Chester  May 27

I went off the ACA route, going straight up SR 460, so I could visit the Miles Carpenter Museum in Waverly.  Carpenter is one of the 20^th century’s most important folk artists. His works are in the Smithsonian, Abby Aldrich Rockefeller Folk Art Museum and many others.

He ran a sawmill until 1957 when he turned his attention to carving hand-painted creatures, interpretations of contemporary history and human nature. He used whatever wood he found—branches, roots, trunks, and saplings. However, the piece for which he received instant fame in 1972 was his watermelon slice, which has become an icon of folk art.

It was a wonderful experience to revisit the house where I interviewed Carpenter so long ago and to see so many of his creations.  

Popular legend has it that William Mahone, builder of the Norfolk and Petersburg Railroad (now Norfolk Southern), and his cultured wife, Otelia Butler Mahone, traveled along the newly completed Norfolk and Petersburg Railroad naming stations. Otelia was reading Ivanhoe by Sir Walter Scott. From his historical Scottish novels, Otelia chose the place names of Wakefield as well as Windsor and Waverly. She tapped the Scottish Clan "McIvor" for the name of Ivor, a small town in neighboring Southampton County.

As they continued west, they reached a station just west of the Sussex County line in Prince George County where they could not agree on a suitable name from the books. Instead, they became creative, and invented a new name in honor of their dispute. This is how the tiny community of Disputanta was named.

I stop to read historical signs when I can. One between Wakefield and Waverly noted that near that spot the first commercial crop of peanuts was grown in 1842 by Matthew Harris. In the 1890s Louis Obici opened Planters Peanuts in nearby Suffolk.

The Scott’s pine bark mulch that you buy is created three miles outside of Wakefield in a huge mulch and compost mill.

Roadside sign:  Earth without art is Eh.

To understand why I'm riding and raising money, please go to the first post--April 26.
To make a donation to the ALSA, please go to: http://web.alsa.org/goto/deirdresride