Page 13 - A Narrative of the History of Roanoke Virginia

importance of doing whatever necessary at once.” Members of the town’s council seconded
Terry’s concern, and before the meeting ended, they appointed a committee of eight local
leaders to draft a formal address to Frederick Kimball “setting forth the advantages Big Lick
offers as a terminus.”

The completed “memorial,” mailed to Kimball in March, focused on the village’s potential
importance as a shipping center for tobacco and grain. With “a quick road to Northern
markets,” the committee explained, the town would continue its “prosperous course,” and for
that reason, its residents were “fully alive to the great benefits which would accrue to the
town from this being chosen as the point.” If the line picked Big Lick, the memorial concluded,
the village would provide a lot for a depot as well as help secure right-of-ways into town.

In mid-March another team of surveyors, this one headed by Colonel Upton Boyce, chief of
the SVRR’s Committee on Construction, came to town to inspect possible routes. Big Lick’s
town council interpreted Boyce’s appearance as a sign that the village was clearly in the
running, and soon after he departed, it dispatched a delegate to Philadelphia to meet with
SVRR officials. The railroad, nevertheless, continued to survey numerous other possible
routes, and in order to determine the potential cost of the various terminuses under
consideration, it hired local right-of-way agents to secure options on possible roadbeds.

One of those employed was John C. Moomaw, a farmer and canning factory operator from
neighboring Botetourt County. Though hired to explore several different routes, Moomaw
wanted railroad access for his “Cloverdale Brand” of canned peaches, corn, and tomatoes,
and therefore was especially interested in pathways through the hamlet of Cloverdale into
Salem.

His scheme, however, had problems: the original plan for a link at Bonsack was about seven
and a half miles shorter and thus tens of thousands of dollars cheaper; the SVRR was
considering junctions at existing N&W depots in Big Lick, Buford’s (present-day Montvale)
and Ironville (present-day Villamont); and when Moomaw and Clark & Company agents
visited Salem they encountered problems securing right-of-ways into town. Having already
sold the rights for a roadbed to the Valley Railroad, Salem residents were apparently less
inclined to offer expensive incentives or cheap land to get a junction with the SVRR. Indeed,
one resident recalled that “the Mayor and town council went hunting to avoid meeting the
railroad men.”

Big Lick merchant Peyton Terry happened to be in Salem when the negotiations there fell
apart. The news, he informed other businessmen at a meeting the next night, meant they
had a window of opportunity to push even harder for the junction.

There is some debate about what happened next…

Which we will cover in the next installment. The topics will be similar to “The midnight ride of
Paul Revere” re-titled “The Ride that made Roanoke” as well as a shocking episode that
almost caused the whole promising future to come tumbling down.