Sherryl Woods - A Small Town Love Story: Colonial Beach, Virginia

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

Ive had a lifetime to get to know the people of Colonial Beach, but never have I had more fun and met more characters than in the months when I was working on this book. I need to thank Kitty Norris, head librarian at the Cooper Branch of the Central Rappahannock Regional Library, who started me on this journey by mentioning that there were so many stories in town that needed to be recorded or written down. She provided endless assistance and cheerleading to get this job done, as did so many of the people youll meet in these pages: Ellie Caruthers, Jackie Curtis, Jessie Hall, Alberta Parkinson, Diana Pearson and Mary Virginia Stanford, who were always ready with a bit of town history, a new name for our ever-growing list of possible interviews and a whole lot of laughter. A special thanks to Frank A. Alger Jr., who recorded many of our sessions and created an oral history of Colonial Beach that will provide a lasting resource for those who come after us.

I couldnt possibly have gotten to everybody on our list, including some dear friends who are incredible storytellers in their own rightmy favorite electrician, William Hall, and his wife, Joyce, the Reverend Ron Okrasinski, longtime pastor of St. Marys Episcopal Church (whos so great at eulogies, residents often seek him out to do theirs no matter their denomination), Larry and Andrew Groves, who entertain me with stories on a regular basis, childhood friend Marge Owens and her mom, Mary Burnley Owens. Marge played Drifters basketball, and Mary Burnley worked for the Texaco distribution company owned by John Ware for many, many years. The list is endless.

Even though there are so many more with stories to tell, I hope this book captures at least the essence of what makes Colonial Beach so unique and special for me and for many of those I spoke to.

Even more, I hope it will resonate with many of you who long for a simpler lifestyle. Most of all, perhaps, I hope it will encourage you to talk to those in your family or in your town who have wonderful stories to share. Get them down before theyre lost.

In the meantime, welcome to my world.

AFTERWORD

So, there you have it, a little glimpse into my world and an introduction to just a few of the neighbors who make Colonial Beach, Virginia, into one of the most unique communities I could ever imagine living in. Some people are larger than life. Others are soft-spoken, but have made their presence felt in different ways.

There are those who enrich the lives of everyone around them with their community spirit of volunteering or giving, who quietly assist those in need or join together in times of trouble with an outpouring of support. This small community, some eighty miles from Washington, but filled with military veterans, rallied in an amazing way after 9-11, providing money and other assistance to those affected by that national tragedy. Members of St. Marys Episcopal Church took the train to New York to provide assistance in the heart of the disaster area.

Whether the suffering is large-scale or small, theres usually a neighbor willing to rush in and help.

After so many extraordinarily unique periods in the towns history, the evolution continues to determine exactly what identity Colonial Beach will have for the future. Way back when the towns fate was in the hands of lifelong locals like Boozie Denson and Gordon Hopkins, there was always a sense not only of who we could become, but who we had been. Todays town leaders, often come-heres, with no long-term roots in Colonial Beach, sometimes lose sight of the past and its importance or of the critical need to respect and preserve it, not only in our buildings, but in our values.

When I had my business, I operated with one major self-imposed rule (aside from good customer service), and that was to keep my nose out of local politics. I knew there was no quicker way to lose business than to take sides. But when town leaders in 2002 and 2003 were determined to sell prime waterfront property, including our town green, to a developer to build condos, I tossed that rule out the window.

Not only did I speak out and generate a petition against itand lost business in the processbut I worked with others to create yet another event to keep that town green and its stage as a vibrant centerpiece for town activities. Market Days, combined with the Bluemont concert series, was officially sponsored by a local Realtor, run by the Ladies Auxiliary of the Volunteer Fire Department, with all proceeds from the booth rentals going to support the fire department. It was a win-win-win for the Realtor, the fire department and the community.

Hurricane Isabel, which caused sufficient damage to scare off the developer, may have had more to do with saving the green than anything we did, but that event, which lasted a number of years, combined with the long-running Potomac River Festival, the annual Rod Run to the Beach, the newly created Bike Fest and other activities, have preserved the greenfor now, anywayfrom those who would replace it with privately owned waterfront condos and forever change the landscape along our prime, public waterfront.

There are so many more stories I could share from my past in Colonial Beach. There was the night my old gang went to see a Frankenstein movie at the Mayfair. The girls found it hysterically funny, which deeply offended the guys, so deeply, in fact, that one of them built a life-size replica of Frankenstein (Frankies hair was made from my friends grandmothers old fur piece) and planted him at my front door one very dark night. After that impressive introduction, Frankie accompanied us on many a prank during those teen years. His head lived in the back of a closet until just a few years back and even became part of my bookstores