by Perry Neel and Deona Landes Houff
photography by Woods Pierce

Jennie Amison believes.

She believes that because she’s recovered from drug and alcohol addiction, anyone can.

She believes that even after she got sober, God let her be arrested and sent to jail so she could learn one more lesson and be of further use in her work helping addicted ex-prisoners adjust to life on the outside and stay out of trouble.

She believes that releasing an imprisoned addict back to his or old neighborhood with  $25, no housing and no skills is setting that person up to fail and re-offend.

She believes that Gemeinschaft Home in Harrisonburg provides an answer with a six-month transition program that teaches life skills. She believes this even if the client didn’t come from here and could be one of Gemeinschaft’s failures, a Shenandoah Valley newcomer who commits crimes.

She believes that despite the recent gutting of what she’s worked for at Gemeinschaft, the program she’s transformed and run for 10 years will survive. State budget cuts of $1.5 million have meant staff layoffs and the sale of two of the program’s four transition houses.

 ”I feel like I’m sitting back watchin’ my momma die. This is a ministry for me. Something I truly, truly believe in,” Amison says. “I know we are going to win. I have that total committed faith, because I know what He can do.”

“He” is God. April 8 is the day Amison believes God will come through, when Gov. Tim Kaine announces if Gemeinschaft will receive the state funding it’s relied on for years, money that in recent months has been cut, restored and then hacked again from the strapped state budget.

Amison believes in victory. And if she is denied victory on April 8, she believes in re-invention.  After the budget dust settles, Gemeinschaft could shrink even more, serving fewer clients with shorter programs. It will be a shadow of its former self, perhaps all the way back to what it was at its 1986 beginnings: a modest program serving only local ex-offenders.

When the budget cuts were first announced, stress sent Amison to the hospital for two days. “I didn’t know that stress could do that to a body,” she says. But she claims to be fine now.

And she still believes.

…

Dec. 4 will mark the 20^th anniversary of Amison’s sobriety. Today she is 59, a grandmother, the executive director at Gemeinschaft, and an international expert on reentry. Some people in Harrisonburg might not want to hear what she has to say, but the United States Congress and the cities of St. Louis, Philadelphia, Pawtucket, Charleston (S.C) and Albuquerque have all listened, either to her testimony or her consulting. She’s shared her wisdom with 200 people in Tokyo and hosted a Japanese group who visited Gemeinschaft to learn from its success.

“I make it my business to let it be known that we have one of the most innovative programs in the nation,” she says of Gemeinschaft.

She did just that on March 11 before a U.S. House Appropriations subcommittee. With her dark skin, closely cropped blond hair and long polished fingernails, she was not the typical dark-suited white male CEO recently seen testifying before Congress.

“Reentry is not about the ex-offender,” she told the subcommittee. “It is about public safety and building community capacity. It is about improving communities through making ex-offenders contributing members. Reentry is about healthy and wholesome communities.”

Gemeinschaft board member Ruth Stoltzfus Jost of Harrisonburg attended the testimony. “One of Jennie’s strengths,” she says, “is that she’s dramatic and unforgettable. Whatever she does, you’re not gonna forget it.” Jost was amazed to find that Amison had lent West Virginian Congressman Alan Mollohan a book on reentry and that he’d returned it.

Jost says the book-lending is typical of Amison’s reach-and-touch ways. “She makes the connections,” Jost explains. “She jumps in, she knows who to call, she’s got contacts.”

Twenty years ago Amison’s contacts were less than desirable. She was a young mother in Norfolk with a drug and alcohol habit and a husband at sea. “He was sending me money, and I was going crazy,” she remembers.

Amison’s marriage to Craig survived,  she got sober and stayed that way. She enrolled in Norfolk State University and attended 12-step meetings, including ones every Tuesday at a local jail. She thought she understood the women in jail. Then she joined became one of them.

“I was sitting at my mom’s house waiting for my ride [to school] and the sheriff rode up,” she remembers of her 1991 arrest. Some bad check writing had caught up with her, and she got four days. “I did baby time. The funny part was I did mine after I got clean and sober.”

Four long nights of sleeping on the jail floor wasn’t funny at the time. But she firmly believes that as smart as she thought she was, God used jail for her benefit. “I needed one more thing. One more lesson,” she says. The lesson for her was that she needed to be more responsible and take care of life’s details. Sobriety was a great achievement, but she still didn’t have it together,  not if she was writing bad checks.

After college graduation, Amison worked for 10 years with the Department of Corrections as a transition specialist, helping inmates who were about to be released. “I saw prison becoming a revolving door,” she remembers. Inmates would go free and be back within six months. The stories were always the same: no housing, no job, no money and a lot of what Amison calls “babymommadrama.” She knew there had to be a better way, so she began to study and visit other programs.

“And me being a legend in my own mind, I decided I can do it better,” she remembers.

 … 

In Harrisonburg, the board at Gemeinschaft Home agreed with Amison’s self-assessment. Gemeinschaft - a German word meaning community - was founded in 1986 in Harrisonburg as a project to provide therapy, training and transitioning for local addicts who were being released from jail or prison. “We struggled,” remembers Bridgewater attorney Larry Hoover, who has been on and off the board for years. “We didn’t have a real core or clarity about the program.”

Hoover considers heading his greatest contribution to Gemeinschaft chairing the search committee that hired Amison nine years ago. She “helped to fully develop the potential of the program,” Hoover says.  It added sites, started serving women as well as men, took  ex-offenders from all over the state and according to James Madison University research has seen a 75 percent success rate - no arrests, convictions or recommittals - among its 650 graduates.  Virginia prisons see about 29 percent of inmates reincarcerated within 36 months of their release from prison. Gemeinschaft proves to be cheaper, too. Virginia prison costs at least $35,000 per inmate per year. Gemeinschaft costs $20,020 per resident per year.

All Gemeinschaft residents have a history of addiction and no record of violence. They must sign a binding contract to live by the Home’s rules and complete the program. The residents receive training in life skills, employment, financial management, community service, family relationships, and ethical and spiritual growth. Several have joined Amison as members of Lindale Mennonite Church.

At first Amison tried to sabotage any possible success in Harrisonburg. She had often referred paroling inmates to Gemeinschaft.  But she was reluctant to become its director. 

“I purposely came 30 minutes late [so the interview] so that they wouldn’t give me the job,” recalls the woman who had for a decade had taught prisoners to never arrive late to a job interview. “I didn’t want to leave the city and come up here to the country.”  Amison, the great believer, just couldn’t see herself happy in the Shenandoah Valley.  But a shabby resume and a weak interview were of no avail.  “God in his infinite wisdom wanted me here,” she says now.

The match was perfect.  Her background made her a natural with the former inmates and substance abusers.  “They’ve been so beaten down, that what they need is hope,” she says. 

She takes them into her office where the walls and desk are covered with awards and recognition. She tells them she’ll always be there for them. She proves it when they call at midnight about to backslide.

One former resident tells Amison her that every time he is about to screw up, her voice or face seems to pop up. “He’s stayed out of trouble all these years,” she says.

 …

Not all the residents stay out of trouble. In 2007, Harrisonburg State Sen. Mark Obenshain, Harrisonburg -Rockingham Commonwealth’s Attorney Marsha Garst and others went public with their opinions that  Gemeinschaft’s residents had brought too much trouble to the Valley. The Department of Corrections began making fewer referrals.

Then the great state budget cuts of  2008 hit. Last fall, Virginia announced it would cut all its $1 million in funding for Gemeinschaft. The General Assembly reinstated the money earlier this year, but it was cut in a conference committee just before the session ended.

Now funding is up to Gov. Kaine. Amison knows Kaine and he knows her (she’s an active Democrat), and she believes there’s hope. Once known as someone who would not take “no” for an answer, lately she had had to.  In mid March the City of Harrisonburg turned town her request for grant money. The program - the only one of its kind in Virginia, teh one she and her staff she built to national and international prominence - is in real trouble.

 ”Some people think I am crazy,” Amison acknowledges.  “But when you come from the pits of hell where I came from, you know only He [God] can bring you out.”  Right now the home is running only at about half capacity, 27 of 48 slots for men and seven of 14 slots for women are occupied.  Without state funding, Gemeinschaft will likely close its women’s program.

Not daunted, Amison says “one way or another, we are going to be open.” She is already taking referrals from District Courts for  a three-month, instead of six-month, program.

The shift is difficult and makes success more elusive. The referrals, who come straight from jail, are having DTs whereas people came out of prison clean and sober. “These people only get 90 days [to straighten out and] I ain’t never seen too much you can do with a drunk in 90 days,” she says.

Amison is also fearful about job opportunities for those referred from court.  “They can’t hold a job anyway because nobody has dealt with their issues, like anger, rejection, bad relationships.”  And many just aren’t mature yet.  “I keep getting them younger and younger.” 

Can the younger offenders in shorter programs get the message?  It  might be all Amison can do to instill some principles.  Two on her list: “There is no right way to do a wrong thing.” And “the mark of a man is what you do when nobody is watching.”  She knows she has taught that to the older ones.  But with them she has had more time and perhaps more open ears.

What she’d really like is for the prison program people to stick around longer.  If the program extended to a year, residents could use the time to pay court fines, child support, continue drug tests and group sessions while paying rent to Gemeinschaft, she says.

Meanwhile, she waits for April 8. At night she goes home to Craig, three of their five children, a granddaughter and a future daughter-in-law. And she prays.

Amison knows she can do most anything.  Her office is surrounded with reminders.  Among the awards, certifications and recognitions, there hang photos of her with President Barack Obama and Archbishop Desmond Tutu. Both were taken during the dignitaries’ visits to JMU when she approached them, introduced herself and made sure the moment was photographically recorded. Above her chair, signed by Gov. Kaine, is a framed letter restoring her voting rights, which she lost for writing those bad checks almost 20 years ago. She sought out Kaine at the JMU Obama rally last year just to be able to say, “Please don’t leave us out of the budget.” 

She believes that he believes in Gemeinschaft. “I’ve been calling everybody from here,” she says in her Harrisonburg office. “I’ve been calling Richmond, I’ve been calling Washington. It would really be a disaster to have to give up.” 

The General Assembly restored enough funding to keep the Commonwealth Center for Children and Adolescents open in Staunton.  A budget offered by Tim Kaine had called for the center’s closing. The Psychiatric Society of Virginia named Del. Chris Saxman (R-Staunton) “Legislator of the Year” for his efforts to keep the center open.

During an odd round of fighting over whether events bring people downtown or not, Waynesboro City Council voted down and then approved the Waynesboro Omnium, a bike race through downtown on Sunday, April 26. “For decades, Waynesboro has been troubled by an inability to see beyond the moment,” editorialized The News Virginian. Or to quote a real estate developer who tried to do business in Waynesboro last year, that city is “five or six funerals away” from being where it needs to be.

Minor panic ensued with a text message warning people to stay away from Wal-Mart because of a planned gang initiation made the rounds in Harrisonburg. Turns it the message was part of a hoax that started in Memphis in 2005.

Jennifer Schools Moore, 38, was arrested for obtaining a prescription by fraud and felony drug possession. The Harrisonburg dentist had been prescribing painkillers for a former employee but using the drugs herself. In a letter to patients, she confessed that she had not been serving on a mission in Chile for eight weeks as she’d said but rather been in drug rehab.

People fought and fought, but Augusta County stood by its property assessments. The county library refused to allow Augusta Citizens Against Unfair Assessments to place a petition in the county library because of a policy that that “no political candidate material, partisan political messages, petitions or similar ideas will be posted.”

Ralph Kiser, 89, died. He was an alumni of and long-time coach at Virginia School for the Deaf and Blind.

Jan Wampler, 49, of Weyers Cave died from diabetes complications. She was a former teacher at McGaheysville Elementary and 1987 Virginia Elementary Physical Education Teacher of the Year.

Fay G. Polhill, 74, a former nationally respected special education teacher in Staunton, died. She was also a church organist and pianist in Waynesboro.

Paul Jerman, 54, died in a fire at his Stuarts Draft home.

Lt. Col. Jeffrey White, 46, died from a burst aorta in church in Texas. He was a former ROTC professor at JMU and had been back from Iraq for three week.

Jennifer Bland, 26, died. She’d been paralyzed after being shot in 2000 in Harrisonburg. The suspect in her shooting, Jose Ramon Sastre-Cintron, has not been caught despite a broadcast on America’s Most Wanted.

Mike Wiseman, 51, was charged with the stabbing death of his roommate, Chuck Moore, 41, on West Beverley Street in Staunton. Police had visited the home several times before the murder.

The Buffalo Gap High School girls’ basketball team won its second straight state title. Girls’ teams from Robert E. Lee and Turner Ashby lost in the finals.

Ronnell Brandon, 18, was sentenced to 35 years in prison with all but 19 months suspended for selling prescription pain pills to his teammates on the Harrisonburg High School Football team in 2007.

Adam Greenbaum, owner of the Visulite Cinemas in Staunton, took over management of the Dixie Theater just down the street. His first order of business was to close for a few weeks and install new seats.

A car driven by an 11-year-old boy crashed in Crimora, sending four people to the hospital. The boy’s father, Michael Powell, 31, was among the injured.

Harrisonburg City Councilwoman Carolyn Frank aggravated many when she suggested closing the not-full Stone Spring Elementary School for a year or two to save money. Others appreciated her thinking outside the box. Regardless, it’s not gonna happen.

Authorities seized 34 sick horses in Waynesboro on land owned by Tory Allen Garrett of Afton.

Augusta Medical Center announced plans to hire three cardiologists thus ending an agreement that has University of Virginia cardiologists traveling to AMC every day to perform catherizations, stents and angioplasty.

Harrisonburg City Schools announced it was cutting 16 teaching and support positions to make up for budget woes.

Augusta County Schools decided to cut dozens of positions but not to cut indoor track, after a stirring hearing in which students testified to the sport’s meaning in their lives, as everyone who wants on the team gets on the team.

The Blue Ridge Area Food Bank Network announced that demand for food from the network was up 17 percent since July.

Apparently because Sen. Creigh Deeds (D-Hot Springs and running for governor) and Del. Chris Saxman (R-Staunton) couldn’t come to agreement on whom to name General District Court Judge for Staunton and Augusta County, this year’s General Assembly adjourned without naming a permanent judge. Nominated were Waynesboro attorney Lynn Lawson; Staunton Circuit Clerk of Court Tom Roberts; Staunton Commonwealth’s Attorney Ray Robertson and Staunton attorney Boyce Brannock, one of Saxman’s neighbors. The News Leader, meanwhile, pointed out that Brannock and his law firm of Timberlake, Smith, Thomas & Moses P.C. were sued in November for $1.4 million by three unhappy former clients.

Things went better in Harrisonburg and Rockingham courts where former Deputy Commonwealth’s Attorney Richard Claybrook was named the county’s General District Court judge and Harrisonburg attorney David O’Donnell was named juvenile and domestic relations court judge for the city and county.

The Augusta Regional Chamber of Commerce made the following awards: Citizen of the Year: Jim Perkins; Industry of the Year: NIBCO of Virginia Inc.; Agribusiness of the Year: Augusta County Farm Bureau; Sponsor of the Year: SunTrust Bank; Enterpreneur of the Year: Diane Clark with Blackhorn Academy in Fishersville; Tourism Business of the Year: Barren Ridge Vineyards; Ambassador of the Year: Seth Bokelman of Frontier Bank; Business of the Year: Augusta Medical Center; Citizen of the Year: Dr. James Perkins, outgoing president of Blue Ridge Community College.

The Virginia Department of Transportation proposed closing most of the rest stops on Interstate 81 and offices in Luray and Verona.  Citizens showed up in droves at a hearing to say this VDOT idea is a terrible one.

Bethany Lutheran Church, Valley Pastoral Counseling and St. John’s Episcopal Church were all robbed within a week in Waynesboro.

Andrew Max Eggman Jr., a former Mennonite missionary, was sentenced to 10 years in prison with all but two months suspended after entering an Alford plea to Rockingham County charges that he secretly filmed teen-aged relatives having sex with international students at Eastern Mennonite University.

Wayne Edward Gill, 39, of Stuarts Draft, was charged with paying for and filming a 17-year-old girl performing a sex act on him at Gill’s Auto Repair in Staunton. His brother owns the shop. The girl, a Robert E. Lee High School student, was trying to make money to pay off a drug debt.

Andrew Traylor, 14, who is home schooled in Augusta County, won the regional spelling bee in Charlottesville. Andrew Logsdon, 13, an eighth grader at Wilbur Pence Middle School in Dayton, won the regional spelling bee in Harrisonburg.

Plan 9 Records announced it was closing its Harrisonburg store by the end of March. LaDeDa also prepared to close its Harrisonburg shop.

Construction of the high-rise (well, high for downtown Harrisonburg) Urban Exchange condo and apartment development continued to amaze, especially since it’s a wooden, not steel, structure.

A Staunton physician accused of sexual battery in his office is named Charles Weisman. This column listed his first name wrong last month.

This month’s cover headline of “Tough Love” could not be more fitting. I have loved eightyone, and it’s been tough. I am so sorry that this will be our final issue. eightyone rarely made a profit, I never took a salary and in a recent weeks, our bank balances have been scarier then ever. We have hung in there a long time - well past the point of financial feasibility - and I am grateful to have been part of such perseverance. We will miss eightyone, and we will miss you, our readers.

After I announced our closure on March 18, readers swarmed me with grief and gratitude. Often at a funeral we wish the deceased were around to hear the love pouring from survivors. I got to experience that kind of appreciation without dying. It was heartening and a little heartbreaking. Thank you.

Now for some specific thanks:

Most of our advertisers are overworked small business owners with minimum ad budgets. I am grateful that they turned to us for help in spreading the word about their efforts and they shared in my belief that our readers are the Valley’s best customers. I hope you readers will continue to support small local businesses. They need us now more than ever. Thank you, advertisers.

Our members are my heroes. More than I can say, their encouragement kept me going. eightyone has closed before (in 2002) and when I brought it back in 2004, it was because I had a lot of financial and moral support from members. Never, ever doubt what a kind word and a few dollars did for my soul. Thank you, members.

If you never advertised or became a member and feel guilty about it, please stop. I’d be happy if you learned from eightyone’s closure not to take for granted the people and things that you love and if, in honor of our efforts, you gave a word of encouragement to someone who needs it, donated to a struggling (aren’t they all?) non-profit, or spent a little extra money at a small locally owned business.  Times are harder than many of us have ever seen, so just help someone if you can and leave the guilt to me.

I feel terrible that closing eightyone will mean financial and professional loss for our talented staff. To each of them, I owe huge thanks. I will list them in the order I met them. Thanks to:

• Assistant Editor/Publisher Perry Neel, who wrote the first cover story that signaled eightyone was like no other publication: “At Marino’s: Stories from Staunton’s Last Beer Joint” in December 1998. Since then, Perry, known to the rest of the world as a relentless cynic, has talked me out of quitting this paper more than once and in general been a valued colleague and friend. Thanks, Perry
• Photographer Woods Pierce, with whom I shared the most unforgettable reporting experience of my life, four amazing days in post-Katrina Mississippi. He was there for a lot of other memorable moments, too, but the Gulf Coast ones overpower the rest. Thanks, Woods.
• Art Director Kristen Ramsey, who gave eightyone its distinctive look. I cannot imagine having published eightyone all these years without her miraculous skills. She joined us in November 2000 and has done stellar work in every issue since, with beautiful editorial and advertising. More amazing, she has often achieved this with her small children hovering beside her computer. Thanks, Kristen.
• OrderUp Editor Kirsten Parmer, who joined us in 2006 and showed us all that food writing is more than menu recitation and notes on bad service. We saw a huge readership jump when we started publishing her fine work and we learned something every month. Thanks, Kirsten.
• Datebook Editor Roberta White Byerly, who transformed eightyone for Kristen Ramsey and me by taking over the editing and pagination of our extensive calendar pages. Roberta’s job references were the most sterling I’d ever heard. She lived up to each one. Thanks, Roberta.
• Web Master Laura Brennan, who put up with our non-techy ways and gave us a site that stands out for its neatness. She always got what I was saying. Not everyone does, so I really appreciated that. Thanks, Laura.
• Assistant Publisher Jason Grogan, who didn’t join us until November 2008. Had I not met Jason on Election Day, eightyone would have ended in December. His work made it possible for us to hang on for three additional issues. Our readers owe him big gratitude. Thanks, Jason.

Thanks also go to several freelance writers, including Nancy Bondurant Jones, Sonya Shaver, Bruce Dorries, Lauren McKinney and Jeremy Nafziger. Nancy wrote about history for us almost every month. Sonya and Bruce wrote cover stories that pulled in new readers. Lauren and Jeremy both wrote covers for eightyone just once but in stories that for many defined this paper. Lauren wrote in October 2000 about the 1950s bulldozing of an African American neighborhood in Harrisonburg. Jeremy wrote in June 2006 about what many saw as unfair prosecution of four Kurdish men who had immigrated to Harrisonburg.

Those kinds of stories - which we didn’t pull off every month but oh how sweet it was when we did - are what many will miss about eightyone. So I also thank everyone we ever interviewed or photographed. I have enormous respect for people willing to share their stories - not in attention-seeking, narcissistic ways, but in quiet living rooms and offices where it was just them, a reporter with a tape recorder and Woods. Thank you for trusting us with your stories.

I could write for pages more about the Shenandoah Valley and how it’s great and not-so-great and misunderstood and underestimated, but we go to print in two hours and I need to end.  I hope to bulk up our site in the next few months to include our entire archives, and if anyone out there is crazy enough to start a publication in this economic climate and increasingly digital age bless you, because the Valley needs you. I’ll give you an hour of free advice and war stories. After that, you’ll have to pay me. Pay … I like the sound of that. Find me through www.eightyone.info.

Peace and blessings to each of you,
Deona Landes Houff
Editor/Publisher

by Kirsten Parmer/kirstenparmer@gmail.com

I credit my parents for my love of food and words. In our house, we devoured both with equal gusto. My mother read aloud to us long past the age when it was really necessary. In the evenings, my brothers and I would curl up on the floor next to the kitchen, as her lyrical voice mixed with the smells of homemade bread, simple meals and freshly washed dishes. My father gobbled up The Washington Post every morning, reading interesting pieces of it to anyone in earshot, the scent of toast and strong, black coffee wafting through his words. There were lively dinner parties with interesting guests and free-flowing words. I could come up with dozens of meals from years past where I can vividly recall both what we ate and what we talked about. Food and words. Words and food. In our house they were inseparable.

So it’s really no surprise to me that being a food writer is one of the most fun jobs I’ve ever had. I have loved the task of tying together stories and food, regardless of its level of perfection, and finding a place for it in our local culinary repertoire. I love the way words can create texture and temperature or describe a taste or technique. It only seems fitting, then, that I give my final words to some of my favorite dishes and discoveries along the way.

I learned about the power of food. The Staunton Grocery-the best thing to happen to area dining in my time writing about it- taught me to fall in love with pork belly, sous vide short ribs with melted, carmelized fat as tasty as its tender meat, lemon verbena donuts and farmers markets. Chef Ian Boden and his staff taught me that how you cook can impact everything from how your body digests food to the prosperity of local agriculture, and can still move you to the core. A simple mustard-chive gnocchi dish at the Joshua Wilton House with earthy morel mushrooms, green olives, braised garlic and silky saffron butter sauce reminded me that even in relatively elemental dishes, perfectly balanced flavors have the power to take your breath away. That a paper bag full of tacos carnitas from the Tacos El Primo truck in Harrisonburg with salsa verde, diced onion, cool radishes and fresh cilantro have the power to transport you somewhere much more exotic than Reservoir Street.

I learned to love casual lunches with friends. The light crunch of battered cod in Cally’s fish tacos, combined with heat from cilantro and wasabi and sweet from black-eyed peas and mango, became a favorite. The Dave’s Taverna rooftop on a warm spring day and a pita cheesesteak with gooey melted cheese and hot peppers. Or the #6 at Cinnamon Bear with its warm, soft cheese roll, turkey, spinach and chipotle sauce. I adore the traditional Cuban media noche at Earth and Tea Café with thick sliced ham, slabs of Swiss cheese, and dill pickles. And the simply elegant brie, pear and honey sandwich with cracked pepper at Stone Soup Books in Waynesboro.

I learned that sometimes the company you eat with is as important as the food itself. I learned that most people will try anything once. I learned to laugh and enjoy every bite; to appreciate it for what it is and maybe even be a little less critical of it. I learned just how personal food is because each one of us ties it to our own memories and experiences.

One of my favorite quotes comes from Walter Wink and seems an appropriate way to end this column: “Give us a heart for simple things-love and laughter, bread and wine, tales and dreams.” I will miss sharing my meals with you. Keep eating local and keep eating well. 

Quick Bites

In Staunton, L’Italia has changed it’s name to Emilio’s. Belle Grae Inn is offering wine dinners on the second Thursday of each month. The Staunton Grocery held its first local producer dinner, highlighting Baker’s Farm heritage pork in all six courses-even dessert. Congratulations to the Bistro who is celebrating their 10th anniversary. Nick’s Italian Kitchen in Verona is now Little Maria’s. Worth the road trip is Devil’s Backbone Brewing Company in Nellysford. In Harrisonburg, Downtown 56 is no longer serving lunch. Dukerz Sports Grille opened behind the mall, and and Jack Brown’s Burger and Beer Joint will open downtown on Main Street this spring.

by Nancy Bondurant Jones/nbjrawley@aol.com 

Winter skies deceived this year.  Dark clouds quilted overhead often enough yet scant rain or snow resulted.  The summer drought had filtered through autumn and then marked winter as well.  Will April live up to its reputation of “showers to bring May flowers”-and ease water levels?  Then will Rockingham County’s amazing Tide Spring open its erratic flow into visibility above ground and overflow into a stream below? 

A tide spring is one of a few natural springs designated by their ebb and flow action.  I use the word “few” advisedly as only seven such springs have been recognized in Europe and eight in North America.  The one on Glen and Lois Showalter’s farm has drawn visitors for more than two centuries.  If one of those visitors was Thomas Jefferson is not clear; however, in 1787 he wrote friends in Europe about various natural phenomena in Virginia as well as the following in “Notes on Virginia:”

The mention of uncommon springs leads me to that of Syphon fountains.  There is one of these near the intersection of the Lord Fairfax’s boundary with the North Mountain, not far from Brock’s gap, on a stream of which is a grist-mill which grinds two bushels of grain at every flood of the spring.

Whether Jefferson’s comment is from personal observation or others’ commentary is not clear. What is clear is that visitors have long been enchanted by the mysterious flow.  Sunday school classes as well as families used to picnic there, and it became a romantic destination for couples courting.  However I missed the show when I visited the site last fall and waited about half an hour with no resulting bubble up and flow into the stream bed curving below on its 12-minute journey to confluence with Tide Spring Branch beside an adjacent field. 

Other visitors have been more patient as an account in the Rockingham Register for Oct. 29, 1885, described under the title “Tide Spring.”  The article reflects a usual show to share with out-of-town visitors:

Yesterday we had the pleasure of accompanying a couple of ladies from Chrisman, Edgar county, Ill., and their relative here to the Intermitting Spring on Jacob Mayes farm, near this place.  When we arrived at the Spring we found it entirely destitute of water, and the sand in the bottom of the cavity or springbed, was entirely dry.  The cavity is some ten feet in diameter and some three feet deep.

After waiting two hours, and using every exertion to revive the desponding patience of our visitors, the water began to creep up through the sands and gravels, to the great astonishment of our strangers.  In fifteen minutes the cavity was full to the brim of beautiful clear water and a stream rolling down the branch sufficient to turn a mill.  In about eight minutes it had stopped running out of the spring, and in some eight minutes more the remainder of the water in the spring had gone back down through the sand and gravel to find its way out of some lower opening…. This spring is evidently one of the greatest natural curiosities in America…Warm and Hot Spring, Niagara Falls, Natural Bridge, Blowing Cave, Garden of the Gods, and all the grand gorges of the Rockies not excepted.

Having been greatly impressed by visits to all the above except Blowing Cave, I will keep trying to find a time when Rockingham’s Tide Spring is likely to flow.  An article in Journal of Geological Education, 1990, v. 38 by retired JMU professor Jim Lehman details former studies as well as his own close investigative observation from mid-1982 to mid-1987.  His generous sharing of information for this article is much appreciated.  One point he emphasized was that local precipitation and seasonal changes profoundly influence the spring’s performance.

Lehman also recognized that due to a thick vegetative mantle that increases transpiration and evaporation, “it takes one and one-half times the monthly rainfall to keep the spring active in June-September as it does during the other months.”  His observations further concluded “The spring ran continuously on several occasions, but only when the area was thoroughly saturated after heavy rains or unusual snow melts.” Through a series of audio recording at shallow depths, Lehman’s study revealed too “the existence of an active underground pocket 55 meters from the spring opening.”

Jefferson’s descriptive term “Syphon fountain” is certainly more accurate a description than “Tide” chosen by local citizens comparing it to an ocean tide flow in and out.  This spring is a siphon-modern spelling-lifting water to the surface from an underground source.  Yes, the water does the impossible-it flows up hill. 

Thanks to current owners Glen and Lois Showalter who not only provided photos and past newspaper features plus guided me on my too-short tour, I have hope of witnessing this wonder after an April of serious rainfall.  In my imagination, I will share a view once enjoyed by Jefferson no matter where others stand. 

 

Directions to Tide Spring

From Harmony Square on Rt. 42 N in Harrisonburg continue north about 7 miles  to 784 which at that point is Kline’s Mill Road. Turn left onto the gravel road. After a half mile, you cross Linville Creek at a low water bridge.  About 1 mile beyond the bridge, you join Rt. 617, Woodland Church Road. Turn right and continue a quarter mile to cross a country bridge over Tide Spring Branch.  Immediately upon crossing the bridge, turn left on 784, now Tide Spring Rd. which becomes a one-lane tarmac for a half mile. Park along the road where tarmac ends.  The farm gate to the spring is to your left and there are no signs.  Line up the big silo and go 2 times further in the same general direction to the spring. Tide Spring is surrounded by dead limbs to discourage cows from entering the spring basin.  With good precipitation, Tide Spring flows regularly for about 10 minutes with flow starts every 50-55 minutes.

photo by Mackenzie Grimes/grimes26@gmail.com 

Penn Laird, October 2008

by Judy Gruen/judy@judygruen.com

Like a lunatic, I’ve frizzled away two days in fruitless search of a two-inch square blue receipt that proves that I paid ten bucks to park downtown for a business meeting seven months ago. Without this blasted tiny scrap of paper, I could still honestly claim the expense on my income tax statement, but I would live in fear that an IRS agent might knock on my door (probably when I have ugly green exfoliating sea kelp mask on my face) and challenge me to produce the receipt, or else find myself wearing a new pair of matching silver bracelets. Or worse, the discovery of my tax “discrepancy” might make someone decide to invite me to join the Obama administration, and during Congressional confirmation hearings, a pesky senator would unearth my secret and make me the new Treasury Secretary. Sorry, but I’m not taking any chances.

You might say that this is a conundrum of my own making. A more organized person wouldn’t have tossed business receipts helter-skelter in file folders, the kitchen junk drawer, or in one of my car’s 18 cup holders. But who among us is without filing sins, let her cast the first 1040 form! I am careful about filing important papers. Usually. But darned if many of these same documents fancy themselves as European workers: after only a few hours on the job, they saunter off for six weeks of paid leave in the Bahamas.

Tax preparation has become more painful than hemorrhoids. But what else can you expect? Even if you took every copy of the Gideon Bible ever printed in the known universe and laid them end to end, they would only cover Title 26, Subtitle E, Chapter 51, Subchapter H, Part 1, Section 5502 of the absurd, preposterously massive tax code. For the curious among you, this section deals with necessary applications to the government before commencing the business of manufacturing vinegar by the vaporizing process. I kid you not.

Once, a maverick senator floated the outlandish idea to “simplify” the tax code. He thought there was no earthly reason why the entire tax code couldn’t be a document that a normal human being might be able to read in only 15 years (with occasional bathroom breaks), instead of 30. This senator’s district was instantly gerrymandered, and he was never heard from again.

To understand our income tax system, we need to understand certain sophisticated terms including “gross income,” “alcohol fuel credit,” “depreciation,” and “American Samoa.” Well meaning people have tried to explain these terms to me numerous times but I still ended up befuddled and with a twitch in my left eyelid.

I once tried to calculate my own taxes following the instructions on the 1040-Not-So-E-Z Form, which went something like this:

“Enter taxable income from line 39.

Enter the smaller of line 16 or 17 of Schedule D.

Subtract line 21 from line 20 on your cousin’s Schedule R.

Enter the smaller of line 15 or line 23 if it is a full moon (but not less then zero).

Subtract line 28 from line 86 from your neighbor’s Schedule B.

Enter the larger amount from line 23 or line 45 if married and filing jointly, or married and filing a joint instead of a tax return because you figure the government had already messed with your head quite enough.”

Even if you are bold or crazy enough to try this at home, none of your arduous calculations will matter anyway. No matter how many brain cells you explode trying to figure it out, the fix is in, and the government will conclude that you owe them at least $10,000. They have no choice, since they are sending out checks to millions of Americans who pay no taxes, and heck, somebody has to cover that nut.

I’m giving my scavenger hunt for the blue receipt another two hours, and then I’ll turn it all over to the Lord and my accountant, who doubles as the Lord at this time of year. And then I’m going to pop a couple of migraine pills and lay down, relieved that it’s only another 11 months till I have to reenact this tragic-comedy all over again.

 Judy Gruen’s most recent book is “The Women’s Daily Irony Supplement.” She lives in Los Angeles.

by Perry Neel/skepticume@comcast.net
photography by Jason Grogan/groganjc@gmail.com

Shakespeare aside, the biggest theater to hit Staunton recently has been of the courthouse variety. In August, a jury watched three hours and 33 minutes of dirty movies in the city’s obscenity case against a local porn shop owner and his staff. Come November and on through winter, the apparent end of a 41-year-old murder mystery played out as the High’s Ice Cream killer confessed to the crimes, implicated a deceased police officer in a cover up and then died herself. Playing his role in each was Commonwealth’s Attorney Ray Robertson, a man who knows who he is and who he isn’t.

Who he is: A lifelong Democrat who has been elected nine times with minimal opposition in conservative Staunton. A champion of law and order. A protector of the state with compassion toward its offenders, especially young ones addicted to drugs. Married father of four. Native of Saint Louis, Virginian since childhood. Chess master. Hunter. Guitar picker. Cowboy movie collector. Author of two 2007 humor-laced books about his profession, “Tips and Tales: A Peek at the Criminal Law” and “More Tales from the Trenches.”

Who he isn’t: “Porn Man.”

Robertson, 66, was lampooned as such in Jim McCloskey’s News Leader editorial cartoons and mocked as worse on local blogs.  He can take the criticism - “I think it is misguided,” he says plainly - and is unshaken in his confidence.  With quiet defiance, he doesn’t care what people think of him.

He is not the white hat-wearing, slick prosecutor often portrayed on TV dramas.  He’s stubborn, sure, but not flashy. “I am charged with prosecuting the laws of the state,” he says simply. Case closed. 

“You don’t argue with people who buy their ink by the gallons,” Robertson says of his critics in the press. “Newspapers and magazines in general like to think themselves champions of the first amendment free speech.  I believe I am a champion of the first amendment, too.”

Robertson is clear that the first amendment does not protect obscenity. And in the case against Rick Krial, owner of After Hours Video, the jury agreed. Robertson argued against turning “Staunton, Virginia, into Las Vegas.” Krial and his corporation were fined a total of $2,500 and closed After Hours. Krial filed an appeal but later dropped it. He told The News Leader he spent about $150,000 on his defense.

Robertson knows that many deem obscenity a crime not worth prosecuting, if a crime at all. Even if porn is victimless and consensual, he says “there are 84 pages in that Code of Virginia that deals with crimes involving morals and decency.”  His job, he says, was and is to enforce the code. Simple as that.

“High profile cases are both draining and exhilarating,” Robertson says of the recent excitement.  “Your adrenalin gets flowing during big trials, enabling you to do your best. You really want to do well for the victims and their families, and you want to make the culprits pay for what they have done.  When it is over, you lay awake at night thinking about how you could have said this or that better, or why you didn’t think of a particular argument that you should have made.  In the end though, if you believe in your heart that you have done your part to the best of your ability, then you have to understand that judges and juries are part of the chain too.  They have much to say in determining outcomes.  Just do the best you can.”

 

…

 

Robertson has been a local prosecutor since 1971 when he went to work as an Augusta County assistant commonwealth’s attorney.  This November, he seeks his tenth term in the Staunton office and is unaware of any opposing candidates. “I’m not much of a politician,” he says shyly.  But he is well aware of the local political scene.  “I could never have been re-elected so many times without a lot of help from my Republican friends.”

He says he doesn’t keep statistics on his conviction rate. “Most cases end in convictions, as you might surmise, simply because the police do a good job and make my job easy. I am proud of one thing: I went 30 years before I ever had a conviction reversed on appeal.”

Robertson loves his $113,761-a-year job, which he describes as “putting the bad guys away and helping people in their hour of need.” As an undergrad at the University of Richmond, he debated all over the country and found that he liked thinking on his feet. The experience led him to study law at the University of Virginia.

A family tragedy provided the motivation. In 1962, during Robertson’s first year in college, a drunk driver killed his father. Always in the back of his mind was that if he went into law, he could do something about drunk driving.

“When I started practicing in ‘68,” he recalls, “everybody took jury trials on drunk driving cases.  Because you always get someone on the jury who’d say ‘There but for the grace of God go I’, and they’d acquit.”  Since that time many movements have converged over the issue.  Mothers Against Drunk Driving.  The use of designated drivers.  And the creation of Virginia Alcohol Safety Action Project (VASAP).  “I learned about ASAP from Indiana,” Robertson says.  He figured it could be done in Virginia so in the 1970s he traveled the state talking with judges and legislators.  His mission was to educate them on a better way to deal with drunks behind the wheel.

 ”Without getting caught and being forced to do something, [drunk drivers] don’t get around to helping themselves.”  Rather than simply locking up drunk drivers or taking away driving privileges, the point of VASAP, he says, is to help them deal with their drinking.  They get a heavy schedule of programs to attend with significant out-of-pocket expense. The purpose is to change behavior.

Robertson is convinced that VASAP has saved a lot of lives and sees it as his most significant work. “I helped write the first piece of legislation on that,” he beams. “It is one of my proudest achievements because it is a gift back to my Dad.”

Robertson also practices prosecutorial compassion toward drug addicts in Staunton’s “Drug Court,” a yearlong program structured around meetings with substance abuse counselors, probation officers and judges.  Defendants enrolled in the program must hold a job.

“We take [suspects] that are addicted to drugs [into Drug Court],” Robertson explains.  “We don’t help dealers, we just help addicts.”

“If they mess up while they are in [the program] you throw them in jail.  They agree to that at the start.”  What they get out of the deal is that they plead guilty but are not found guilty.  They end up with reduced or even dropped charges. 

“We’ve had a huge reduction in the recidivism for drug addicts,” Robertson says. “A prosecutor is beating his head against the wall if all he is trying to do is throw [addicts] in jail. It doesn’t help anybody, it doesn’t turn them around, it doesn’t make them confront what they’ve done.” 

He believes that jailing first-offender addicts is a waste of taxpayer money and does little to prevent crime. “What I’m all about is reducing the crime rate and crime prevention.  It would be a hell of a lot easier for me if these people didn’t do the same thing over and over again.”

Crime prevention needs to start early, Robertson says.  In the 1990s, he helped initiate the Blue Ridge Restorative Justice Program for juveniles in Staunton, Augusta, Waynesboro and Highland.  In Robertson’s mind, the punishment should fit the crime, which for a juvenile is trying to make him see the magnitude of his crime.  A panel of adult volunteers meets with the kid, and he or she sits down with the victim if the victim desires a meeting.  It is a face-to-face reality check.

The message, Robertson says, is “there are consequences for your actions. You are being held accountable.”  Juveniles must write a letter of apology to the victim or victims and complete community service.  If the juvenile successfully meets program requirements, charges are   reduced or dropped. Funding for the program has been cut, and Robertson is desperately hopeful that the program will not die altogether. “Start with kids,” he says, “and turn them around before they become bad adults.”

 

…

 

No doubt some would say that Robertson, with his concern for addicts and kids in trouble, is soft on crime and that the man who’s supposed to punish lawbreakers shouldn’t be working to keep them out of jail. That mindset doesn’t shake his resolve. Neither does the idea that “Porn Man” is a prude who wasted taxpayer time and money going after Rick Krial.

A porn history lesson is important for perspective, Robertson explains.  The U.S. Attorney Generals office has changed its enforcement policy over the last two decades.  Under President Clinton, Attorney General Janet Reno “made a policy decision to no longer go after obscenity, but to focus on child exploitation.” This was the same period of time that saw Internet pornography grow to a 12 billion dollar industry.  He also believes that the Mafia controls the porn industry.  In 2000 under President Bush’s Attorney General John Ashcroft, the Obscenity Task Force was resurrected.

Add to this that the courts have consistently ruled in favor of community standards.  This is the point he emphasized in the case.  “I look at my community and what my community is all about,” he says.  Staunton had never had such a business, he argued, so it was clear that this was not what the community desired.

Robertson cites a string of other issues related to pornography: the exploitation of women, the connection to sex offenders and pedophiles and the overall message of the movies, which is unprotected sex.  There is never any depiction of venereal disease or pregnancy.  “It undermines traditional values of monogamy and family relations.”  Robertson sums it up by quoting President Obama: “The young people should have a reverence for human sexuality.” 

“And I believe that,” he adds.

Press hasn’t been as biting about Robertson’s handling of the High’s murder case, which brackets his career. When he arrived in the area in 1968, the unsolved murder was only a year old and “still the talk of the town,” he recalls. He became Staunton’s prosecutor in 1973 and over the years dealt with rumors and leads.  Then out of the blue it was resolved, but not without some hitches. The investigator hired by the families of victims Carolyn Perry and Connie Hevener obtained a confession from Sharron Smith, but did not tape it.  Police sent a wired police investigator to Smith’s nursing home room, but she wouldn’t talk. Even a preacher could not get it out of her again.  “She told him she had made her peace with God and didn’t have to make peace with anybody else,” Robertson says.

What finally worked was the law.  Police Investigator Mike King dropped Robertson’s name, promising that the prosecutor wouldn’t send Smith to jail if she confessed, which she did on Nov. 28.  The families wanted Robertson to bring her to trial, but they did not want her have to serve any time.  “That is what worked,” Robertson says.

At the Wednesday, Dec. 10, press conference announcing Smith’s arrest, Robertson said she was so sick that she might not last the weekend. But she lingered, and Robertson scheduled a Jan. 7 hearing, only to cancel it because of Smith’s health. She died on Jan. 19. Four days later Robertson was part of another press conference, one that announced Smith’s proclaimed motive (revenge for being teased because she was a lesbian) and who she said hid the gun and covered the crime: Ray Robertson’s old friend, Davie Bocock, the original lead police detective on the case.

Staunton was spellbound, though not particularly surprised after months of rumor. Robertson was left to wonder about Bocock. He is troubled that the detective is deceased and cannot defend himself.  But he clearly believes in Bocock’s guilt.

“Why would she say that if it weren’t true, that’s the nagging question,” Robertson says. And why would Bocock cover for a killer?  “In his mind there must have been some reason to do it, he continues. “A special relationship with Sharron Smith?  Maybe she had something hanging over him.”

This part of the case may still be resolved.  Robertson never thought a possible murder weapon given to police on Jan. 23 was the right gun, and ballistics proved him correct. He believes the gun is buried at a camp Bocock rented. “We’ve got some ideas and we’re working on them and that is all I can tell you,” he says with typical quiet resolve. 

I thoroughly enjoyed the February article on cemeteries by Perry Neel. It reminded me of riding bikes with my kids to this abandoned little cemetery a couple of miles from our house back in Illinois.  The kids were always excited when we went there and I enjoyed sharing my anthropology major with them.  But then, that’s about all an anthropology degree is good for - not!  We enjoyed it, and it was educational as cemeteries bring together history (obviously), math (figuring out how old someone was when they died), art (we especially liked the lamb decorations), botany (this particular cemetery was pretty overrun with wild roses which were beautiful and fragrant), and compassion (we always had a silent moment when it was evident a small child had died).  Thanks for reminding me of this memory.  I may have to go find myself an abandoned cemetery this weekend.

Connie Medaris
Waynesboro

I read the article, “Set in Stone” with interest, since I’ve always enjoyed reading what’s on tombstones. In the Woodbine Cemetery near my work I found these words about a man I’ll call “John Smith” inscribed on the large granite slab covering his grave:

“John Smith,
A man eminently distinguished
by the clearness and accuracy
of his intellect,
by diligence, by patience,
by firmness, by love of truth,
by rigid uprightness,
by unostentatious piety,
by the serenity of his temper
and by the benevolence of his heart.”

Modesty wasn’t directly mentioned as a trait, and I wondered whether he composed these lines himself or whether they were written by others.

Harvey Yoder
Harrisonburg 

Invista and United Workers Inc. union reached a tentative agreement that will result in fewer than expected being laid off at the Waynesboro plant. Hershey’s in Stuarts Draft announced temporary layoffs a week after it held a job fair to hire 120 people. A company spokesman said Hershey still plans to make those hires later in the year. Unemployment in Waynesboro reached a 15-year high.

Nicole Nicholson, 17, died in a fire at her boyfriend’s home in Bridgewater. He made it out but suffered serious burns. Authorities said the fire was accidental and not suspicious and that drug paraphernalia was found in the room where Nicholson died, but they believe it belonged to a resident of the home. Nicholson was a junior at Turner Ashby High School and an employee of Taco Bell.

A jury convicted Donna Hockman, 35, of the July 25 murder of her boyfriend, Dustin Stanley, 23, in Lacey Spring. Hockman claimed self-defense. She shot Stanley five times in the back.  During trial, it came out that Stanley was a confidential informant for the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives.

Residential property assessments averaged a 27.7 percent increase over 2005 figures in Augusta County. Residents were outraged. Churchville attorney Francis Chester threatened to sue, petitions flew and Supervisor Tracy Pyles said the county needed to reassess the assessments. Land, not buildings, grabbed the bigger boost, and January sales figures reflected that the assessments were about on target. Waynesboro residents saw an average 3.7 percent increase. Staunton’s assessments jumped an average of 4.3 percent.

Parent companies of both The News Leader in Staunton and The News Virginian in Waynesboro announced furloughs. If the Daily News-Record in Harrisonburg had furloughs, most in the know doubt that paper’s publisher would be open about it.

The Blue Ridge Area Food Bank had to throw away 4,000 pounds of food because of the salmonella outbreak in peanut products.

Waynesboro police named Chris Hilliard, 28, Officer of the Year. He led the department in DUI arrests in 2008, despite not being on the streets since April. He has a rare form of cancer and has been on desk duty.

Michael J. Ozyjowski, 75, of Waynesboro died nine days after a Hermitage car crash caused by another driver who was talking on her cell phone. Ozyjowksi drove himself home but was admitted to the hospital the next day. The state police are looking for a female driver of a white SUV, who may not realize she caused an accident.

Emmylou Dayle Chute, a senior at Virginia School for the Deaf and Blind in Staunton, was the sixth congressional district winner of the 15^th annual Harry F. Byrd Jr. Leadership award. She received $10,000.

Ridge Huffman, 18, of Stuarts Draft was arrested for the Buckhannon, W.Va., murder of Rebekah Jane Gibson, 20, of Waynesboro. The two were romantically involved, he said. He also told police he has schizophrenia and multiple personalities.

The Daily News Record reported that three calves in Linville tested positive for rabies, as did a raccoon found on the same property. The farmer involved had thought the calves just had a stubborn pneumonia.

The Staunton City School Board decided to cut more than 38 jobs next year to make up for budget shortfalls. Teachers, aides, cafeteria monitors, reading and behavior specialists, bus drivers and clerical staff saw positions cut.

Lorena Orellana, 39, of Harrisonburg was convicted of felony child abuse after burning her two children on the face and neck with a spoon on May 4. The former Pleasant Valley Elementary School teacher’s assistant was sentenced to six months in jail.

The Greenville BB&T bank was robbed of an undisclosed amount of money by a masked white man wearing a gray hoodie.

The Artisans Center of Virginia announced the temporary closing of its gallery in Waynesboro. Rumors are that the center will eventually relocate to property being developed next to the Frontier Culture Museum in Staunton.

Walter Curt, a wealthy East Rockingham businessman, stepped down after six months as the Republican Party of Virginia’s voluntary finance chairman. In his resignation letter, he called  the party’s organizational structure “dysfunctional” and said he didn’t see that changing anytime soon.

Robert E. Lee High School quarterback Dae’ Quan Scott decided to play ball at James Madison University next year. He had originally told University of Richmond coaches he would attend that school.

Dr. Lee Weisman, 45, of Blue Ridge Family Medicine turned himself into police after being charged with two counts of misdemeanor sexual battery in his Staunton office, one in January and one in February. In December, the state Board of Medicine began investigating 2007 sexual incidents between Weisman and a patient and allegations that he prescribed narcotics for that patient, though he knew she was a illegal drug user.

Thanks to stronger-than-normal ticket sales and enthusiastic donor response, the American Shakespeare Center reached its $250,000 financial goal for January, enough to keep it operational for now. ASC says it needs to raise $400,000 more by May 1.

Elkton’s notorious drug dealer Vern O’Dell Crawford, 64, was sentenced to 30 years in jail. His wife, Joyce Crawford, 66, was sentenced to time served. His sons, Darrell and Kenneth, also received prison time. U.S. District Court Judge Samuel G. Wilson said he believed Vern was the master and the rest of his family puppets in their years of crime.

WHSV-TV went digital for a few days and then went back to its analog signal after some Bergton and Fulks Run customers had trouble getting the digital signal. All television signals in the United States are going digital for real June 12.

Staunton native Lloyd Sullenberger, 68, died. He was the Circuit Court judge who stayed the execution of Earl Washington in 1985. Washington, a mentally retarded man, was famously found guilty of a 1982 murder in Culpeper after police walked him through a confession. DNA results later cleared him, and he was released from prison.

Douglas E. Thomas, 48, of Waynesboro was killed in a car accident on a wintry slick Route 340, south of Crimora.

Beloved Waynesboro physician Dr. Paul Woods, 90, died. Dr. Mark Miller, 54, died. He was a physician at Western State Hospital from 1996 until retiring due to illness in 2007.

Mildred “Bee” Hite May, 90, died. Valedictorian of Timberville High School’s class of 1935, she helped establish the Village Library in Broadway and the Plains Memorial Museum.

Marvin Cochran, 64, died. He was famous in Waynesboro for riding around town on his electric wheelchair. His unit at Springdale Apartments was adorned with 75 clocks. He was a collector.

Gracie Crickenberger, 100, died. She’d played the organ at Fishersville Baptist and worked in doctor’s offices, including that of the late Dr. Thomas Gorsuch in Waynesboro.

G.M. Hutchinson, 56, died. The Mount Sidney man had emceed horse shows throughout the area. His signature announcement was describing a victory lap as “going only where the champions get to go.”

Once known as Fort Run, Williamsport, Thompson’s Store and Riddle’s Tavern, the town of Timberville celebrated 125 years of official incorporation.

According to the Daily News-Record, The Lincoln Day Ceremony, held six miles north of Harrisonburg at Lincoln Cemetery, attracted about 200 people on Abe’s 200^th birthday. The president’s father was born in Rockingham County.