Clarke County, Virginia

"Almost heaven, West Virginia, Blue Ridge Mountains, Shenandoah River" goes the song. The Blue Ridge and Shenandoah only touch the far eastern part of West Virginia.  Most of the river and mountains are in what people here call "that other Virginia, " usually with a sneer. Clarke County, Virginia is on the Shenandoah River and the Blue Ridge Mountains form the eastern border of the county, just south of Charles Town, West Virginia. Winchester, a much larger place, is 10 miles west of Berryville, Clarke County's seat, along I-81. I stayed in My Usual Chain just outside Winchester, in Frederick County.

The census now considers Clarke County part of the Washington, D.C. metropolitan area. It's more than sixty miles into Washington, but the county is along US 50, to Washington, and Virginia Route 7, to Arlington, just across the Potomac. It's possible to drive in a bit, then take Metro into town, or to one of the inner Virginia suburbs. With housing prices prohibitive to anyone on a normal government salary in Washington, it's not a surprise that people commute from so far away. Clarke County has limited development to near Berryville, the largest town, and  Boyce, the other incorporated place in the county.  Much of the county is still agricultural, with lots of the land protected as parks and open space. I saw newer garden apartments, townhouses, and large homes (with too many gables) near Berryville.

I left home just before nine A.M. Monday, August 13. It's 147 miles courthouse to courthouse, in my algorithm one night out. Berryville is mostly east and a bit south of Morgantown and the recommended route was to go to Cumberland, Maryland on the interstate, then take back roads through Paw Paw, West Virginia to near Winchester on US 522, then more back roads to Virginia Route 7, and Business 7 into town. I had been that way before and taken wrong turns, but this time I did it correctly and arrived at the old courthouse in Berryville just after noon.

There is a new government complex on the edge of town which includes a library. The old courthouse was built in the 1830s, then a porch and a cupola were added in the 1850s. In Virginia, it's obligatory to have a statue on the courthouse lawn honoring Confederate soldiers.

The historical society is down Main Street, and, although it was closed, like most of the town on a Monday, there was a kiosk outside with maps. The exhibit said that the county was settled first by planters who moved up the Shenandoah River, with large plantations growing food crops, the climate being too cool for cotton and tobacco. Slaves did most of the work, and the county population was nearly half African-American until early in the twentieth century. That population left for Washington and Baltimore for good jobs. I imagine they would work for the government in Washington and in factories in Baltimore.

Most of the  restaurants along the three block stretch of Main St. were closed, but a little Chinese restaurant was open. I ordered the chicken and broccoli, which came with fried rice. Pork fried rice. The server seemed surprised that I wouldn't eat that, and offered me a bowl of steamed rice. Two couples came in after me and she explained to them that all the meals came with pork fried rice. They were happy with that.

I saw political signs for Barbara Comstock and Jennifer Wexton. Comstock is the Republican incumbent in a district that goes from Winchester down to the DC line, and south to Manassas. She is considered vulnerable in this predominantly wealthy suburban D.C. district. Wexton is a liberal Democrat who beat out five other candidates in her primary. I didn't keep an exact count, but I'm guessing I saw more Comstock signs than Wexton signs. Clark County is the least populous and most rural part of this district. Comstock, according to Wikipedia, is a strong supporter of the current President, anti-immigrant, anti-choice and anti-gay. Her signs made me feel unwelcome.

I was upset with myself, because although I thought I remembered everything, I forgot a jacket (forecast was for rain) and hiking shoes, as I planned to hike a piece of the Appalachian trail, which runs along the eastern edge of the county in the Blue Ridge. I drove out there, and started to hike in my trendy black Converse shoes. It was overcast, and the forecast was rain, but I thought I might beat it. I only got five minutes in when the temperature suddenly dropped, the sky got much darker and a stiff breeze came up. I thought it would be wise to leave, and it started to pour just as I got to the car.

I drove back to Winchester to check out Apple Blossom Mall, and see exactly where the motel was. There is a multi-screen cinema in the mall, and I thought that if the rain continued, I would spend the evening there. They didn't have Spike Lee's mew movie, "Black KKKlansman",which is what I most want to see, but they did have Dinesh D'Souza's fascist propaganda piece (not to put too fine a point on it). I decided not to patronize that theater. I did stop at a gelato stand in the mall, not cheap at $5.00 a small cup, but good. I got to the motel just before the check-in time of 4 P.M. and although the clerk wasn't happy that I and two other parties were there early, she checked us in. I fell asleep not long after I got to the room.

Next door to the motel is a chain buffet restaurant. I had salad, a small piece of baked fish and some fruit... and fried chicken, onion rings and four or five desserts. I felt better. Back in the room, I listed the ten southernmost places in Clarke County and drove out to look for them. I had maybe an hour and a half before dark. I found White Post, a historic district famous for a white post that supposedly led to Lord Fairfax's country home. I never saw the post, and a few other country houses near there were either behind locked gates with "No Trespassing" or impossible to find. I got back to the room just after eight, as the sun was setting.

I didn't sleep that well (too much fried chicken?) and I had thought maybe I would just go home in the morning after my motel breakfast. There had been severe flooding in southern New York state and eastern Pennsylvania, and there was a prediction of bad storms in the afternoon in Morgantown Tuesday. But in the morning, it was clear, cool and sunny out, and I thought I should try to see more, especially in historic districts in Millwood and Boyce, southwest of Berryville.

My best find was Long Branch estate, with a house dating from 1831, designed by the owner with advice from Baltimore's Benjamin Henry Latrobe. The estate is now run as a museum by a charitable trust. The house was not open when I went by, but the grounds were. The views to the Blue Ridge are breathtaking. Nearby, in Millwood, is a historic district and a mill from 1785 built by General Daniel Morgan and Lieutenant Colonel Nathaniel Burwell.  The Burwell family owned Long Branch. I made it to Boyce, not far away, which is a more sprawling historic town along a railroad line.  I went back to Berryville to find Josephine City, really just a neighborhood built by and for freed slaves after the Civil War. There are three school buildings, "separate but equal," the first built in 1882, then two more buildings, the last, a high school from 1951, now converted to apartments for seniors. The oldest houses on Josephine St. are vacant and decaying, but there are some newer, modern houses there as well.

I stopped into a dollar store in the old American Legion Hall in Berryville, mostly to use the bathroom, but I also bought a snack, and the bath soap I usually use. There is a plaque on the doors saying that Patsy Cline had performed there.

I had one more place to visit, an estate at the far northwest end of the county. I wanted to be out of Clarke County by noon, then find a branch of that big sub shop chain nearby, and be on my way home. Typically for this trip, I couldn't find the place I was looking for, but i found the restaurant on the edge of Winchester just after 12 and had lunch. I was glad I had followed my plan and was ready to go at the time I wanted to be gone. I reached for my phone to message Joe what time to expect me, only the phone was gone. I checked the car, looked at the sub shop, including in the trash. Nothing. So I retraced my steps, about twelve miles back to the dollar store, and asked the cashier if she had found a phone. She had, in the bathroom. I offered a tip, which she wouldn't take. She only said I could take the survey on my receipt and give them a good review. I did that when I got home.

I called Joe at 1:20 and told him I was on my way. Of course, I stopped at WIllie's Ice Cream Stand as I was leaving Berryville for a home made ice cream sandwich. I followed Google's directions, hampered by a disabled truck in lane near Winchester, and street work in Cumberland. I  was home by 5:30.

Old Clarke County Court House 1832 and 1850

Confederate Monument, Court House lawn, probably early 20th century

Main St., Berryville

Park, Berryville

Along the Appalachian Trail east of Berryville

Long Branch Estate House, 1831

View form Long Branch east to the Blue Ridge

Millwood Commercial Historic District

Burwell-Morgan Mill, Millwood, c. 1785

Church building, Boyce

House in Boyce Historic District

Original Josephine School, 1880s

Josephine Technical School, 1930s

Segregated high school in Josephine, now apartments for seniors

Former American Legion Hall where Patsy Cline sang, and where I lost my phone in the bathroom, Berryville

Willie's Ice Cream Stand home-made chocolate chip ice cream sandwich

Cleveland- July 2018

My sister Robin couldn't get tickets to an art exhibit she really wanted to see in Washington, so she offered me and Joe an all-expense paid trip to Cleveland to see the same exhibit. I told her the week of the twenty-third was good because City Council was to meet the third, seventeenth and thirty-first of July, so I would be free. Only a majority of the Council voted to change the schedule to the tenth, twenty-fourth and thirty-first so people could go away over 4th of July. Last year, many of us rode bikes at Morgantown's 4th of July parade and I thought we might do that again. Anyway, we ended up in Toronto on July 4th.

I told Robin that Southern Airways had moved its Washington to Morgantown flight to Baltimore-Washington airport, the closest to my sister's house in Maryland. She flew to us Sunday, July 22nd, on one of the toy airplanes (eight seats total) that Southern runs, and it was generally a good experience. A good Morgantown airport joke was when Robin asked "Do you have to get the car?" and I said "It's right here." I had parked across the driveway in the airport, three steps from the door to the terminal.

Sunday was Tisha B'Av, a Jewish day of mourning and fasting, which Robin and I have never observed, but Joe does, so she and I partied with friends at Mark Brazaitis' house for his birthday and marking the end of the excellent West Virginia Writers Workshop, which I attended last year, but not this year. We adjourned to a Chinese restaurant for dinner. Joe could eat after dark, so we had snacks with him, and Robin and Joe played Scrabble.

We left Tuesday to drive to Cleveland, 203 miles to our hotel on the west side. My nephew's wife's grandmother, Nancy, lives in Akron, with her husband Russ, and on seeing that we were heading to Ohio, asked us to come and have dinner with them. We napped at the hotel, and agreed to meet them in Akron. They took us out to the restaurant in the hotel where Russ is a partner on the Cuyahoga River in Cuyahoga Falls. It's a beautiful place built right on the river. Nancy and Robin got a chance to talk about the newlyweds. Everyone else had drinks, so much hilarity ensued.

Wednesday was our day at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, on the waterfront, near downtown Cleveland. I knew a lot of stuff there, but it was interesting to see it all in one place, and of course my rock and roll memories predate your average American's by thirty or forty years. We spent a lot of time there. In the evening, we found a synagogue on the west side, and explored Birdtown, a now very mixed working class neighborhood full of ethnic churches, where all the streets are named for birds. We also discovered an old-time Jewish Deli, Rubin's, on the west side.  Robin had an inexpensive but enormous corned beef sandwich. We looked at the fancy houses on Lake Erie in Lakewood. Our guidebook said to catch the sunset from Lakewood Park. We were there about 8:55, ten minutes early, but couldn't find a parking spot.

We had tickets to the art exhibit, Yayoi Kusama's "Infinity Mirrors" at 1:15 Thuursday. We headed out in the morning to Cleveland Heights, a suburb east of Cleveland, once mostly Jewish, now mixed, but predominantly African-American. I wanted to see The Park Synagogue, opened in 1950 and designed by Erich Mendelssohn, a former teacher at Germany's Bauhaus School of Art in the 1920s and early 1930s, who fled to the United States. We found the synagogue after some searching, took a few pictures and were chased off by a security guard, who was upset that we were on the grounds. Park Synagogue is  affiliated Conservative, and they maintain this building and a newer one farther out in the suburbs. Most of the Reform synagogues (our movement) are in Beechwood, another few miles out. Only the Orthodox community has decided to stay in Cleveland Heights, where synagogues are on major streets allowing one to walk to them on Sabbath and holidays. We drove through that area, and also found a commercial historic district with banners honoring Harvey Pekar, a famous cartoonist from the area.

We were back at the museum before noon, just as well, as it was hot and humid outside. We had lunch in the museum, which is two buildings, one from 1909 in a classical style, and  a much more modern building of recent vintage.We ate salads in their cafeteria, and since our tickets were timed, we saw photos by Danny Lyons, about lower Manhattan being torn down for urban renewal in the 1960s, and an exhibit of William Morris fabrics and book illustrations, from the "Pre-Raphaelites," an anti-modern group of designers from the late nineteenth century.

Yayoi Kasama is a Japanese-born artist, active in Japan, New York and London. In her early days, in the 1960s, she painted people who went to demonstrations naked. I was disappointed that we couldn't get naked and be painted. The thrust of the exhibit was her "Infinity Mirrors," a series of boxes, maybe six by eight feet. Two or three people walk in, and they give you thirty seconds to look around before they pull you out.. There is a narrow walkway for a few people, and maybe two feet of sculptures on each side, and mirrors. It's amazing. I'll show you pictures at the end of this post.

We stopped at the gift shop on the way out, where Joe bought a polka dot Kasama mug, and we each got a tie, mine in a William Morris pattern, his in a Gustav Klimt pattern. We headed back to the motel before rush hour really kicked in, and napped.

Robin wanted to go to Tremont, an up-and-coming neighborhood of trendy restaurants and bars. We picked a restaurant called "Fahrenheit." I had my doubts, as they had valet parking for seven dollars. I parked two blocks away for free. That might have been a mistake, because, shortly after we decided to eat inside, it started to pour. Anyway, the food was delicious, not cheap, and the service was excellent. I ran back to get the car, and we planned to stop at a cake and ice cream store for dessert. That store was  just closing when we arrived, so we found another ice cream place and got carry-out cups .

We headed home Friday. Our hotel took Robin to the nearby airport, and Joe and I prepared to go. We were getting gas at the station next to the motel when Joe's phone rang. Robin's flight to Baltimore was cancelled because of a prediction of bad storms in Maryland. We picked her up at the airport and we all drove back to Morgantown without incident, stopping for lunch at Eat and Park in Franklin Park, north of Pittsburgh. Robin flew out on Southern from Morgantown Saturday.

We miss big cities now that we live in Morgantown. Cleveland has a bad reputation but we liked it there and may go back. Pittsburgh is closer to us and Washington is a very big deal, only getting to Washington involves driving over the mountains, which can be rough.

I travel to many places, often alone. It was great, for once, to have Joe and Robin with me.

At the Sheraton Suites- Akron, with Russ Fesler. That's the Cuyahoga River under the restaurant in the hotel.

At The Rock and Roll Hall Of Fame

The Hall Of Fame

In Birdtown, Lakewood

The first "Infinity Mirror." The three of us are the only ones in the box.

The modern side of the Cleveland Museum of Art. The balls are by Kasama.

Earlier Thursday at Park Synagogue in Cleveland Heights

Infinity Mirrors

Banners celebrating cartoonist Harvey Pekar, Cleveland Heights

Robin and Joe are "outside the box"