Page 16 - A Narrative of the History of Roanoke Virginia

this soil and whose inherent right would thus be wrested from them.” Indeed, according to
him, he and numerous other natives were of the opinion that “whoever comes here with the
secret or avowed purpose of ‘running the town’ will find this an almost tropically warm
climate and a very unpleasant place to live.”

The ‘real’ reason Clark and company had chosen the area was the thousands of acres of
inexpensive farmland surrounding the town that won the junction. Indeed, the Philadelphians
selected Big Lick because it was a tiny village; the firm had no plans to develop the hamlet,
but simply intended to use it as a temporary base of operations until its industries and
company town went up nearby. In a word, Roanoke was a temporary solution.

Shortly after the Clark & Company executives left, locals voted to change their town’s
peculiar name to “Kimball.” “This has been done,” John C. Moomaw informed their honoree,
“to give evidence of the high esteem and appreciation you enjoy in the heart of these people
on account of the improvements you are projecting in their midst . . . and to show that our
people hold no unkind feelings toward the people of the North.”

Frederick Kimball responded to the honor in early July, informing townspeople that while he
would “always remember this act of courtesy on their part,” he preferred the name
“Roanoke,” the appellation of the county and nearby river. Locals, the Big Lick Weekly News
observed, had expected Kimball to show just such “delicacy and good taste” in declining
their original choice. They believed “Roanoke” was a “decidedly prettier name for a town,”
and shortly afterwards approved it as the legal name for their village.

According to Kagey, there is considerable confusion over the meaning and genealogy of the
English word “Roanoke." Its origins, however, are likely from the Powhatan world “rawrenoc”
or “rawrenoke,” meaning polished shell money, or from what was originally called “Roanoak”
Island, home of the Lost Colony.

Local leaders drafted a town charter for “Roanoke” that they believed would facilitate
additional development. It exempted capital invested in manufacturing enterprises from
municipal taxation for the following ten years and limited property taxes to less than 1
percent of assessed value. These decisions, while enticing to N&W as well as other
industries, would ‘bite them in the rear’ in future years as the council had little or no
significant funds with which to maintain services for their new city.

On top of this they expanded the town’s boundaries almost two and a half square miles,
which absorbed the Town of Gainsborough along with land east of Big Lick recently
purchased or optioned by the Clark firm. Although locals and outsiders alike began calling
Big Lick “Roanoke” that summer, it was not until February 1882 that the Virginia General
Assembly approved the new charter and made that name official. “After the town is regularly
laid off,” the Big Lick correspondent of The Salem Register explained, “all enterprising men
are invited to come and settle in our Embryo City of Roanoke.”

Although little development occurred that summer, another newspaper was already
predicting that “in two years this place will be as large as Lynchburg.” A thumb of the nose