Shenandoah Valley, Walker’s exploration to find a suitable place for westward expansion did not immediately result in a rapid increase in settlement. According to Kincaid, “The French and Indian War, soon to engulf the border, would halt for more than a decade the settlements advancing over the Appalachian divide from the Great Valley” (Kincaid 2005:52). A 1755 map titled “North America from the French of Mr D’Anville: Improved with the back settlements of Virginia Course of Ohio” (Figure 2) from the Boston Public Library Digital Commonwealth collection corroborates these written accounts through the clearly defined “Walkers Settlement 1750” along the “Cumberland or Shannomen’s River” as highlighted by the yellow star. During the French and Indian War, Robert Dinwiddie was succeeded by Jeffery Amherst as the Governor of Virginia in 1759 (McAnear 1950:196). Jeffery Amherst’s governing duties were carried out by his appointed Lieutenant Governor Francis Fauquier because Amherst was serving as general in the war. This left Lord Amherst free of obligation to the colonies (McAnear 1950:197). Following his death in 1768, Fauquier was succeeded as Lieutenant Governor by Norborne Berkeley (William and Mary Quarterly 1900). Governor Berkeley died in 1770, leading to the appointment of John Murray, the fourth Earl of Dunmore, as Governor of Virginia (Horne 1975:176). These rapid political changes made consistent regulation of the hundreds of westbound settlers difficult and allowed more settlers to move beyond the 1763 boundaries. The French and Indian War (1754-1763) resulted in Great Britain’s control of all land located east of the Mississippi River (Brown 1937:510). Following the end of the war, the British, who were unwilling to antagonize hostile Indians occupying the land surrounding the Ohio River, issued The Royal Proclamation of 1763 (Morgan 2007:131).
Bailey Beech Spring Boone’s Path Brick Store Cany Hollow Chandler Corinth Cox Crab Orchard Cum Bow Cynthia Delphi Douglas Dryden Ely Ewing Fritts Gibson’s Station Hunter’s Gap Jap Jonesville Long Field Oak Glen Oak Glen Pennington Gap Pridemore Rocky Station Rose Hill Slemp Stickleyville Tide Turkey Cove Van Walnut Hill White Shoals Yocum Station Zions Mills Adamant Caylor Comfort Delolisar Democrat Hagan Hagan Hubbard Springs Milt Nurseries Occonita Towell Figure 5 Postal Route Legend for Figures 5-8 (Adapted from Roeser 1891) Figure 6 1891 Post route Map of Lee County, Virginia (Roeser 1891) Figure 7 1891 Lee County: Post Route Map (Adapted from Roeser 1891)
Chapter 5: Results The primary data collected during this research was the ethnographic and survey information gathered in the field in Lee County during June 2015. The result of this research was the creation of a website dedicated to the history and heritage of the county: www.theleecountystory.com. This website was developed to provide the community with a heritage museum space without requiring the economic resources consumed by a physical museum building. Additionally, the website was created with community input and brings together organizations from Lee County in a virtual location. The results of both the field and web research indicate a correlation between the importance of material culture from the past, such as quilting, and the values placed on heritage in the community. Family and kinship were the primary themes of almost all of the interactions that took place during research for this thesis. Multi-generational knowledge, both shared among community members and taught to younger members, was listed as an important factor in Lee County heritage. The incorporation of local history, including family history, with community input, was revealed to be important to the county residents. Lack of time was a major factor in the low number of responses and interviews gathered during field research, but through follow-up communications, more information was collected. The creation of the website serves as an example of the
How important do you think local history is to your community on a scale of 1-5? Community Members: 3, 4, 4, 4, 4, 5, 5, 5, 5 Community Member Average Ranking: Mean: 4.33 Median: 4 Mode: 4, 5 Overall Average Ranking: Mean: 4.45 Median: 5 Mode: 5 Organizations: 5, 5 N/A How important do you think artifacts are to your community on a scale of 1-5? Community Members: 2, 4, 4, 4, 5, 5, 5, 5, 5 Community Member Average Ranking: Mean: 4.33 Median: 5 Mode: 5 Overall Average Ranking: Mean: 4.36 Median: 5 Mode: 5 Organizations: 4, 5 N/A ****Not Comparable only 8 responses*** How important do you think archaeology is to your community on a scale of 1-5? Community Members: 2, 3, 4, 4, 4, 4, 5, 5 N/A Overall Average Ranking: N/A Organizations: 2, 5 N/A The averages of the community responses to the local history and artifacts categories show that individuals ranked the artifacts to be equally as important as the local history. This is significant because there is a clear correlation between the importance of past material objects (artifacts) and the importance of local history. Local history is a category very much subjective to individual bias and can be thought of as a sub-category of heritage because of the lack of specificity in the question. The ties between heritage and material objects, as discussed in Chapter 3, are based on an
placed into several broad categories. The first open-ended question was “What is most important to you about the history of your community?” This particular question was asked only to the community members and not to the organizations, but yielded important information used to coordinate different aspects of the website. In response to what was most important about the history of their community, the first historical category that stood out was that of preservation, recording, teaching, and learning. Almost every response included some variation of learning about the area’s past, listening to stories about the area and what it used to be like in Lee County, or keeping records about the history of the area in order to pass it on to the next generation. The residents of the county (over varying time periods) was a common theme of the preservation, stories, and records thought to be important and this was expanded usually by the qualifier ‘how the people lived in the county’. Additionally, area distinctiveness closely followed the responses about past residents. This included statements as broad as, “Preserving the history that shaped this region” and as specific as “Indian heritage”. Specific histories were also mentioned, such as, “churches, and schools”. The second open-ended survey question was, “What historical resources do you think would be useful to others in your community?” and it was asked to both the organizations and the community members that participated in the survey. A complementary pattern between the first open-ended question and the second question was common. The history responses that listed preservation and then some part of local history expanded more specifically into what kind of resources could best preserve the history. For example, one participant in response to the first question stated, “The bridge from the past generation to the future generations” and then listed under resources,
1881 South-West Virginia Showing the Mineral Deposits of Iron, Coal, Zinc, Copper and Lead. Also, the Staples of the Various Counties Methods of Transportation, Access and Etc. John Wiley and Sons, New York. Brown, Ralph M. 1937 "A Sketch of the Early History of South-Western Virginia." The William and Mary Quarterly 17.4:501-513. Calloway, Colin G. 2007 The Shawnee and the War for America. The Penguin Library of American Indian History. The Penguin Group, New York. References Cited, continued Clinch-Powell Resource Conservation & Development Council 2015 Patterns by County. AQT Appalachian Quilt Trail. Electronic Web Directory. http://www.vacationaqt.com/. Accessed 25 July 2016. Cox, W. Eugene and Joyce Cox 2007 Keokee, Virginia: Origins of an Appalachian Coal Mining Community. Keokee High School Alumni Association, Inc. Johnson City, Tennessee. Deutsch, Eberhard P. 1967 The Constitutional Controversy Over the Louisiana Purchase. American Bar Association Journal 53(1): 50-57. Draper, Lyman C. 1998 The Life of Daniel Boone. Ed. Ted F. Blue.1st ed. Stackpole Books, Mechanicsburg, Pennsylvania. Friends of Wilderness Road State Park 2015 About Wilderness Road State Park. Friends of Wilderness Road State Park. Web. <http://www.friendsofwildernessroad.org/park.html> Gannett, Henry 1905 The Origin of Certain Place Names in the United States Bulletin (Geological Survey (U.S.))) Issue 258 of U.S. Geological survey. Bulletin. U.S. Government Printing Office: The University of Michigan 2007 Hagy, James W. 1967 The Frontier at Castle’s Woods, 1769-1786. The Virginia Magazine of History and Biography 75(4): 410-428. Harrison, Rodney.