. No cover.<br />

Gently Used Clothes <strong>for</strong><br />

Kids Help the Budget<br />

by Kathy Johnson<br />

Denise Harvey had an idea. As the mother of<br />

three young children (two girls and a boy) she<br />

knew how difficult it could be <strong>for</strong> a parent to find<br />

good, af<strong>for</strong>dable clothing. What if there was a<br />

way <strong>for</strong> parents to save on children’s clothing and<br />

equipment? What if she sold good quality, gently<br />

used items <strong>for</strong> parents on a budget? That’s how<br />

Little Blessings came to be.<br />

Located in the parking area next to the Afton<br />

Service Center on Route 151, Little Blessings<br />

could be a parent’s best friend. Not a consignment<br />

shop, Harvey said, “I buy them, then resell<br />

them. But they have to be good quality.”<br />

The clean and neat little store carries a nice<br />

assortment of neatly hanging infant and toddler<br />

clothing. Everything is well displayed and the<br />

shop is bright and well arranged, making it easier<br />

<strong>for</strong> a parent (or grandparent) to find what they<br />

are seeking.<br />

The shop is open from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. on<br />

Friday and Saturday and from 3 to 6 p.m. on<br />

Thursdays. “I know it’s hard <strong>for</strong> parents to get<br />

away sometimes,” Harvey said, so she added the<br />

late time on Thursdays to offer times a working<br />

mother or dad could use. The baby beds, playpens<br />

and toys all carry the well-known names of<br />

high-quality merchandise (Fisher Price, Little<br />

Tykes, Graco <strong>for</strong> example) with a much smaller<br />

price tag than when new.<br />

The store officially opened January 1, but as<br />

the economic times tighten Harvey has noticed<br />

growth in this small, woman-owned, business.<br />

“I see more and more new faces every week,”<br />

she says. And why not; children rarely wear out<br />

clothes. Sometimes they are passed along to family<br />

or friends, but with Little Blessings a family<br />

may be able to gain some income from the resale<br />

of good, usable children’s clothing and use that<br />

money to purchase the next sizes up.<br />

Those with good quality items they’d like to<br />

sell, can call Harvey <strong>for</strong> an appointment at (434)<br />

981-0320.<br />

Saturday, August 16, 1 - 5 p.m.<br />

Gabriele Rausse, the father of Virginia<br />

viticulture, will pour and discuss four<br />

selections from his own winery. Free<br />

samples from the store’s bakery and<br />

gourmet deli. No cover.<br />

Friday, August 29, 5 - 8 p.m.<br />

Reception <strong>for</strong> the noted landscape<br />

photographer Ben Greenberg<br />

(bengreenberg.com), whose art will<br />

hang in the store through mid-October.<br />

Includes a wine tasting, live music, and<br />

hors d’oeuvres. No cover.<br />

Every Sunday, 1:30 - 4 p.m.<br />

Acoustic jam featuring musicians from<br />

around these parts. Bring your favorite<br />

instrument and join in!<br />

Enjoy a Taste of<br />

Country Only<br />

Ten Minutes from<br />

the Big City<br />

Just past the intersection of<br />

Plank Road and Miller School Road<br />

(434) 823-4752<br />

<strong>Light</strong> Industial—continued from page 1<br />

encourage this.”<br />

Scottsville District Commissioner Linda<br />

Porterfield urged the commission to think about<br />

rezoning land near the southeast corner of the<br />

Route 250/Interstate 64 interchange at Pantops/<br />

Shadwell, which has a jumble of “old zonings,”<br />

she said, that might be better used now <strong>for</strong> light<br />

industry. Other commissioners were cool to the<br />

idea.<br />

“I’m looking <strong>for</strong> employment in the growth<br />

areas and I’m reluctant to commit to rezoning<br />

land and <strong>for</strong>eclosing it to other uses that might<br />

bring in jobs,” said Loach.<br />

During public comment, Morgan Butler from<br />

the Southern Environmental Law Center urged<br />

commissioners to “approach proposals like Mr.<br />

<strong>Yancey</strong>’s cautiously,” and instead to investigate<br />

possible changes in zoning ordinances.<br />

<strong>Crozet</strong> resident Mike Marshall suggested that<br />

planners consider rail access as strongly as interstate<br />

access and said that available LI land in<br />

<strong>Crozet</strong>, all of which has existing rail access, is still<br />

substantially unused. He also asked planners to<br />

define what is meant by “af<strong>for</strong>dable” land.<br />

“To me, ‘adjacent’ means sprawl,” said Strucko,<br />

trying to defend the growth area boundaries. “Mr.<br />

<strong>Yancey</strong>’s proposal goes against my principles. It<br />

would extend the <strong>Crozet</strong> growth area south of Rt.<br />

250. Obviously, I don’t agree with that.”<br />

Cannon agreed. “The underlying concept of<br />

the Comprehensive Plan is to prevent opening up<br />

more rural land <strong>for</strong> development.”<br />

“There is not a problem in the county that does<br />

not have a growth area solution,” asserted Loach.<br />

“The <strong>Yancey</strong> proposal should be taken up in the<br />

context of master planning. The community<br />

should have a say. We need more coming up from<br />

the growth areas [residents] and less coming down<br />

from above.”<br />

“I’m not convinced there is a need to expand<br />

the growth areas,” concurred Edgerton. “I think<br />

light industrial can be integrated in the growth<br />

areas in a sympathetic way.”<br />

Is there something you would<br />

like to share with us?<br />

Tell us about your<br />

weddings, special birthdays,<br />

birth announcements,<br />

engagements, or other<br />

special occasions<br />

<strong>for</strong> in<strong>for</strong>mation & rates contact<br />

Allie Pesch at the <strong>Gazette</strong><br />

ads@crozetgazette.com


page 12 s AUGUST 2008<br />

<strong>Crozet</strong> gazette<br />

Mt. Salem—continued from page 1<br />

outdoor lighting. They put up a<br />

church bell and a flag by the front<br />

steps. They planted flowers and<br />

cleaned up the yard and the cemetery<br />

where more than 50 graves bear<br />

the names of member families:<br />

Payne, <strong>Mills</strong>, Johnson, Waller,<br />

Morton, Frye, Sims, Massie, Walker,<br />

Adams, Wood. They saw to it that<br />

graves had flowers on them and that<br />

veterans’ had flags on theirs. They<br />

put picnic tables out <strong>for</strong> summer<br />

occasions and put a sign, embellished<br />

with an angel, at the intersection.<br />

The restrooms got fixed up.<br />

They added a clock, new curtains,<br />

ceiling fans and wall-to-wall carpeting<br />

to the church.<br />

Soon Pastor Colemon presided<br />

over the first wedding ever recorded<br />

at Mt. Salem when Bianca Jackson<br />

married James Horne Jr. The church<br />

was packed. An anniversary celebration<br />

was held marking 111 years,<br />

including a congratulatory proclamation<br />

from the Albemarle Board<br />

of Supervisors.<br />

Pastor Colemon always kept his<br />

guitar at hand, ready to play. He<br />

had a spiritual serenity about him.<br />

He was wise about God, impressing<br />

people with it. (When the movie<br />

Evan Almighty was being made in<br />

<strong>Crozet</strong>, Colemon, handsome and<br />

distinguished-looking, was picked<br />

to play a congressman and he met<br />

actor Morgan Freeman, who played<br />

God in the movie.) Other churches<br />

from across central Virginia came<br />

visiting at Mt. Salem. The church<br />

was roaring back to life.<br />

Then, last year, with the tangible<br />

features of his vision nearly realized<br />

(he lacked only the upholstered<br />

cushions in the pews), he died of<br />

skin cancer. A first spot had been<br />

cut away, but the significance of a<br />

second spot was not understood<br />

until it had insidiously invaded him.<br />

He fought until the treatments<br />

seemed worse than the disease. He<br />

always trusted God and he went on<br />

that way.<br />

Mt. Salem held a Family, Friends<br />

and Fellowship Day July 27 and<br />

they extended an invitation to all<br />

the souls in western Albemarle.<br />

They had held a similar celebration<br />

(and invited the community, too) in<br />

June, to mark the arrival of the<br />

refurbished, padded pews and both<br />

the legacy and the beginning, Pastor<br />

Colemon had left them.<br />

Raymond Moton, guitar in hand,<br />

and his family filled the small (8 by<br />

10 feet) choir loft. They led off with<br />

“We’re Going to Sit Down by the<br />

River.” They had come over from<br />

Gordonsville.<br />

“We’re having a good time<br />

already!” said Joyce Colemon, Paul’s<br />

widow, who carries the title missionary<br />

and who has taken up leadership,<br />

at least <strong>for</strong> the time being, of<br />

Mt. Salem Gospel Church (Pastor<br />

Colemon changed the name to<br />

mark the church’s more pentacostal<br />

style).<br />

Mary Colemon (Paul’s sister)<br />

answered the call <strong>for</strong> a testimony.<br />

She hadn’t always paid attention to<br />

God, she admitted. “I found there is<br />

not only a God—there’s Jesus. And<br />

we can’t reach God except through<br />

his son.” She thanked God <strong>for</strong><br />

everything she has, her family, her<br />

church. “Glory to God!”<br />

“God wants us to acknowledge<br />

him,” Colemon added. “It’s not up<br />

to us to question him.”<br />

Her text <strong>for</strong> the day was I<br />

Corinthians, chapter 12, verses 1-3,<br />

on the body of Christ and the need<br />

<strong>for</strong> unity in the church.<br />

The congregation was mainly<br />

women, all dressed in Sunday finery.<br />

Some were young. Some had<br />

belonged <strong>for</strong> 60 or 70 years. Sunday<br />

attendance can range from a dozen<br />

souls to 30.<br />

The Moton Family came back<br />

with “We Cry Holy, Holy, Holy Is<br />

the Lamb.”<br />

Above them on the sanctuary<br />

wall, the church’s theme from Psalm<br />

147 is announced in stick-on lettering:<br />

“When the praises go up, the<br />

blessings come down.”<br />

On the back of the sanctuary wall<br />

is a mural of Jesus’ baptism by St.<br />

John the Baptist in the Jordan River.<br />

A small Christian flag is on the left<br />

wall and a small American flag is on<br />

the right. A painting on silk of the<br />

Last Supper is next to it. Two vases<br />

of silk lilies and fern fronds flank<br />

the lectern directly behind the altar.<br />

On the altar, whose front rail is<br />

carved with the words “In<br />

Remembrance of Me,” a large Bible<br />

is held upright and open in a stand.<br />

Candles stand on either side of it. A<br />

brass chandelier is suspended above.<br />

continued on page 22


<strong>Crozet</strong> gazette AUGUST 2008 s page 13<br />

Our Dancers Per<strong>for</strong>mTM<br />

Albemarle Ballet Theatre<br />

Robert Garland Photographers<br />

Ballet, Jazz, & Modern Dance<br />

Register Now<br />

Come Take a Free Class<br />

Albemarle Ballet Theatre • 5798 Three Notched Road • <strong>Crozet</strong> VA 22932<br />

434.823.8888 • www.aBallet.org • Dance@aBallet.org<br />

Free class is limited 1 per person, is not transferable or redeemable <strong>for</strong> cash, and ABT students are ineligible.<br />

Copyright 2006 -2008 Nicole Hart & Albemarle Ballet Theatre, Inc. All rights reserved


page 14 s AUGUST 2008<br />

<strong>Crozet</strong> gazette<br />

By Dr. Robert C. Reiser<br />

A Tribute to Harvey Laub MD<br />

Harvey Laub, MD, passed away on July 11, 2008, at the age of 53. He<br />

was beloved not only by his family and friends but also by his patients.<br />

<strong>Crozet</strong> Family Medicine will not be the same without him. Harvey shared<br />

much of himself with his community, including this piece written <strong>for</strong> the<br />

<strong>Crozet</strong> <strong>Gazette</strong> not quite a year ago. Harvey’s humor and positive attitude<br />

were remarked on by all and are obvious in his writing. RCR<br />

<br />

<br />

Mt. Salem—continued from page 1<br />

Alexander Salomon, MD<br />

Board Certified in<br />

Internal Medicine<br />

Just a little cough … by Harvey Laub, MD<br />

My little cough started some time in early spring, not long after the jonquils<br />

bloomed and soon after our lovely <strong>Crozet</strong> was blanketed with its annual<br />

shower of pine pollen. As a busy family physician I was familiar with the<br />

faint wheeze I periodically experienced. As I did <strong>for</strong> all my patients, I created<br />

a mental list of all the possible causes. Chronic coughs, that is those lasting<br />

more than three weeks, can be caused by an array of maladies, some serious<br />

… and many not so serious. The more common causes include smoking,<br />

reflux (heartburn), asthma and allergies. Sometimes after a viral bronchitis, a<br />

bothersome cough may last <strong>for</strong> weeks. It isn’t at all unusual to diagnose a<br />

cough due to environmental exposures (dry wall dust, house dust, kerosene<br />

fumes, new carpets, and insulation). If a small, otherwise well child came to<br />

my office with a persistent cough and a nasty odor hovering about the head<br />

I was sure to find a <strong>for</strong>eign body (peas and peanuts are popular) lodged in a<br />

nostril or ear. My favorite kiddy cough is the so-called ‘social cough’ per<strong>for</strong>med<br />

by older infants and young toddlers who quickly learn they can get<br />

the immediate attention of their mother (or father) with a spunky little<br />

cough.<br />

Chronic coughs can also indicate a more serious condition like chronic<br />

obstructive pulmonary disease (chronic bronchitis and emphysema), pneumonia,<br />

pulmonary fibrosis (scarred lung tissue), sarcoidosis (an inflammatory<br />

condition affecting the lungs and other organs) and cancer.<br />

How does a person tell if he or she has a serious or not so serious chronic<br />

cough? First, be very careful about diagnosing yourself. In medical school I<br />

learned that ‘a physician who diagnoses himself has a fool as a doctor.’ Here<br />

are a few questions you can ask yourself to help decide whether you should<br />

see your doctor:<br />

1. Has your cough lasted more than 2-3 weeks?<br />

2. Does your cough produce excessive phlegm or blood?<br />

3. Are you wheezing or short winded?<br />

4. Are you having fevers or drenching night sweats?<br />

5. Are you excessively tired?<br />

If you answer yes to any of these questions, then it would be a good idea<br />

to get checked.<br />

So why did it take me six weeks to see a doctor? The astute women readers<br />

already know the reasons. But <strong>for</strong> the benefit of my caveman colleagues (yep,<br />

all you guys out there) let me delve into the male psyche a bit and try to<br />

explain why men would rather cut the grass or change the oil than see a doctor.<br />

An alarming number of men never go to the doctor and often minimize<br />

their symptoms. In one survey, 24 percent of men said they would wait as<br />

continued on page 19<br />

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<strong>Crozet</strong> gazette AUGUST 2008 s page 15<br />

The drought of 2007 is still fresh<br />

in our memories, not to mention<br />

several other dry years in the recent<br />

past. Although precipitation <strong>for</strong><br />

2008 has been running close to normal,<br />

you never know when some<br />

one is going to turn off the tap. So,<br />

it’s not a bad idea to look at some<br />

ways <strong>for</strong> us gardeners to deal with<br />

erratic rainfall.<br />

One of the most basic ways to<br />

address water in your garden is by<br />

improving the thing that retains it,<br />

that is, soil. To me, and I would<br />

guess to most gardeners, soil is the<br />

least sexy aspect of our craft. The<br />

mere mention of soil science and<br />

amendments is enough to put me to<br />

sleep. Nevertheless, bear with me <strong>for</strong><br />

a few minutes as we take a very brief<br />

look into the dirt.<br />

By Charles Kidder<br />

Dealing with Drought<br />

If you are either putting in a new<br />

bed or a whole new garden, that’s<br />

your golden opportunity to improve<br />

your soil. Bringing in loads of topsoil<br />

is the quick and dirty—pun<br />

intended—method of starting a new<br />

bed; however, it may not be the best<br />

course of action. You’ll achieve better<br />

results by incorporating organic<br />

matter and fertilizer into your existing<br />

soil. Granted, this is a major<br />

undertaking, requiring tilling in four<br />

inches of organic material into the<br />

top eight inches of soil. If you are<br />

seriously contemplating such a project,<br />

I suggest you take a look at Tracy<br />

DiSabato-Aust’s excellent book, The<br />

Well-Tended Perennial Garden.<br />

More realistically, most of us are<br />

just trying to improve the soil structure<br />

in our existing beds. Depending<br />

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Located in Afton near the<br />

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in an area ripe with vineyards and<br />

orchards, these 6.5 to almost 8-acre<br />

parcels command a bucolic view of<br />

the Blue Ridge in many directions.<br />

With good access off of Route 151<br />

(drive to be completed in 2009), these<br />

parcels have the location advantage<br />

of about a ten-minute drive to either<br />

<strong>Crozet</strong> or Waynesboro and easy<br />

access to I-64 <strong>for</strong> a quick run to<br />

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Sensible covenants protect your<br />

lifestyle and property value while still<br />

allowing <strong>for</strong> you to enjoy unfettered<br />

country living. There are only four of<br />

these parcels being offered <strong>for</strong> sale.<br />

This is the time to take advantage of this unique opportunity.<br />

Parcel 1—7.009 acres, $295,000 Parcel 2—6.555 acres, $295,000<br />

Parcel 5—6.93 acres, $250,000 Parcel 6—7.871 acres, $250,000<br />

877-826-7799<br />

434-823-7799<br />

The Shoppes of Clover Lawn<br />

Route 250 in <strong>Crozet</strong> across from<br />

Blue Ridge Builders Supply<br />

www.MountainAreaRealty.com<br />

on the present organic content of<br />

your soil—which can be revealed by<br />

a test—you should add one or two<br />

inches of compost to the surface<br />

every three years or so. Ideally, this<br />

should be scratched down into the<br />

soil, but this is tricky around existing<br />

plants, not to mention laborintensive.<br />

Mulch helps to retain soil moisture,<br />

and is best applied after the soil<br />

has warmed up a bit and is thoroughly<br />

moist. Too much mulch is<br />

not good, so avoid the tendency to<br />

add more just to freshen up its<br />

appearance. Three inches should be<br />

the maximum depth around woody<br />

plants, two inches around perennials.<br />

And in either case, the depth of<br />

mulch around the crown or trunk of<br />

the plant should be zero. Piling<br />

mulch there can lead to rot and<br />

death.<br />

So, how about that precious commodity,<br />

water? You’ve probably run<br />

across plant descriptions that say,<br />

“Once established, Plant XYZ is<br />

very drought-tolerant.” Take the first<br />

two words of that sentence to heart.<br />

You must be prepared to provide a<br />

reliable supply of water <strong>for</strong> the first<br />

season of a perennial’s growth, and<br />

ideally, two to three years <strong>for</strong> trees<br />

and shrubs. This means about one<br />

inch of water, either from the sky or<br />

from a hose, every week from spring<br />

through fall. And don’t trust your<br />

eyes to judge how much falls during<br />

a brief downpour. Put out a rain<br />

gauge, even if it’s just an old tunafish<br />

can. Just empty it once a week<br />

to prevent mosquito breeding.<br />

The one-inch-per-week rule is just<br />

a rough average <strong>for</strong> most plants, and<br />

is not meant to indicate the frequency<br />

of watering, only the<br />

amount. For the first month after<br />

plants are in the ground, keep a<br />

watchful eye on soil moisture.<br />

Absent significant rainfall, you may<br />

have to water every two or three<br />

days, especially <strong>for</strong> small plants.<br />

Apply water both near the plant’s<br />

crown and away from it in order to<br />

encourage the roots to spread outward.<br />

And deep watering will let the<br />

roots penetrate further into the soil.<br />

Everything I’ve said above applies<br />

to plants in the ground. As anybody<br />

who has grown plants in containers<br />

knows, they often require water once<br />

continued on page 25<br />

fine gardening services<br />

Garden Maintenance, Renovations, Hand Pruning,<br />

Spring and Fall Cleanups, Turf Renovation<br />

Annual contracts or per occurrence<br />

Fairly priced services provided by<br />

professional horticulturists<br />

Over 50 years combined experience<br />

Proudly serving our community<br />

since 1984<br />

Conveniently located in <strong>Crozet</strong><br />

Charles House 434.960.6221 • 434.977.2510


page 16 s AUGUST 2008<br />

IT Help Desk<br />

In<strong>for</strong>mation<br />

Upgrade<br />

By Mike Elliott<br />

High-speed<br />

Internet options,<br />

continued...<br />

Remember the last time you were<br />

left off the invitation list to a party<br />

that you really wanted to attend?<br />

What if that party was rocking every<br />

day of the year and you could hear<br />

it and see it but you were still left<br />

out? For most of us, it would be like<br />

rubbing salt in an open wound.<br />

I imagine that’s close to how most<br />

folks feel who are still unable to get<br />

adequate high-speed Internet access<br />

at their homes. It seems that every<br />

week I hear about a new website, a<br />

really funny video, or a not-to-bemissed<br />

web-based application that<br />

<strong>for</strong> all intents and purposes is offlimits<br />

to dial-up users. The modem<br />

connection they use simply can’t<br />

handle the bandwidth demands of<br />

the ever-growing library of rich<br />

media and advanced applications<br />

available to high-speed Internet<br />

users.<br />

In the last issue, I asked to hear<br />

from anyone who feels left out of<br />

the high-speed Internet access<br />

party—and I heard from you! The<br />

good news is that some of you have<br />

started using the cell phone carrier<br />

option I covered in that column<br />

with great success, albeit accompanied<br />

by a bit of sticker shock. And<br />

un<strong>for</strong>tunately, there are still a number<br />

of folks among our readership<br />

living in areas that appear to be outside<br />

the existing reach of regional<br />

carriers, leaving them with no reasonable<br />

options.<br />

Among those living through the<br />

dial-up nightmare are a number of<br />

our neighbors in Greenwood. I<br />

remember reading a Letter to the<br />

Editor about four issues back from<br />

resident David Booth who’s been in<br />

the throes of battle with service providers<br />

trying to persuade them to<br />

extend coverage to his area. They’ve<br />

seen states like West Virginia go the<br />

extra mile with state funding to provide<br />

statewide broadband coverage<br />

options through government-supported<br />

telephone company infrastructure<br />

upgrades. He’s working<br />

with a group of like-minded neighbors<br />

to enlist the support of anyone<br />

and everyone who will listen to their<br />

plight of inadequate rural-area<br />

Internet service options.<br />

I contacted Mr. Booth about the<br />

predicament they’re in, and he graciously<br />

shared his story. At this time,<br />

it appears that he and his concerned<br />

neighbors can only hold out hope<br />

that our state government will raise<br />

the bar with initiatives like they’ve<br />

seen in West Virginia to provide<br />

better coverage to all. While they<br />

wait on our legislators to take action,<br />

they’re crossing their fingers that the<br />

proliferation of cell tower installations<br />

will at some point provide<br />

adequate coverage.<br />

At the same time, I hope there’s<br />

some level of com<strong>for</strong>t he and others<br />

with “zero options” can take in<br />

knowing they’re not alone. Here in<br />

Virginia, the problem has garnered<br />

at least a cursory level of attention<br />

by our legislators, which has led to<br />

initiatives to assess the extent of the<br />

gap areas and at some point to begin<br />

filling them.<br />

The Commonwealth’s Broadband<br />

Roundtable is in the process of collecting<br />

data to document the “state<br />

of Broadband in Virginia.” They’re<br />

using a speed test program available<br />

at www.speedmatters.org/ to test<br />

and collect data speeds across rural<br />

and urban markets. Clearly, they’ll<br />

also identify gaps in coverage using<br />

this tool as well. Encourage as many<br />

people as you can to visit this site<br />

and take the test. You can find loads<br />

of in<strong>for</strong>mation covering on-going<br />

state ef<strong>for</strong>ts at www.otpba.vi.virginia.gov/broadband.shtml<br />

and a<br />

related site www.cit.org/broadband/.<br />

So what are the remaining<br />

options? A discussion with wireless<br />

expert and <strong>Crozet</strong> neighbor David<br />

Simpson indicates there are still<br />

more alternatives using outdoor elevated<br />

antennas and small-scale wireless<br />

amplifiers to boost cellular signal<br />

strength, among others. If I hear<br />

of any success stories using any of<br />

these technologies, I’ll happily<br />

report on them in a future column.<br />

And of course you can wait <strong>for</strong> LTE<br />

and WiMax deployment, but those<br />

long-range wireless technologies are<br />

likely a ways out <strong>for</strong> the rural areas<br />

that would benefit from them most<br />

and roll-out may be slow and possibly<br />

expensive.<br />

One other thought is if you have<br />

a portable computer, you could sit<br />

outside of Panera Bread at Barracks<br />

Rd. shopping center like I’m doing<br />

right now and “borrow” their wireless<br />

signal. They prefer you also eat<br />

there, and I’m often happy to oblige<br />

them when I need a solid Internet<br />

connection. Until you come up with<br />

a better alternative <strong>for</strong> your home,<br />

this might be the only way you get<br />

to see that super funny video on<br />

YouTube that your dial-up access<br />

chokes on. Using the SpeedMatters<br />

test, I’m clocked in at 383 kbps<br />

downstream and 372 kbps<br />

upstream—a very adequate connection<br />

speed satisfactory <strong>for</strong> most<br />

things I do. This is radically faster<br />

than the 26.4 kbps dial-up speed<br />

that Mr. Booth is struggling with at<br />

home.<br />

Although we must move on to<br />

new topics, I’ll try to give you<br />

updates on any evidence of progress<br />

I hear about on the broadband availability<br />

front. Next month, we’ll shift<br />

gears a bit and start talking about<br />

how to pick out a new computer<br />

and what factors should go into the<br />

decision-making process. If you<br />

have thoughts on this, I’d love to<br />

hear them. Send an email to mike@<br />

in<strong>for</strong>mationupgrade.com and I’ll do<br />

my very best to get back to you or<br />

include your topic in an upcoming<br />

article. It’s been great hearing from<br />

you. And as always, thanks <strong>for</strong> reading!<br />

On a side note, the hard drive in<br />

my main computer died shortly<br />

after the last issue went to press and<br />

although I had a good backup that<br />

<strong>Crozet</strong> gazette<br />

got me going again, I lost a week or<br />

two of email in the process. If you<br />

sent me something and didn’t get a<br />

response, please send it again. I’ll<br />

cover the topic of computer backup<br />

and recovery be<strong>for</strong>e too long—especially<br />

since I have recent first-hand<br />

experience of the horror that fills the<br />

pit of your soul as you realize your<br />

computer won’t wake up again …<br />

ever—unless you have a good<br />

backup.


<strong>Crozet</strong> gazette AUGUST 2008 s page 17<br />

Tempkin, Rule, and SMAC Dazzle at State Long Course Meet<br />

By Rob Rule<br />

<strong>Crozet</strong>’s Max Tempkin excelled <strong>for</strong> the<br />

Waynesboro YMCA Swim Team (SMAC)<br />

when it competed in the 2008 Long<br />

Course State Championships in Newport<br />

News July 24–27. Representing the<br />

Waynesboro YMCA Swim Team were<br />

Ethan Cohen, Norah Hunt, Jordan Miller,<br />

Brazil Rule, and Max Tempkin in the<br />

10-and-under division and Jessica Arnold,<br />

Anna Corley, Olivia Heeb, and Remedy<br />

Rule in the 11-12 year old division.<br />

Max Tempkin had first place finishes in<br />

the 50meter backstroke, 200m freestyle,<br />

and 50m freestyle. The young SMAC star<br />

placed second in the 200m Individual<br />

Medley, and fifth in the 100m butterfly.<br />

Tempkin set two Virginia meet records with<br />

a time of 34.45 in the 50m backstroke and<br />

30.18 in the 50m freestyle. Tempkin bested<br />

the meet record <strong>for</strong> the 50m freestyle held<br />

by David Walters since 1998. Walters is<br />

now part of the U.S. Olympic Team in<br />

Beijing. Tempkin’s backstroke time broke<br />

the SMAC team record by over three seconds—a<br />

record <strong>for</strong>merly held by current<br />

U.Va. swimmer and team captain Lee<br />

Robertson. His 200m freestyle time of<br />

2:27.52 broke a 25-year-old SMAC record<br />

by almost six seconds.<br />

Remedy Rule cleaned up in the 11-12<br />

year old girls division, breaking five SMAC<br />

records. Rule finished second in the 200m,<br />

100m and 50m freestyle, as well as in the<br />

100 and 50m backstroke. She came in third<br />

in the 400m free and 100m fly. Rule’s 200m<br />

free broke Waynesboro legend Melanie<br />

Mathews’ previous SMAC record by almost<br />

two seconds with an AAAA time of<br />

2:16.77. Rule and Jessica Arnold finished<br />

fourth and fifth in the 200m backstroke,<br />

both beating the previous SMAC record,<br />

which is now held by Rule at 2:38.94.<br />

Coach Ryan Sprang congratulating Max Tempkin on his first place medal<br />

<strong>for</strong> the 100 backstroke.<br />

Jessica Arnold, Anna Corley, and Remedy Rule relax between races at the<br />

Long Course State Championships in Newport News, VA.<br />

In other highlights, Ethan Cohen placed<br />

eighth in both the 200m free and 100m fly.<br />

Norah Hunt finished third in the 200m<br />

freestyle with a time of 2:32.82, earning an<br />

AAAA time and missing the SMAC record<br />

by less than half a second. In the 400m free,<br />

she finished second and earned another<br />

AAAA time standard. Jordan Miller finished<br />

15th in the 400m freestyle and placed<br />

17th in the 100 fly, earning an AA time.<br />

Brazil Rule dropped almost a second off her<br />

best time coming in 23rd in the 50m backstroke<br />

with a time of 42.12.<br />

Jessica Arnold and Anna Corley stayed<br />

close throughout the four-day meet, finishing<br />

sixth and seventh in the 200m freestyle,<br />

fifth and sixth in the 100m backstroke, and<br />

third and fifth in the 50m backstroke,<br />

respectively. Corley took sixth and Arnold<br />

ninth in the 200m IM, both recording<br />

AAA times. Olivia Heeb dropped an<br />

impressive two seconds in her 200m breaststroke<br />

to finish 11th and set a new SMAC<br />

record with her time of 3:12.46.<br />

Overall the SMAC Team dominated the<br />

small team division, almost doubling the<br />

score of its closest competitor. The team<br />

placed 11th in the state overall. Max<br />

Tempkin was the second highest scorer <strong>for</strong><br />

all of the boys at the meet, while Remedy<br />

Rule was the fifth highest scorer <strong>for</strong> all of<br />

the girls at the meet and the only person in<br />

the top ten at the lower end of her age<br />

bracket. The team did so well that five<br />

members have earned the honor of representing<br />

Virginia at the Northeast Zone<br />

Swim Meet to be held in Rockville,<br />

Maryland August 6–9. The five include<br />

Max Tempkin and Norah Hunt in the<br />

10-and-under division, and Remedy Rule,<br />

Jessica Arnold, and Anna Corley in the<br />

11-12 year old division.<br />

Al Reaser<br />

Automobile Sales Consultant<br />

Kiser Auto Sales Stuarts Draft, VA<br />

I provide a positive purchasing experience with:<br />

No haggle pricing<br />

A trusted small town dealer<br />

Fair trade-in value<br />

Respect and attention given to your wants and needs<br />

Let me find the EXACT late model<br />

vehicle YOU want.<br />

Phone: (434) 823-5711<br />

Cell: (434) 806-2049<br />

alreaser@gmail.com<br />

www.kiserautosales.com<br />

Want to shape the future of af<strong>for</strong>dable housing in <strong>Crozet</strong>?<br />

Take part in a unique opportunity to help<br />

design green, mixed income housing<br />

adjacent to downtown <strong>Crozet</strong><br />

Community Design Workshop II<br />

Saturday, August 23, 10 am - 4 pm<br />

<strong>Crozet</strong> United Methodist Church fellowship hall<br />

10 am site tour<br />

12 pm lunch<br />

12:30-4 pm interactive design session<br />

(Please join us <strong>for</strong> any part of the day)<br />

A joint partnership of Piedmont Housing Alliance and Charlottesville Community Design Center.<br />

For more in<strong>for</strong>mation, call 434.984.2232 or email info@cvilledesign.org.


page 18 s AUGUST 2008<br />

<strong>Crozet</strong> gazette<br />

Still Open and Really Not Sorry About It One Bit<br />

A new addition to the sign along Route 250<br />

<strong>for</strong> the Greenwood Motel, the last motel still<br />

open in <strong>Crozet</strong>, says it’s sorry to be surviving.<br />

Huh? What’s that about?<br />

The man who made the sign acknowledged<br />

making it, but refused to give his name. He<br />

refused to be photographed.<br />

Then he relented some and said he could be<br />

referred to as “Pauly.” He later added that his<br />

mother, Helen H. Lang, owned and operated the<br />

Greenwood Motel, which dates to 1954, from<br />

1961 until her death a few years ago and that he<br />

has worked there all that time.<br />

What’s the message behind the sign?<br />

“They [county officials] never worry about the<br />

real estate tax,” said Pauly, on the verge of a snarl.<br />

“But that what’s hurting us. They’re taxing us off<br />

our land.<br />

“I want to make it as difficult as I can <strong>for</strong> them.<br />

They are going to take over your land and put<br />

houses all over it. They’re hoping I’ll give up.<br />

They’re lighting their candles.”<br />

The motel was built by one Herman Stormer,<br />

who was connected with the Knickerbocker<br />

Company, the firm that started Acme Visible<br />

Records on Rt. 240. It opened under the name<br />

the E&S Motel (<strong>for</strong> Emily Stormer, Herman’s<br />

wife). It was next briefly owned by family named<br />

Jessup, then the Drosulhagens, and ever after it’s<br />

been providing a living <strong>for</strong> the Langs and now<br />

Pauly.<br />

There was a pony in the front yard <strong>for</strong> years,<br />

tethered to a stake, until it died in 1998 at age<br />

34. Now Pauly’s main companion is a gray and<br />

white cat named Sugar Plum.<br />

The motel has eight rooms <strong>for</strong> rent, all concealed<br />

from the road by a screen of shrubbery,<br />

and private quarters over the office. The rooms<br />

are spacious (16’ by 16’), clean and neat, with<br />

two double beds, wall-to-wall carpeting, and they<br />

have large tiled bathrooms. They were designed<br />

from the first <strong>for</strong> wheelchair access. The furnishings,<br />

vintage 1960s, are com<strong>for</strong>table. Pauly<br />

replaced all the windows in the motel not too<br />

many years ago. They have TVs, but no cable programming<br />

and no Internet service. (“I got off the<br />

Internet,” explained Pauly. “I got tired of it.”)<br />

Rooms go <strong>for</strong> $50 a night. He had a charming<br />

thank-you letter to show off from a young couple<br />

who stayed over the Fourth of July weekend.<br />

As <strong>for</strong> his neighbors across the road in Foxchase:<br />

“I hate that. It’s a mess. They don’t even look at<br />

us.<br />

“They’ve ruined a beautiful area and it’s all<br />

greed, greed, greed. They just want houses here.<br />

“It’s a bad situation here with taxes but it will<br />

get worse. Growth doesn’t help you because of the<br />

services you have to provide. If I ran the county<br />

nothing would go to waste. Nothing goes to waste<br />

around here.”<br />

The lettering on the new sign was salvaged<br />

from an old one knocked down by a storm. “I’ve<br />

had several reactions [to the new one]. That ‘sorry’<br />

got to them.”<br />

Pauly, who is virtually retired, is making every<br />

economy he can and his expenses aren’t large. His<br />

tax bill is the expense defying his ef<strong>for</strong>ts at thrift<br />

and security on his property.<br />

“They talk a lot about af<strong>for</strong>dable housing, but<br />

what we need is af<strong>for</strong>dable taxes,” he said with<br />

exasperation.<br />

<br />

Thinking About Moving?<br />

Let a <strong>Crozet</strong> Resident be Your Guide<br />

<br />

<br />

<br />

<br />

<br />

<br />

Annick Salomon<br />

REALTOR®<br />

(434)242-3674<br />

300 Preston Ave, Suite 500<br />

Charlottesville, VA 22902<br />

Each Office Independently Owned and Operated<br />

<br />

Licensed to Sell Real<br />

Estate in Virginia


<strong>Crozet</strong> gazette AUGUST 2008 s page 19<br />

Dr. Harvey Laub—continued from page 14<br />

long as possible be<strong>for</strong>e consulting a<br />

doctor despite having well-known<br />

warning signs; 17 percent said they<br />

would wait a week. This has proven<br />

fatal <strong>for</strong> many well-meaning guys,<br />

such as Darryl Kile, the St. Louis<br />

Cardinals pitcher, who complained<br />

of shoulder pain and weakness one<br />

week be<strong>for</strong>e he died of a heart attack<br />

at age 33. Half of all male migraine<br />

sufferers never consult a doctor<br />

about their pain, compared with less<br />

than a quarter of women sufferers.<br />

Psychologists have long been aware<br />

of male stereotypes emphasizing<br />

strength, control and stoicism. To<br />

many men, acknowledging pain or<br />

other symptoms is considered more<br />

a sign of weakness than an opportunity<br />

to promote health by diagnosing<br />

a treatable condition. Many men<br />

just feel they are too busy to see a<br />

doctor.<br />

In my 23-year career as a family<br />

doc, I can assure you that more than<br />

once a week a well-meaning male<br />

patient confided that the reason he<br />

came to see me is because his wife/<br />

mother/girlfriend made him! In my<br />

case, my astute nurse (Michele<br />

Snead LPN) and caring transcriptionist<br />

(Valerie Seal) put the pressure<br />

on. Un<strong>for</strong>tunately, my doctor<br />

had recently left town so I decided<br />

to get checked after returning from<br />

a three-day trip to Wallops Island<br />

where I helped chaperone Henley<br />

Middle School’s 7th grade science<br />

class at their annual field trip<br />

(encourage your kid to go—it’s an<br />

incredible experience).<br />

This is when my symptoms worsened.<br />

Now, in addition to the nagging<br />

cough, I experienced intense<br />

fatigue. Those of you who have had<br />

mononucleos’s know what I’m talking<br />

about.<br />

I returned home on Saturday and<br />

my life changed on Sunday. A chest<br />

X-ray showed I had pneumonia and<br />

a mass. One week later I had received<br />

my first in a series of chemotherapy<br />

treatments <strong>for</strong> Stage 4 lung cancer.<br />

Since that time I have been quite<br />

<strong>for</strong>tunate. My cancer is responding<br />

to treatment and my energy level<br />

has improved enough to resume<br />

enjoying and appreciating the miracle<br />

of life.<br />

Workers with Webb Incorporated, a horizontal drilling and tunneling<br />

firm from Richmond, installed a 24-inch steel pipe wide enough<br />

<strong>for</strong> a man to crawl through deep under the CSX railroad tracks and<br />

under Railroad Avenue in July. The 150-foot pipe, roughly connecting<br />

St. George Road to Blue Ridge Avenue, will improve service reliability,<br />

according to Dominion Virginia Power engineer Jeff Carter. “It’s to<br />

help keep the lights on. The area from <strong>Crozet</strong> to Afton is a high-outage<br />

area,” he said. This will allow us to restore power quickly. We can isolate<br />

an area and feed power from two different directions.”<br />

Fardowners—where local ingredients<br />

and a local vibe come together!<br />

Sunday Night Listening Series<br />

presents<br />

AN EVENING OF JAZZ WITH<br />

Bobby Read<br />

of Bruce Hornsby and the Noisemakers<br />

with special guests<br />

Bert Carlson, Brian Caputo, and Matt Hall<br />

Sunday, August 31, 6 - 9 pm<br />

Admission $10<br />

On The Square, Downtown <strong>Crozet</strong><br />

434.823.1300<br />

Mon - Thurs 11 am - 9 pm, Fri & Sat 11 am - 10 pm<br />

Sunday Brunch 11 am-3 pm<br />

Don’t miss our<br />

Acoustic Brunch<br />

Every Sunday<br />

11 - 3


page 20 s AUGUST 2008<br />

<strong>Crozet</strong> gazette<br />

<strong>Crozet</strong><br />

Scouting News<br />

Cub Scout Fall Sign-Up<br />

Meetings Set <strong>for</strong> August 28<br />

Boy Scouts of America is holding Cub Scout fall recruitment meetings <strong>for</strong><br />

first- through fifth-graders and their parents at local schools and churches<br />

August 28 at 7 p.m. BSA’s Cub Scout program allows boys to grow through<br />

a wide variety of activities like camping, fishing, hiking, archery, skits, songs,<br />

crafts, and more. Activities are used to achieve the aims of scouting: citizenship<br />

training, character development, and personal fitness.<br />

BSA also offers the year-round Boy Scout program <strong>for</strong> boys in grades 6<br />

through 12, as well as the Venturing program, a co-ed, high-adventure youth<br />

development program <strong>for</strong> young men and women aged 14-20.<br />

For more in<strong>for</strong>mation on the programs, contact Richard Bogan at (434)<br />

882-0611 or email him at monticello763@hotmail.com.<br />

Your Local<br />

Grocery Store<br />

Goodwin Creek<br />

Farm Market<br />

Delivering fresh<br />

bread, baguettes,<br />

dinner rolls—wild<br />

flower honey wheat<br />

and other varieties<br />

The Farm at Red Hill<br />

Tomatoes on the vine and other organicallygrown<br />

vegetables as available<br />

Gators Take Third at the<br />

JSL Championship Meet<br />

<strong>Crozet</strong> Gators Elsa Strickland,<br />

Lexi Campbell, Carly Witt and<br />

Maggie Rossberg (above, left to<br />

right) set a new Jefferson Swim<br />

League record in the 11-12 Girls<br />

200 meter freestyle relay at the JSL’s<br />

championship meet at U.Va.’s<br />

Athletic and Fitness Center July 24<br />

and 25. They swam it in 1:51:30.<br />

The <strong>for</strong>mer record was 1:52. The<br />

girls were recognized at the Gator’s<br />

team banquet July 26 along with<br />

the team’s other JSL award winners,<br />

parent volunteers and coaches. The<br />

Gators finished third among the<br />

league’s 16 teams, trailing the powerhouse<br />

Fairview Swim Team, the<br />

JSL’s traditional winner (1958<br />

points), and Boar’s Head Swim<br />

Team (1700.25 points) with<br />

1679.75 points.<br />

First-year head coach Mike<br />

Brown was given a CGST T-shirt<br />

with the title “Slurpy King” on it<br />

and keystone parent Cynthia<br />

Simpson was recognized as “the<br />

backbone of the Gators.”<br />

The all-volunteer-run JSL had<br />

more than 2,400 swimmers this year<br />

and the Gators, with 220 members,<br />

was the second largest team behind<br />

Fry’s Spring Beach Club.<br />

Halloway Sweet Corn as available<br />

Peaches from Henley’s Orchard<br />

Nectarines from<br />

Crown Orchard<br />

Twin Oaks Tofu<br />

Check out our expanded line of<br />

organic and natural products<br />

Introducing gluten-free items


<strong>Crozet</strong> gazette AUGUST 2008 s page 21<br />

de<br />

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ountainside “In Leadership we learned how to<br />

give SENIOR LIVING a proper presentation,”<br />

explained Maupin. “We talked<br />

about making eye contact with the<br />

audience, keeping a good pace in<br />

our speech, speaking loudly<br />

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“In CSI-2 I learned how to analyze<br />

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drops (with fake blood), how to<br />

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how to figure out what kind of tool<br />

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Samantha Maupin and Adeline Sandridge<br />

microscope. We learned what DNA<br />

fingerprints are and how to present<br />

our case in court. We worked on a<br />

case that was solved a few years ago.<br />

“I would like to do the program<br />

<strong>for</strong> middle school, if given the<br />

chance,” she added.<br />

“We learned a lot about being<br />

more responsible,” said Sandridge,<br />

“and how to be a great leader in<br />

your community, in your school,<br />

and anywhere you can to step up<br />

and help someone. It was also very<br />

worth the ef<strong>for</strong>t we put into raising<br />

money and it was an wonderful<br />

learning experience, overall.”<br />

To help pay their way, the girls<br />

wrote letters to local businesses,<br />

family and friends. Maupin helped<br />

Sandridge sell lettuce at the <strong>Crozet</strong><br />

Farmers Market and they baked all<br />

the goods <strong>for</strong> their bake sale. (“Mom<br />

washed the dishes <strong>for</strong> me,” Maupin<br />

said.) The bake sale raised over<br />

$200.<br />

“I wasn’t able to raise all of the<br />

money I needed <strong>for</strong> NYSP,” said<br />

Maupin. “But I tried to raise as<br />

much as I could. Part of being a<br />

leader is taking responsibility <strong>for</strong> the<br />

things you want to do.”<br />

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page 22 s AUGUST 2008<br />

Mt. Salem—continued from page 12<br />

The altar is flanked by Victorian–era<br />

wooden, straight-back chairs that go<br />

back to the origins of the building,<br />

which has about two dozen pews in<br />

it. The walls are paneled up to the<br />

window ledges and above that they<br />

are painted a fresh white. Across the<br />

ceiling space stretch two pairs of<br />

rods with turnbuckles that pull the<br />

old walls plumb. A space heater sits<br />

behind the piano and a flue with a<br />

thimble where a woodstove once sat<br />

has been closed off. On the piano<br />

sits a pitcher that reads: “Pouring<br />

out Blessings.” The atmosphere of<br />

the room is warm and com<strong>for</strong>table.<br />

Sounds in it are softened and clear<br />

and light takes on a cool, shady<br />

quality. It’s as homey as a family TV<br />

room.<br />

The Moton Family next sang<br />

“There’s a Praise Inside I Can’t Keep<br />

to Myself.” The congregation was<br />

clapping along. The church was<br />

using the National Baptist Hymnal,<br />

1977 edition, and many books had<br />

broken bindings that had allowed<br />

pages to drop out. Moton sang<br />

songs from a binder he had assembled.<br />

“If you don’t have praise <strong>for</strong> God<br />

on the inside, you can’t be beautiful<br />

on the outside,” Missionary<br />

Colemon said when the song was<br />

over. “We are truly blessed to be in<br />

the land of the living. God didn’t<br />

have to let us be here to see each<br />

other again.”<br />

Marva Eaves, the church clerk,<br />

made the announcements. The<br />

members of Mt. Salem church were<br />

invited to a homecoming at Mt.<br />

Carmel in Brown’s Cove on August<br />

12.<br />

Colemon, not being a pastor<br />

(though perhaps she might become<br />

one), next offered words of encouragement,<br />

rather than a sermon.<br />

“We’re not lacking here at Mt.<br />

Salem,” she said. “We’re not numerous.<br />

But wherever there are two or<br />

three gathered in His name ….” The<br />

crowd knew how to fill in the rest.<br />

“All we have to do is stay faithful.<br />

We are pressing <strong>for</strong>ward to keep<br />

these doors open.”<br />

She has recently returned from a<br />

trip to Rome. She wanted to see the<br />

holy city, as she called it, and tour<br />

the Vatican. She had encountered<br />

an elderly lady there in need of help<br />

and she had spent a lot of time with<br />

her. She felt God wanted her to<br />

extend that help. “We don’t know<br />

what God has in mind <strong>for</strong> us to do.<br />

We have to keep our hearts and<br />

minds open. When you give, God<br />

supplies your needs,” she reminded<br />

the crowd. True to her title,<br />

Missionary Colemon has also made<br />

a trip to Ghana in west Africa.<br />

“We are blessed,” she said. “We<br />

need to count our blessings. We<br />

need to keep leaning on Jesus.<br />

“Churches can burn you out,”<br />

she acknowledged. “You need to<br />

take time <strong>for</strong> family and friends and<br />

fellowship.”<br />

She came back to I Corinthians.<br />

The congregation had pulled out<br />

their Bibles, mainly large, leatherbound<br />

volumes with big print. They<br />

fell open as if exhausted from hard<br />

use. The gilt had been worn off the<br />

page edges by so much thumbing<br />

to find passages. Most had been carried<br />

in in tough zippered pouches.<br />

Some were plain and some had been<br />

embroidered.<br />

“Unity. Unity! That’s what we are<br />

here <strong>for</strong> today.”<br />

Mt. Salem is praying <strong>for</strong> a pastor,<br />

but she warned them to be patient<br />

and careful. “Many wolves will<br />

come in sheep’s clothing.” Pastor<br />

Colemon had worried about this.<br />

They don’t want someone whose<br />

real motive is just to secure a salary,<br />

someone who would take advantage<br />

of them and move on. “We are<br />

equipped here spiritually,” she reassured<br />

them. “We want a spirit-filled<br />

pastor. We believe in teaching. Bible<br />

study is not just <strong>for</strong> children. It’s <strong>for</strong><br />

everybody.”<br />

Still, she stressed hospitality. You<br />

<strong>Crozet</strong> gazette<br />

Mary Colemon, Bianca Horne (of Boston, MA), Joyce Colemon, Jon Colemon and Marva<br />

Eaves.<br />

never know who God will send your<br />

way, she said.<br />

“This church is going on because<br />

there is unity here,” said Raymond<br />

Moton, who visits lots of churches<br />

to play. “The devil will try to come<br />

in and cause division. Keep praying.”<br />

Then he and his family sang<br />

“Because of Who You Are, I Give<br />

<br />

<br />

<br />

<strong>Crozet</strong> Baptist Church<br />

5804 St. George Avenue 434-823-5171


<strong>Crozet</strong> gazette AUGUST 2008 s page 23<br />

Missionary Joyce Colemon<br />

You Glory” and “Work it Out,” one<br />

of his favorites, he said.<br />

“The devil always wants us to<br />

think things are not going to work<br />

out <strong>for</strong> us. Now God’s time is not<br />

our time, but he will work it out. In<br />

fact, it’s already worked out. We just<br />

have to wait.”<br />

Women, mainly, went <strong>for</strong>ward<br />

next and about 15 <strong>for</strong>med a circle<br />

near the altar. They held hands and<br />

prayed <strong>for</strong> their families and friends.<br />

“Stand in the gap,” urged Missionary<br />

Bereavements<br />

Colemon.<br />

Then the group dispersed outside<br />

to set up lunch. A small beach tent<br />

had been erected to protect the<br />

food. The six picnic tables placed in<br />

the shade of the grove were covered<br />

with white plastic and had cups<br />

with flower arrangements were<br />

placed at their centers. The fare<br />

included fried chicken, slow-cooked<br />

green beans, creamed corn, macaroni<br />

and cheese, collards, shrimp<br />

jambalaya, biscuits and cakes and<br />

Matthew Benjamin Thomas, 22 June 28, 2008<br />

Fred Massey Whiting, 81 June 29, 2008<br />

James Albert Tomlin, 61 July 1, 2008<br />

Mary Esther Couch, 82 July 4, 2008<br />

Frances Wickersham Hoffman, 97 July 3, 2008<br />

Nicholas Jerett Rogers, 23 July 3, 2008<br />

Lawrence D. Wingfield, 62 July 4, 2008<br />

Charlotte Mawyer Fisher, 59 July 6, 2008<br />

Dorothy Etta Gibson, 71 July 7, 2008<br />

Lucy Buck LeGrand, 99 July 7, 2008<br />

Helene Arlene Witt Fields, 79 July 9, 2008<br />

Elizabeth E. Smith, 71 July 7, 2008<br />

Carter Randolph Allen, 86 July 10, 2008<br />

Delaphine Bradshaw Norvelle, 87 July 11, 2008<br />

Agnes Nadine Shiflett, 82 July 10, 2008<br />

Harvey Morris Laub, 53 July 11, 2008<br />

Mabel Watts Matheny Hayslett, 87 July 12, 2008<br />

Charlie Ervin Johnson, 85 July 12, 2008<br />

Robert Samuel Reid July 12, 2008<br />

Daniel H. Cowan, 80 July 13, 2008<br />

Frances Lee Steppe, 71 July 19, 2008<br />

Maria Elena Casas Rainey, 55 July 21, 2008<br />

Henry David Walls, 85 July 18, 2008<br />

pies. There was plenty to go around<br />

and the meal was leisurely.<br />

Elder John Marshall (a title of<br />

respect reserved <strong>for</strong> pastors with<br />

proven preaching skills and spiritual<br />

sagacity), who leads the Free Union<br />

Gospel Church in Louisa County,<br />

arrived with some members of his<br />

congregation. When they had had a<br />

chance to eat, the evening service<br />

would begin. The practice of church<br />

congregations traveling to visit each<br />

other is referred to as “fellowship.”<br />

It is common among the churches<br />

in western Albemarle, including<br />

Piedmont Baptist in <strong>Yancey</strong> <strong>Mills</strong>,<br />

Mountain View in Batesville, Union<br />

Mission in <strong>Crozet</strong>, Mt. Zion in<br />

Newtown and Mt. Carmel in<br />

Brown’s Cove.<br />

Elder Marshall seems mild and<br />

serene—until he takes up his message.<br />

He wore a black collarless shirt<br />

under a neat camel-colored jacket<br />

that set off the modest, plain gold<br />

cross on a chain from his neck. For<br />

the evening service, the Moton family<br />

had taken places in the pews. The<br />

service started with songs as members<br />

of the Free Union church came<br />

<strong>for</strong>ward in front of the altar to sing,<br />

unaccompanied, as the spirit moved<br />

them. First came “All My Troubles<br />

Will Be Over Soon,” a rousing per<strong>for</strong>mance<br />

that produced a lot of<br />

clapping in the church.<br />

Then the microphone passed to<br />

the next volunteer, who wanted to<br />

sing “I Feel Like Going On.” “No<br />

matter what goes on in your life,<br />

you have to have a happy spirit,” she<br />

said to explain her choice. Cries of<br />

“Hallelujah! Hallelujah!” answered<br />

her from the pews when she finished.<br />

The microphone passed again:<br />

“Take My Hand, Precious Lord,<br />

And Lead Your Child On.”<br />

The congregation’s hearts were<br />

prepared <strong>for</strong> Elder Marshall and he<br />

assumed authority. Though the<br />

Church was not especially warm,<br />

some of the women had taken up<br />

small wooden-handled paper fans<br />

and were stirring breezes across their<br />

faces. Some wore delicate lace coverlets<br />

in their hair.<br />

“I can’t make it without Jesus,”<br />

Elder Marshall began. Then he<br />

advised his listeners: “Put away your<br />

things.” He meant give up any<br />

attachment to your possessions.<br />

Then he told a story, a sort of parable,<br />

about a man who slaps another.<br />

His moral was “whatever comes at<br />

you, write it in sand, so the wind<br />

will blow it away.” Let the injuries<br />

done to you leave your heart and<br />

mind, “and when it’s gone” (when<br />

God has lifted your suffering from<br />

you) “write it on stone so rain can’t<br />

wash it away.”<br />

He announced his text: Isaiah 43:<br />

10-13, part of which reads: “Be<strong>for</strong>e<br />

the day was, I am he.” Bibles were<br />

brought out to follow along. When<br />

the reader got to the line Elder<br />

Marshall wanted to stress, he<br />

stopped him. “Be<strong>for</strong>e the day was, I<br />

am he.” There is only one God was<br />

the point, and he ordained all reality.<br />

“I love the Lord and I won’t take<br />

it back,” said Elder Marshall<br />

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page 24 s AUGUST 2008<br />

<strong>Crozet</strong> gazette<br />

Mt. Salem—continued from page 23<br />

emphatically. “The devil didn’t want<br />

it to happen.”<br />

He began to preach. “You are<br />

healed from the inside outside. A<br />

doctor cuts you open to heal you.<br />

What happens on the outside is<br />

going to pass away. What happens<br />

on the inside could give you eternal<br />

life.<br />

“I’ve never seen a God like this,”<br />

he said as if amazed.<br />

“The things I used to do I can’t<br />

do no more because God has taken<br />

that away from me.”<br />

He talked about a man bound to<br />

alcohol. “AA can’t do nothing with<br />

him, but JC can get rid of it.” God<br />

is acting in situations where people<br />

are addicted to drugs, too, he said.<br />

Elder Marshall was an intense<br />

speaker with shifting cadences. He<br />

seemed to loom large. He gripped<br />

the attention of his audience. When<br />

he quickened the pace of his talk, he<br />

gradually raised the steely determination<br />

in his voice. Then he might<br />

pause. “Come on! Come on!”<br />

demanded those in the church.<br />

He asked <strong>for</strong> a hallelujah. He got<br />

what he wanted. “Thank you, Lord,<br />

<strong>for</strong> supplying my needs this day.”<br />

“This day, this day,” agreed the congregation,<br />

some of whom spontaneously<br />

stood up.<br />

“Sometimes you’re asking God<br />

<strong>for</strong> something and you already have<br />

it,” observed Elder Marshall, taking<br />

up a more conversational tone.<br />

“How many times have you said<br />

you don’t have anything to eat and<br />

there’s food in the cabinet? You’re<br />

missing it. Until we realize what we<br />

have, we’re missing it.<br />

“I’ve never seen a God like this,”<br />

he repeated, still seeming amazed.<br />

“It doesn’t take much to take<br />

what God has <strong>for</strong> you,” he advised<br />

the crowd. “Keep your hands open<br />

if you want something in them.”<br />

He shifted between calm, meditative<br />

talk, storytelling, and urgent,<br />

<strong>for</strong>ceful, insistent points. “I’ve never<br />

seen a God like this,” was his refrain.<br />

He commanded the room <strong>for</strong> more<br />

than an hour, but the time went by<br />

unnoticed.<br />

“When God is fighting your battle<br />

<strong>for</strong> you, all you have to do is<br />

stand still and watch it.” And the<br />

people were ready to give their battles<br />

over to God to win.<br />

Elder Marshall asked <strong>for</strong> any who<br />

might need it to approach the altar<br />

<strong>for</strong> prayer support. Several went <strong>for</strong>ward<br />

and a few of the congregation<br />

gathered around and placed their<br />

hands on each petitioner, who quietly<br />

expressed his or her need or<br />

anxiety. Singing began spontaneously.<br />

“Give them victory, Lord,” prayed<br />

Elder Marshall. “Give him whatever<br />

he needs, God.”<br />

People brought their injuries and<br />

worries and left them, at least partly,<br />

<strong>for</strong> Jesus to bear. The emotion they<br />

sat down with was not what they<br />

had stood up with.<br />

The faith of Mt. Salem church<br />

was manifest now and profound.<br />

“You can’t see the supernatural,”<br />

Elder Marshall had said, “but you<br />

can feel it.”<br />

The service was ending.<br />

Missionary Colemon made a concluding<br />

statement: “Our duty to<br />

God is to be obedient to his word.<br />

He has given each of us a mission.”<br />

The congregations parted, but as<br />

brothers and sisters and in unity.<br />

Ladies of Mt. Salem tidied up the<br />

church and put things in order.<br />

Everyone had their jobs to go to the<br />

next day and tasks still to do at<br />

home, but Sunday they had devoted<br />

to God at Mt. Salem.<br />

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brought to the empty building at<br />

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<strong>Crozet</strong> gazette AUGUST 2008 s page 25<br />

Summer Movies<br />

by Heidi Thorson<br />

Co-Owner<br />

Put a New Face<br />

on Your Garage<br />

One of the most popular<br />

home improvement projects<br />

is replacing the garage<br />

door. This project enables<br />

a homeowner to spruce up<br />

his or her home’s appearance<br />

and improve the<br />

garage’s utilization as a<br />

work/storage area. When<br />

selecting a new garage<br />

door, homeowners are<br />

advised to unify the style<br />

of the new door with the<br />

overall design of the house.<br />

It also pays to select a<br />

wood–composite material,<br />

which is made entirely of<br />

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only are wood-composite<br />

doors energy-efficient, they<br />

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even in extreme climates.<br />

Homeowners may also<br />

want to pay attention to<br />

garage organizing systems<br />

that improve functionality,<br />

whether the garage is used<br />

as a work area or a storage<br />

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Whether you’re looking <strong>for</strong><br />

everyday hardware supplies<br />

or large building supplies<br />

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find them at Blue Ridge<br />

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Home Center. We are<br />

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Across<br />

1. Built on ___<br />

5. Frequently<br />

8. Kind of spicy food<br />

12. Bush and Ingles-Wilder<br />

15. Spelling event<br />

16. * _____-E<br />

17. Precedes borealis<br />

18. Building wing<br />

19. ___ have to do<br />

20. What *’d answers are<br />

23. Opposite WSW<br />

24. Jokers<br />

28. Bug<br />

31. Garfunkel<br />

32. Put on<br />

33. Pretty rock<br />

34. Horse’s hello<br />

36. Dating couple<br />

38. Rational<br />

39. * With 40 Across, Meryll<br />

Streep’s current vehicle<br />

40. * See 39 Across<br />

41. * Kung Fu ___<br />

42. Much, 2 words<br />

43. Proceed<br />

44. Stranger<br />

45. Commandment number<br />

46. Screened<br />

47. Pitch<strong>for</strong>k-shaped letter<br />

49. Commercials<br />

50. Washes away<br />

52. Prohibit<br />

53. * Harrison Ford’s current character<br />

60. Inflation hedge<br />

63. Posess<br />

64. Tri-colored cat<br />

65. with 66 Across, Robert Downy<br />

Jr.’s currentcharacter<br />

66. See 65 Across<br />

67. The Dark ___<br />

68. Salamander<br />

69. Leaky inflatable raft sound<br />

70. Surprised interjections<br />

Drought—continued from page 15<br />

Down<br />

1. Hunk<br />

2. Anka<br />

3. French dough<br />

4. Bright, spongy shoe<br />

5. Fat<br />

6. Shrunken wool<br />

7. Ma Bell’s industry<br />

8. Precedes shout<br />

9. It may be tipped<br />

10. Entirely<br />

11. Sick<br />

13. Biblical boat<br />

14. Rattled weapon<br />

21. Exams one may take slowly<br />

22. Politicians do this <strong>for</strong> office<br />

25. Kampala’s country<br />

26. Was undecided<br />

27. Rubs wet paint<br />

28. Cell dweller<br />

29. Less imaginary<br />

30. Geisha garb<br />

31. Discovery sound<br />

32. Expressionless humor<br />

35. Clock standard: Abbr.<br />

37. Roof metal<br />

38. Unhappy<br />

41. Hawaiian porridge<br />

43. Truths<br />

46. Rooster’s girl<br />

48. Quick bite<br />

51. “Oh no, you ___!”<br />

52. Wedding announcements<br />

54. “___ a Teen-age Werewolf”<br />

55. Middle Brady sister<br />

56. Hodgepodge<br />

57. Near<br />

58. Canyon reply<br />

59. Drunks<br />

60. Sloe liquor<br />

61. It’s mined<br />

62. Feeling down<br />

solution on page 26<br />

Visit us at 5221 Rockfish<br />

Gap Turnpike, <strong>Crozet</strong>, or<br />

call 434-823-1387.<br />

HINT: To save money on<br />

electricity, select a new<br />

garage door with windows<br />

that allow sunlight in.<br />

Visit our website at:<br />

www.brbs.net<br />

a day, depending on exposure, soil<br />

and pot type, and variety of plant.<br />

Conventional sprinklers and<br />

automated irrigation systems are not<br />

the ideal ways to provide water to<br />

plants. Both lose a lot of water to<br />

evaporation and tend to have spotty<br />

coverage. The worst thing about<br />

automated irrigation systems: many<br />

dutifully pop up and spray every two<br />

or three days, regardless of the water<br />

needs of the plants. I’m sure you’ve<br />

seen some blithely doing their thing<br />

the day after a heavy rain. Utterly<br />

unconscionable.<br />

Either lugging a watering can or<br />

dragging a hose around your garden<br />

is arduous, but it gets the water to<br />

the plants that really need it. (Plus,<br />

it’s a notable deterrent to over-watering!)<br />

A shower-wand extension on<br />

your hose provides a gentle spray<br />

and also gives you an extra three feet<br />

of reach to get under the branches of<br />

shrubs. Give each plant a good dose;<br />

then move on to the next plant or<br />

two, returning to the first plant after<br />

the initial watering has had time to<br />

soak down.<br />

There are a couple of reasonable<br />

alternatives to hand watering. One<br />

is drip irrigation. This involves running<br />

a special hose through your<br />

beds, to which are attached smaller<br />

hoses with nibs. These trickle water<br />

on to the plant <strong>for</strong> an hour or two,<br />

allowing it all to soak in. Drip irri-<br />

continued on page 27


page 26 s AUGUST 2008<br />

<strong>Crozet</strong> gazette<br />

<strong>Crozet</strong><br />

Bookworms<br />

Dig Deeper<br />

Franklin, a character from the<br />

Franklin picture book series by Paulette<br />

Bourgeois, stopped by the <strong>Crozet</strong><br />

Library’s Summer Reading Wrap-Up<br />

Ice Cream Social July 28 to congratulate<br />

<strong>Crozet</strong> kids <strong>for</strong> doing such a fabulous<br />

job of reading through the summer.<br />

Ninety-seven teens and 445 children<br />

participated in the library’s<br />

Summer Reading clubs and together<br />

they read a whopping 8,405 books,<br />

according to <strong>Crozet</strong> librarian Wendy<br />

Saz. That’s 975 more than last year’s<br />

total of 7,430. And adults are reading<br />

more, too, she said. The number of circulation<br />

transactions in June alone was<br />

up 13.5 percent from last year.<br />

Ice cream treats <strong>for</strong> the event were<br />

provided by the Friends of the Library.<br />

CROZET<br />

BEAUTY SALON<br />

Mae Hazelwood - Owner<br />

Open Monday - Saturday<br />

Appointments encouraged. No credit cards.<br />

Full line of Paul Mitchell & Biolage Matrix<br />

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<strong>Crozet</strong> Shopping Center<br />

Solution to this month’s puzzle


<strong>Crozet</strong> gazette AUGUST 2008 s page 27<br />

Drought<br />

—continued from page 25<br />

gation is most practical <strong>for</strong> small<br />

plants and plants in containers; <strong>for</strong><br />

larger plants it would require a spaghetti<br />

maze of little hoses.<br />

Soaker hoses are much more commonly<br />

seen in home gardens. These<br />

hoses leak—by intent. They are<br />

porous and ooze a steady volume of<br />

water onto the soil. Like the drip<br />

system, very little water is lost to<br />

evaporation or runoff. (Sprinkler<br />

hoses are a little different from soakers.<br />

They lie flat on the ground and<br />

spray up and out to about a foot’s<br />

distance.) Soaker hoses can be buried<br />

just under the mulch if you don’t<br />

like to see black hoses snaking<br />

around your garden.<br />

One problem with doing that: it’s<br />

easy to <strong>for</strong>get the hose is there when<br />

you come along to dig a hole <strong>for</strong> a<br />

new plant. One whack with a shovel<br />

and soaker hose becomes gusher<br />

hose. Also, soaker hoses are probably<br />

easiest to use in the straight lines of a<br />

vegetable garden, less so in the more<br />

random pattern of an ornamental<br />

bed. Finally, in many applications<br />

that I’ve seen, way too little soaker<br />

hose is put down, so only a fraction<br />

of a larger plant’s roots are getting<br />

sufficient water.<br />

All this talk of hoses and soil left<br />

us no room to talk about some wonderful<br />

drought-tolerant plants! We’ll<br />

do that in the next column, just in<br />

time <strong>for</strong> fall planting. In the meantime,<br />

pray <strong>for</strong> rain!<br />

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For Sale: Nikon D70 Digital<br />

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4th of July Parade

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