Evening star., 1952-08-31
Woodstock Settled
Before Revolutions:
Fought Over in SOS
By George Kennedy
Sfor Stuff Correspondent


heights of the Skyline drive, de-
Vides the Shenandoah Valley inI
two.
Woodstock, which is celebrat!ngl
its 200th anniversary in the first
week of october, lies in the farther
valley. The route to Woodstock is
SIS through Marshall and Front
Royal with a turn to the left on
No. II, the much-traveled valley
road.
It is neat. attractive county,
seat. The valley was fought over
and burned by the Yankees inl
the War Between the States.
It was settled by Germans from
Pennsylvania. Woodstock was
prosperous from the start.
BY the time OF the Revolution
1t had 900 inhabitants. It did not
grow fast from then on. At the
start of World War II it had about
twice that number.
Boom Since the War.
But Woodstock has experienced
something Of a boom since the
war-not from new industries, but
from the prosperity of the
countryside.
Any one who comes to Wood
stock for the bicentennial should
make it a point to motor up the
Fort Valley, which is in the Mas
Sanutten range, a wooded valley
within the larger valley of the
Shenandoah. You turn to the
left at Waterlick on the road from
Front Royal to Strasburg. At
every turn a small farm comes
into view.
The bicentennial will be cele-
brated on October 3 and 4. The
old families of Woodstock are
getting out treasured mementoes
of the past, muskets carried by the
9th Virginia Regiment, the Ger
man regiment of the Revolution,
and the sword grandfather wore
IN the Civil War.
Woodstock expects quite a
homecoming of native sons and
daughters for the celebration. One
thing is common among the ma
tives, they love their town.
Take Dan Burner, the chairman
Of the bicentennial. He lives in
the Oldest house in the town and
runs a profitable antique busi-
ness in a log cabin he brought
down from the mountain and re-
built next door. Dan, who is so,
was a merchandise man in some
big stores, Lord & Taylor's, New
York; Loeser's. Brooklyn. and
T. E. Eaton, Toronto. He came
back, started his business and
then left to become a lieutenant
colonel of the engineers during
the war. He almost regrets every
day he spent away from Wood.
stock. .H@
Jack Sperry, the No. 2 man
IN the bicentennial, came to
woodstock as a boy and has
hardly left it except for service in
France with the 28th Division in
World War I. Jack is SIS and we'll
to-do but lives modestly.
Drugstore Opened in 1924.
Woodstock has a drugstore thatl,
vas started in 1924. It's proprietor
today is doc" Joseph B. Clover.
The walls are lined with bottles
containing the ingredients Of the
old pharmacopedia.
Woodstock is especially proud OF
its new hospital. It is air-con-
ditioned and cost about 81 million.
Harold S. Vanderbilt, who owns
an estate in the county near
Mount Jackson, was a big con-
tributor.
Woodstock citizens are used to
having wealthy neighbors. Willis
Sharpe Kilmer. proprietor of a
popular patent medicine, had a
big place in the valley. His geld
ing, Exterminator, was once the
biggest money winner on Ameri-
can tracks.
The bicnetennary will celebrate
the first settlement of Woodstock
by Jacob Mueller, who came from
Pennsylvania with his wife and
six children in 1852.
Woodstock produced two gen.
erals for the Continental Army in
the Revolution. One was John
Sewer, who became Governor of
Tennessee after the war.
The other was the Rev. John
Peter Gabriel Muhlenberg, whose
dramatic call to arms will be re-
enacted in the coming pageant.
One Sunday in 1766, Mullen
berg preached a remarkable SER
mon at Woodstock. His text was
EccleSiastes, chapter 8:
ITO every thing there is a sea-
son. and a time for every purpose
under the heaven.
His congregation knew that
something dramatic was coming
as his sermon on the text built
up. But they were hardly pre-
pared for what happened. AS he
reached the crescendo the young
Lutheran minister shouted:
"The time to fight has come"
He threw back his black caSsock
and revealed himself In the buff
and blue uniform of a colonel in
the Continental Army.
After the war Gen. Muhlenberg
lived in Philadelphia and gave up
the pulpit for the political plat
form. He became United States
Senator. His statue and that of
Gov. Sewer are in the hall Of fame
in the Capitol in WASHINGTON.