Lohmann: Saving the old train station in Rural Retreat

The trains still rumble through town, sometimes more than a dozen times a day.

And the whistles still blow.

"You get used to it," said Jim Lloyd, the town's barber, who also is a professional musician and raconteur. "For a while, some engineer would come through at 4 o'clock in the morning, and he would hold (the whistle) wide open all the way through. I'd wake up and hear that. I got to checking, and the guy was going through a divorce, and his estranged wife was living in an apartment right on the tracks in the middle of town."

Though they still come through Rural Retreat, the trains have not stopped at the town's depot since the early 1970s.

The depot, constructed in 1866 after the original was burned during the Civil War, became a warehouse for agricultural supplies but eventually wasn't even used for that. As freight trains continued to pass by, the empty, boarded-up building fell further into disrepair. The town turned down a chance to acquire the depot years ago. A local resident obtained it and decided he would try to move it. In sections. Scott Mecimore and others stepped in as the sawing commenced.

"I think we need to save it," said Mecimore, a town councilman who owns Rural Retreat Winery, just up the street from the train station. "I really hope the public feels the same way. We've had some people say, 'Oh, it ain't worth fixing up. You shouldn't waste your money.'

"But this is an important piece of history. This is what built Rural Retreat."

Mecimore and others formed the Rural Retreat Depot Foundation, a nonprofit organization that struck a deal last fall to acquire the building and now must come up with $90,000 by October to complete it. If not, Mecimore will take out loans. Either way, the foundation will own the building and the land, which the railroad has donated.

So far, the foundation has raised only $4,500, though it's really just starting.

Rural Retreat is a town of 1,500, about 90 miles southwest of Roanoke along U.S. 11, the old Valley Road (and just off Interstate 81). For a time in the early 1900s, Rural Retreat thought of itself as the center of the cabbage universe. Now, it's more about livestock and dairy farming. In the late 1800s, Rural Retreat was home to a pharmacist named Dr. Charles T. Pepper, who may or may not — depending on which story you believe — have a connection to the origin of the Dr Pepper soft-drink.

Rural Retreat's train depot is like a lot of old stations in small towns. At one time, it was the heart of the town's bustle, a house of big doings in a quiet place, a dependable tether to the outside world carrying people and mail.

And the stories.

Mecimore and Lloyd, two of the foundation stalwarts, shared the local lore about soldiers aboard World War I troop trains tossing out packets containing their names and addresses and striking up correspondences with local girls they would later come back and marry, about the local physician summoned in an emergency to tend to the injured in a horrific 1903 train accident in Danville (the subject of the famed "Wreck of the Old 97" song) and hopping on the still-moving train at the depot and then shoveling coal on the way to the scene of the crash.

The depot gained lasting fame in 1957 when renowned railroad photographer O. Winston Link made a striking, black-and-white nighttime photo of the Birmingham Special steam engine at the station. Steam-powered passenger service ended on that line less than a week later.

"You can just feel the history in here," Mecimore said as he unlocked the door and we walked into the dark, dusty depot. "You walk into this building, and you can just imagine the people coming in and out of here.

"You just don't see buildings like this. The foundation is solid as a rock. It's got its own character."

Once the building is paid for, the renovation can begin. The idea is to make a combination museum and community center with space for musical events and farmers markets, Mecimore said. A new platform is planned so people can sit and watch the trains go by. "The depot is essential to the future of our downtown revitalization," said Michael James, the town manager. "It will be an historic centerpiece to downtown Rural Retreat. My hope is that the depot will become an attraction to get people to visit Rural Retreat and see what a great community it is."

Saving it from the saw and the moving truck was a good start.

Said Lloyd of the depot and its importance to the town, "This place would look awful empty without it."

----

Find out more

Rural Retreat Depot Foundation, P.O. Box 843, Rural Retreat, Va. 24368, or visit www.ruralretreatdepot.org