Editorial: Hometown pride, Why it matters

This is where Editor Mark Gillespie spent his childhood. It's important to give local graduates a reason to make their homes in Livingston County. Photo from the Wise County, Virginia Chamber of Commerce

GENESEO, NY — I grew up in a small coal-mining town called Wise, Va., a place I left behind and never looked back

Wise was home to 3,300 people at the top of the Appalachian plateau. The gorgeous distant views were marred by strip mines and the devastating practice of ‘mountaintop removal.’ The buildings along Main Street were black with dust thrown off by the massive coal trucks that trundled through town.

Mountaintop removal in Wise County, Va. Photo from Clean Energy VA. Click on thumbnail to see a larger image.

The fortunes of my parents and my friends’ parents rose and fell with the price of coal and the Wildcat union strikes that would periodically close the mines.

We were also the county seat and had a branch campus of the University of Virginia — both of which mitigated the ebb and flow of the coal industry. People with disposable income, however, prefered to spend their money in Kingsport, Tenn., 55 miles away.

Maybe, by settling in Livingston County, I’m asked to look back after all.

The community restoration project that Mount Morris causes me to put myself in the shoes of 17- and 18-year-olds who are preparing to graduate from high school.

Mount Morris High School from villageofmountmorris.com

What do they think of their hometown? Will they remember most the grand old homes, the state park nearby, or the absolutely wonderful sledding hills?

Or will they remember instead the blighted downtown, the crime, the shame of protracted economic recession?

Are they planning to stay in Mount Morris after high school, or return after college? Or are they, like I was, eager to flee for places with a little more shine and bustle.

I am encouraged to see the community memory project that the Mount Morris Central School and author Jessie Barth are putting together. Ten years into the 21st century, this book will show the world a community that values its past and optimistically realizes that its inherent strengths will carry it forward to a brighter future.

It reminds me of the Foxfire oral history series that recorded the traditions and stories of Appalachian culture starting in 1967 and continuing through the present.

Mount Morris is poised for rebirth.

No other community in the county has the combination of infrastructure, Letchworth State Park access, beautiful buildings, and vibrant history — native, early American and immigrant alike.

As an adult, I have begun to appreciate where I grew up. Wise County is the birthplace of actor George C. Scott and Glenn Roberts, inventor of the basketball jump shot. Nearby are the homesteads of bluegrass and country music pioneers Ralph Stanley and the Carter sisters.

But I realized this too late to benefit Wise. I’ve lived away from home for 23 years — paying tens of thousands of dollars in taxes to other states and municipalities and spending hundreds of thousands of dollars on goods and services elsewhere.

When I went back home almost two summers ago, I was amazed at how much the community had grown and become reconnected with its unique heritage. Indeed, a website has been established called returntoroots.org to encourage native sons and daughters to relocate.

But my roots have taken hold here. I won’t be going back.

I hope the efforts of the Mount Morris community will capture the imagination of its youth, and keep their lifetime of productivity and creative energy closer to home.