DOWN MEMORY LANE
Sept. 6, 1973
A movie filmed in Rappahannock County and intended to show a gentler, more solid view of American life, especially Southern American life, will have its “world premiere” Sept. 14-16 at the Sperryville fire hall. The idea for the film grew out of visits to friends in Rappahannock, and especially from a conversation with Chuck Perdue of Woodville. Perdue, who teaches a folklore course at the University of Virginia and has done extensive research on Rappahannock’s black community, focused on how “most people around the world, and even in this country, don’t have a good impression about Americans.”
An old hand-hewn log barn on the property of Mr. and Mrs. C. E. Johnson Jr. near Sperryville was destroyed by fire early Friday morning. The contents, all burned, included numerous apple picking ladders and apple bins, a truck and two antique wagons. About 20 apple trees were killed from the fire and heat. Arson is suspected in the barn fire and an investigation is being conducted by the fire marshal.
Joe Deal of Sperryville received the console stereo given away by Castleton Community Fire Company at the recent carnival the company sponsored. The lawn mower was won by C.W. Fannon Jr. of Castleton.
June 24, 1982
A mini tornado touched down in Huntly last Wednesday night just long enough to cut a swath of destruction at Cdr. and Mrs. A. R. Kreutz’s home. The winds uprooted 24 trees, including a white cherry that was the family’s “pride and joy,” three apple trees and a dozen locusts. The storm also interrupted electrica l service to the area for approximately 13 hours. Potomac Edison personnel were out cutting away tree limbs downed by the tornado until 4 a.m. Thursday morning.
Seven clocks have been donated by Mrs. Grace Sims in memory of her late husband Norman E. Sims. The clocks will be sold by closed bids on July 4 with the proceeds going t o Trinity Episcopal Church. The timepieces are all over 100 years old and have been partially restored by Eugene Tucker of Washington.
“It was a county mistake and the county’s obligated to correct it,” said Charles Estes in supporting a commercial rezoning for Luther Payne at last Wednesday’s planning commission public hearing. Zoning administrator David Konick told the commissions that it had been the intent, when the zoning ordinance was adopted in 1973, to designate Payne’s property as commercial. The parcel, located on U.S. 211 east of Washington, had been in commercial use for some time as the site of Payne’s garage. Instead, two adjoining lots where were (and still are) in residential use, were colored in commercial on the official zoning map that was adopted along with the ordinance. The error didn’t come to light, Konick continued, until the owner’s son, Reid Payne, recently applied to the Board of Zoning Appeals to open a pool and game room in the old garage, a use allowed by special permit in a general business-commercial zone.
May 5, 1993
The Board of Supervisors voted Monday to close the dumpster sites at Huntly and Scrabble and open another manned trash collection site somewhere between Washington and Sperryville. The motion also specified that the Scrabble site would be sold once the new site should be ready by October when the current trash hauling contract ends. Stonewall-Hawthorn district representative Robert Anderson voted against the motion because he said there is a group interested in another use for the Scrabble site, “and I hate to cut them off.” The supervisors put off until June voting on whether or not to enter into a contract with Fauquier County to landfill Rappahannock trash.
Two Rappahannock County High School students have been accepted into special governor’s schools this summer. Jessica Arnold, a rising junior, was accepted into the Governor’s School for the Gifted. She will be studying at the Medical College of Virginia at Virginia Commonwealth University in Richmond for six weeks this summer. Tracy Lynn Hitt, a rising senior, will be attending the Governor’s School for the Arts studying vocal music at the University of Richmond for four weeks. She is a soprano and had to win acceptance in a regional audition.