Rockbridge Vignettes

09/12/2026

09/11/2026

Twenty-five years ago I worked in an office a few doors east of Lower Broadway, 200 feet from the World Trade Center. I wasn’t there when the planes hit (8:46 a.m. was too early for me). But because of debris and the risk of further building failures, the city closed down the area for two weeks. In that period, we — by which I mean every single American — had no stronger friend than Canada.

09/10/2026

I-Hsiung Ju (1923-2012) landed in Lexington in 1969 at the age of 46 and in the seeming blink of an eye he became a once-in-a-generation legend. (In just his second year on campus he won the Ring-tum Phi award for outstanding teaching.) He taught painting, notably the ancient art of Chinese brush painting, which reflected his familiarity with poetry and philosophy. And he established the Art Farm on Maury River Road, where he taught brush painting and nurtured young artists. Now W&L is mounting a retrospective, “The Legacy of I-Hsiung Ju,” which will open next Friday, Sept. 18, and run for three months in the Gottwald Gallery of the Reeves Museum.

09/09/2026

In Glasgow, Dr. John Poindexter Cleveland, a surgeon who was also the town pharmacist, bought the house on the left on Fitzlee Street ion the aftermath of the boomlet of the 1890s. Also in the 1890s, another doctor, G. P. Paxton, built his own house nearby, and the picture on the right shows Dr. Paxton’s house as seen from the tower window of Dr. Cleveland’s house.

09/08/2026

September 8 would have been Pam Simpson’s 80th birthday. What an immeasurable loss to W&L students and to the community that she died early, at 65. Has W&L ever had a teacher more revered by squadrons of grateful students? A better model of a polished, energetic scholar? (University presses loved her. Minnesota, Tennessee and Virginia published her books, and they all remain in print.) At various times she ran each of our local historical organizations and was omnipresent in Lexington and Rockbridge civic life. Professionally, she was president of the Vernacular Architecture Forum, editor of the Southeastern College Art Review, and a board member of most of the other organizations that mattered. It was a life and career of immense consequence.

09/07/2026

Goshen, like Glasgow and Buena Vista (and to a lesser extent Lexington) had been caught up in the economic boom of 1890 that blazed up and came back down quick as a roman candle. By the new century, Goshen was back to its roots as a sleepy railroad crossing and farming village, but it there was enough activity to warrant a new school house. A frame school was built in 1916, next to the Goshen Presbyterian Church. It was replaced in 1933 by a new brick building, now the old town library. Goshen kids today take the bus to Fairfield Elementary or Rockbridge High.

09/06/2026

Dorothy Cannon was a Lexington schoolgirl who entered a story-writing contest conducted by a Baltimore magazine in 1922, when she was 12. She won! Her story told of a boy and girl named Lars and Mary who ran away from home to House Mountain, where they encountered a giant, who asked them to help him plan for a party. They invited everyone in Lexington and all “had a lovely time, and after it was all over they went home. And to this day, when you hear a rumbling of the clouds around House mountain, you may look up and see the clouds piling up. Then you know that the giant is making ice cream pudding and that he is getting ready for a party,” recounted the County News.