Dante in the News
News and Press Releases In and About Dante, VA
January 16, 2011 - WCYB News
Saving Heritage - VA Coal Heritage Trail
By: Jim Conrad
DANTE, Va. -- The plan for the 325-mile-long Virginia Coal Heritage Trail has been sent to the state transportation board. It could become a national scenic byway. Each community along the trail is planning something that will interest the visitors who will someday drive the trail. One of those communities is Dante.
A drive through the old company town of Dante Virginia reminds us that it sure isn't what it used to be. A model of the community in the boom days in the community museum is about all there is to let a visitor know just how prosperous it once was. It lies along Virginia's Coal Heritage Trail and would like to tell its story, but a lot of the site is gone.
"There's a lot of history lost and it's being lost today. we need to recapture what we can and keep it around for our children and grandchildren, there's so much history in this town," resident Larry Morefield said. Some of which we pass by every day and never notice, but the Corridor Management Plan for the Coal Heritage Trail hopes to change that.
"We have lost a number of site along the route that right now we're trying to save some of the ones still remaining," says Debby Spencer a consultant with the trail said. Like Dante's old train depot which was just days away from destruction until with the help of U.S. Senator Mark Warner's office got a reprieve and now talks are taking place with CSX Railroad to give it to the town.
"It's a beautiful, well-constructed old building and I would love to see CSX give it to the community," Morefield said.
"There used to be a depot in every community and we're now down to there are three depots along this route that are actually in their original location. all the rest of them have been torn down or move to another site," Spencer added. A walking trail around the town is one of the projects that are planned to give visitors something to do and a chance to learn some of the town's history.
It's 325-miles long and runs through Southwest Virginia, The Coal Heritage Scenic Byway. It's a way to see the region and a reason to save our history and heritage. Debby Spencer has been traveling Virginia's Coal Heritage Scenic Byway. Along the way she's been discussing having the byway become a National Scenic Byway and preserving a unique history. On this day she visited Dante.
"By doing that, then you develop a plan basically looking at the entire corridor and figure out how to develop it, maintain it, market it, protect it and improve it." Debby Spencer, a consultant with the Heritage Trail said. And preserving it, like saving Dante's old depot in the heart of what once was a thriving, booming coal town, owned by the Clinchfield Coal Company.
"It's a huge opportunity to capture it before its gotten so far down that you can't repair it so that's what we’re looking at. So there are some areas that you can preserve and some areas you reconsider." Sprencer said. Luckily Dante created a museum and preserved a lot of the towns past. And a model of the town in it's hey day was created by artist Bill Landford. "People have just donated stuff, articles we have in here and stuff and we're really fortunate to find the fellow that did the model. It was all gone before we got hold of him. It was all gone and when we got hold of him and talked with him he said “I can recreate that."" Bobbie Gullett with Dante Lives On says.
“That's why the importance was placed on trying to save the depot, It was scheduled for demolition earlier this week but has been put on hold. We're finding treasures about each one of the communities and in the case of Dante, their history is based on the railroad. That has a tremendous story to tell. So the depot is part of the heart of this community." Spencer added.
"We're going to try and get a grant and redo it. We would like to put a library in the upper end and in the bottom part, we would add a craft shop." Gullet says. All along the heritage byway there are similar stories and opportunities to save history.
January 10, 2011 - WCYB News / Bristol Herald Courier
Dante to Make Case to Save Train Depot
By: Debra McCown
DANTE, Va. – The community of Dante has until Feb. 15 to make its case to CSX to save the old train depot. Community leaders and representatives of the railroad, which intended to demolish the unused structure because it’s within 50 feet of an active rail line, agreed to that deadline during a meeting Thursday. The community and regional tourism officials hope to use the depot as a library and an educational stop along the Virginia Coal Heritage Trail, a 325-mile driving route being developed to attract visitors and tourism-based economic development to the coalfields. So they asked the railroad to postpone its plans.
“The call really resonated with us … because it’s really important to us to be part of the community that we serve,” said Quinton Kendall, who represented CSX at the public meeting. “Of course, the other side is we do have a business to run and it’s very, very important to us to run the business safely.”
More than a century after Southwest Virginia’s coalfields were opened for development, the railroads are still shipping coal out of the region. In Dante and nearby communities, CSX trains rumble through regularly. Kevin Hurley, also representing CSX, participated in the meeting by conference call from Jacksonville, Fla. He said the railroad is concerned about safety and liability, as its commercial insurance doesn’t cover non-railroad activity within 50 feet of the tracks.
“We have to protect our company’s assets against risky situations,” Hurley said, blaming an increasingly litigious society for a change in company policy that, years ago, often allowed barriers to be constructed for safety rather than tearing down buildings.
Debby Spencer, project manager for the coal heritage trail, said Dante’s case should appeal well to the railroad because, with planned improvements around a renovated train depot, the CSX corridor through Dante would be much safer.
Spencer, whose firm was hired by the Heart of Appalachia Tourism Authority to work on the project, pointed to the amphitheatre and playground along the tracks that already attracts people when the weather is nice. Local officials are proposing to build a barrier, appropriately constructed with old railroad ties, that would shield the entire area, including the depot, from the tracks.
“CSX will actually have a safer track on a longer stretch,” Spencer said. “If you demolish the depot, you will still have those two issues right next to the track.” She said restoring the depot as a library and a trail destination would enable Dante to showcase the railroad and the integral part it played in the development of the town and the region. The depot here, she said, is the only one left in the region that could be restored and accessible for visitors.
Sen. Phillip Puckett, D-Lebanon, said Dante – and its depot – are particularly significant to Russell County. In its boom time, Dante was the county’s largest population center.
The folks at the meeting questioned whether it would be physically possible to move the two-story brick building to another location, and determined it unlikely that the building could be added to a historic register in the event that it’s moved.
“If you have to move it and it can’t be on the register, it’s going to be extremely difficult to get any kind of grants, any kind of state money or any kind of federal money,” Puckett said.
Charlotte Mullins, director of economic development for neighboring Dickenson County, said the Dante depot is also significant for the Dickenson County towns that were tied to Dante by the railroad. “We didn’t have the roads to travel like we do now,” she said, explaining that when people in the town of Clinchco came to see the doctor years ago, they came by train. “This town played a critical role in Dickenson County history,” she said. “Life in the town of Clinchco was tied critically to Dante, and it was the train that tied them together.”
Hurley, speaking by conference call, said CSX is happy to look at a proposal from the community, particularly if it creates a safer situation along the tracks. But railroad officials can’t give an answer until they see the plan. No timeline was given for how long it would take CSX to consider that plan.
But residents of Dante, like retired CSX locomotive engineer Larry Morefield, are hopeful that, with all of the buildings that have been demolished in this community over the years, they’ll be able to save the depot. “We’d really like to keep this building,” he said, as he briefly addressed the meeting. “It really means a lot to this town.”
dmccown@bristolnews.com | (276) 791-0701
Bobbie Gullett accepts the award | 2010 Oxbow Center's Festive Forest Congratulations Dante! First Place for People's Choice AND Second Place for Most Creative Tree |
October 25, 2010 - WCYB News
Dante Station Saved For Another 90 Days
By: Tarah Taylor
Residents along the Coal Heritage Trail will have a little more time to save a railroad depot from demolition. CSX agreed to wait 90 more days before tearing down the old depot in Dante, Virginia. This will allow residents to offer firm proposals for the building. Some ideas include a library, community center and to make it a stop on the planned 325 mile coal trail.
October 24, 2010 - Bristol News
Dante Depot Gets a Stay of Execution
By: Debra McCown
"Dante almost lost its train depot last week," said Debby Spencer, the woman tasked with developing a corridor management plan for the Virginia Coal Heritage Trail. Two weeks ago, the railroad posted a notice in the community, she said. Displayed at the post office, the notice from CSX said the old train depot would be demolished in two weeks. Spencer said the dumpsters and equipment were already loaded up to be brought to the site by rail when community members and project supporters – with the help of U.S. Sen. Mark Warner and U.S. Rep. Rick Boucher – asked the railroad to step on the brakes. At least for now, she said, the building has received a stay of execution.
Late Friday afternoon, CSX spokesman Bob Sullivan, in an e-mail notice, told the Bristol Herald Courier that the railroad has agreed to postpone the demolition for 90 days to give the community "time to make firm proposals for the building."
The community’s goal is to turn the old two-story building, which has been vacant for decades, into a library and community center, giving it a modern-day use while preserving its historic function as a stop along the coal heritage trail, a 325-mile driving route being developed to showcase the region’s history. A key element of that history, in Dante and other old coal towns like it, is the people who came from all over the world seeking work, creating a unique melting pot in the mountains.
"Dante, really their history is on the railroad, and on their coal," Spencer said. "The railroad was how they got the men in and they got the supplies in there, and they got the coal out." Few of the old train depots that once stood along the tracks remain, Spencer said, and those that are left are important to sharing the area’s heritage with tourists. "To lose a depot when we have so few left would be a crime," Spencer said.
Earlier Friday, Sullivan told the Herald Courier that the railroad plans to demolish the building "in the interest of safety," but is looking at whether it could be put off for a little while. Right now, he said, there is no specific timeline.
"If you have an old building that is not used, near the tracks, that has not been used for a long time and is no longer needed, there is generally an effort to try to take them down," Sullivan said. Over time, he said, other empty depots have been demolished for similar reasons. He said the last time there was talk in Dante of using this building for community space was about a decade ago – and, as far as he knows, nothing came of it.
Spencer said the sticking point 10 years ago was the railroad’s requirement that, to be used, the old depot building must be moved at least 50 feet from the tracks. In Dante’s case, she said, the depot is not movable – and is set back only 35 feet. But in the years since that requirement was first made known, she said, many other communities – including Coeburn, Bristol and Kingsport – have worked out ways to keep their historic depots in place, using barriers instead of distance to keep people away from the tracks.
She’s hopeful that, with plans and ideas submitted to CSX, Dante will be able to keep its old train depot. But right now, she said, all the community can do is wait.
dmccown@bristolnews.com | (276) 791-0701
May 27, 2010 - Bristol News
New life for old Clinchfield Coal building
By: Debra McCown
The ribbon was cut Thursday on a second life for the old Clinchfield Coal Co. office building in Dante. The 52-year-old brick building, which sat empty for years, is the largest structure in the small, Russell County community that was once a regional economic engine.
“I’m very glad to see the building being utilized for a facility that will be positive for the community,” said Walt Crickmer, a former Clinchfield president who worked in the building starting in 1976.
“But on the other side, it’s sort of sad to a degree because Clinchfield Coal Co. was a corner block for the development of most of Southwest Virginia’s infrastructure, towns and communities, livelihoods for thousands of families,” Crickmer said. “There’s just so much history that’s been lost. I hope Dante hangs on.”
The $2.3 million renovation to re-purpose the building was funded with state and federal money, put together by People Incorporated of Southwest Virginia, an Abingdon-based nonprofit focused on improving the lives of low-income people. Dante Crossing, the 12-unit apartment complex created in the old office building, is designed to meet a need for affordable, energy-efficient housing. It’s restricted to people who meet income guidelines, which range from $18,600 to $36,960 depending on family size. The ground floor of the building also has a community space, the Dante Post Office and a storefront that Rob Goldsmith, president and CEO of People Inc., said will be turned into a store again.
“The people in the community feel extremely positive about it,” Goldsmith said after Thursday’s ribbon-cutting ceremony. “There are two or three other buildings in Dante that are being demolished, so it’s nice to have one that’s being restored rather than being demolished.” Dante was once the largest town in Russell County and among the largest in the region, Goldsmith said. Now it’s home to just a few hundred residents, and most of the original buildings are gone.
“The people, they have to go all the way to St. Paul to buy anything, so the people in the community would very much like to have a place where they could go to get a gallon of milk, a loaf of bread, that kind of thing,” Goldsmith said of the storefront, which is to be renovated and leased.
“I think people are hoping that having this building there, particularly when the store is in there and operating, will generate enough traffic that maybe other people will say it looks like a business opportunity.”
Meanwhile, Goldsmith said, People Inc. is on the lookout for more projects that meet stringent federal tax credit guidelines to provide affordable housing in Southwest Virginia.
dmccown@bristolnews.com | (276) 791-0701