Q: I’d like to know which major movies have been shot in and around the Roanoke Valley over the years.

- Sherrick Drews, Roanoke

A: I hesitate to answer this question because I know I’ll be leaving some out, but a little digging reveals that Hollywood has been visiting our region for more than 90 years.

My personal opinion is that the best of the bunch is “What About Bob?” starring Bill Murray and Richard Dreyfuss. Murray attended a premiere event at the Grandin Theatre and was joined by locals who served as extras or worked on the crew. If you haven’t seen it, it’s about a psychiatrist (Dreyfuss) and his very needy patient (Murray) who follows him out of New York City to Lake Winnipesaukee, N.H., one summer. The film was shot mostly at Smith Mountain Lake and on a sound stage at the old National Guard Armory. Roanoke is never mentioned in the film, because it’s just a stand-in for other places, but a byproduct of the production is that we’ve had occasional Bill Murray sightings downtown in the years since.

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Q: Just past the guard rail [where the Star Trail crosses J.B. Fishburn Parkway on Mill Mountain] there is a foundation for a rather large building. It looks like part of it went on up into the woods. By the section closest to the road there are steps and at the top a sidewalk remains. What was it?Mike Davenport, Roanoke

A: This was a question that required quite a bit of research on Roanoke real estate, and so I contacted two sources who know a lot more about it than I ever will. Betsy Biesenbach, who occasionally writes for the newspaper and does a lot of poking through local records for a living, taught me how to find old real estate files buried deep in the computerized Geographic Information System of the city. She was able to locate some records, and the fine staff in the Virginia Room at the main library helped me fill in more details.

The buildings in question are almost certainly the ruins of what must have been a pretty spectacular estate for its time. It appears to have been the home of E.B. Hartsook, who moved to Roanoke as a young man in 1891. Hartsook was born in Maryland and as a young man moved to Leon, Kan., to try his hand at farming. Read More

This ’53 Chevy rests mysterioulsy against an oak on Mill Mountain.

Our mountains are the source of quite a few questions, and over the next two weeks I’ll tackle a few of them. Our first comes from a reader who sent several Mill Mountain queries. I’ll attempt to answer one of them now, and hold another for next week pending more research. Another reader wrote in to ask a more general question about mountain identification in the valley, and I found some very cool stuff in the Roanoke Times web archives.

Q: I’d like to know more about the old car that sits along a hiking trail on Mill Mountain. It’s been there a very long time, but seems like a mystery that would be next to impossible to solve.”

Mike Davenport, Roanoke

A: Ah, the old black car on the side of the trail. My kids have been throwing rocks at that thing since they were old enough to walk.  Read on…

Q.  “Can you tell me where I can find a map that labels all of the mountains in the valley? People say to me, “What’s the name of that mountain?” and I don’t know and I think I should. I bet others wonder too.”

A. LeNoir, Roanoke County

It’s funny how even long time Roanokers don’t know the names of our local peaks. I know a few off the top of my head: McAfee’s Knob and Tinker Cliffs, Roanoke Mountain and the Peaks of Otter are easy, but I hadn’t even heard of Rich Patch Mountain (elevation 3,074 ft.) or Salt Pond Mountain (2438 ft.) until I looked at the fairly new signage at the Star overlook. I’d suggest that as a good place to start. Read on…

Link to Roanoke Times story on our mountains, with a cool interactive map narrated by writer Ralph Berrier :

http://ww2.roanoke.com/221961

Still image from the interactive map. When you click on the link above, you can identify the mountains by placing your mouse over them.

The view from the Mill Mtn. Star. Click to expand. Courtesy of Mill Mountain Discovery Center.

If you’ve got a question, you can either email it to whatsonyourmind@roanoke.com, or just ask it here! All questions will be carefully considered, though not all make it into the paper. The ones that don’t might still attract some reader responses though, so ask away!

I had to drive 300 miles to find it, but I tracked down the elusive can of Kale in Kilmarnock, VA.

At the risk of becoming the guy people turn to when they want to locate a hard-to-find grocery item , a recent message on the blog made me wonder about the things we used to eat a lot of that have fallen out of favor.

Q: I cannot find canned kale in any grocery stores in this area. I was told that Bush Brothers quit making it to concentrate on producing canned beans. I can find frozen kale, but it takes longer to cook. The stores around Roanoke carry mixed greens, spinach and mustard greens, which aren’t nearly as good. Can anyone tell me where I can get canned kale?

— Nora Smith, Salem

A: I keep my eye out and she’s right — no kale in the canned vegetable aisle. One day while shopping, I think I’ve solved the mystery. Read More…

After getting a lot of response to the recent column on underground rivers, this week we go back to the topic:

There are some great questions in the pipeline, but before answering them I thought I’d take this week to provide some more detail on a recent column.

The underground streams beneath Roanoke prompted several readers to reminisce about the old bar in the basement of the Ponce de Leon Hotel, long located in downtown’s Crystal Tower building, which is now under renovation. Joyce Hodges of Salem and others recalled hearing of a wishing well and goldfish pond there, though they never saw it.

Former Roanoke Times reporter and current volunteer extraordinaire George Kegley confirmed that the bar — called the Pipe Room — had a stream running through it and was home to many off (and sometimes on) duty reporters seeking refuge from the newsroom, though he said that longtime columnist Ben Beagle knew it better than he. Before the Pipe Room the Trout House stood in the same location and was home to one of Roanoke’s first taverns.

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With Earth Day coming up Saturday, it seems like a good time to tackle some environmental questions. If you have old personal documents, batteries, paint and prescription medications you would like to get out of the house, read on.

Q: It seems like every year there is a recycle drive going on where you can bring your documents to be shredded. Wondering if there was going to be one this year?

George Bronson, Roanoke

A: In this age of identity theft and digital storage, shredding is one of the few sure ways to make sure that you can safely dispose of old legal documents and tax returns.

Cristina Siegel, executive director of the Clean Valley Council, says that HomeTown Bank is sponsoring a shredding drive in the Salem Lowe’s parking lot on Main Street on May 11. Complete details aren’t available yet, but last time they did this, folks could bring up to three boxes of personal documents for shredding.

Q: Where in the Roanoke area can we find someplace to take dead household batteries?

Read On…

And after the column ran, I heard from the Better Business Bureau that they are sponsoring a “Protect Your Identity Day” at the Salem Civic Center on April 20 as well. Details are below.

Recycling Links for Readers:

Clean Valley Council

RAYSAC (prescription drug disposal) 

Roanoke Valley Resource Authority (household hazardous waste disposal)

Better Business Bureau Protect Your Identity Day 

An unidentified worker stands at the underground confluence of Trout Run and Lick Run, somewhere in the vicinity of the Taubman Museum downtown. If you know this man, let us know who he is!

Did you know there is a hidden ecosystem right here in Roanoke? Where there are rumors of albino fish who live their whole lives in darkness? It’s true, or at least some of it is. Two streams drop below ground and converge below the Taubman Museum, and we did some digging to find out more.

Q:  I was wondering whatever happened to the underground rivers in downtown  Roanoke. Thanks!

Kellee Barbour, Roanoke

A: One of the great things I’ve learned since starting this column is that that our local civic servants seem really happy to help answer questions like this, so I got in touch with Phil Schirmer, City Engineer for Roanoke, who even sent along a photo of an unidentified guy standing in one of our fabled underground rivers.

According to Phil, there are two underground rivers, though they might be more accurately called streams, running beneath the streets of downtown.

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Have you ever been in Roanoke’s subterranean drainage sewers? If so, make a comment here and let us know what you found!

This photo was taken in 1927, but it was almost 20 more years before the job would be complete.

Q: My retired neighbor has lived all his life in Roanoke and is full of interesting facts. Last fall he told me that part of Carvins Cove was dug out by German prisoners of war. He’s not a tall-tale teller, but that was a new one to me! I enjoy the Cove regularly and I’ve never heard anything about this. Can you uncover any details?

John Wiercioch, Roanoke

A: Thanks for asking, John. The social studies teacher in me loves questions like this. The short answer to your question is yes, there were German prisoners of war who were conscripted to work on Carvins Cove during World War II.

Sarah Baumgardner is the environmental communications coordinator for the Western Virginia Water Authority and confirmed this right away, and sent along several documents and photos.

By the time the prisoners arrived in 1944, the reservoir had been a work in progress for decades. W.W. Boxley Construction Co. completed the 80-foot-high dam in 1928, but a combination of a valleywide drought and the Great Depression put the brakes on the project, and people continued to live in the to-be-submerged community known as the Happy Valley behind the dam for years.

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You can learn more about POWs in Salem by reading this story by Roanoke Times reporter Duncan Adams athttp://bit.ly/16W6inG

(all photos credit Sarah Baumgardner, Western Virginia Water Authority

An actual roster of workers from the Salem POW camp who worked on the clearing of Carvins Cove in the 1940s.

W.W. Boxley Construction Company finished the dam in 1927.

 

Lots of the questions for the column originate in the car. As we make our daily circuit while commuting or doing errands like taking the kids to school, we see things that stick with us, and yet remain unresolved because we don’t ever have the time to stop the car, get out, and ask about the things that make us curious. That was the case for Katie Wright.

Q: Ever since I moved to north Roanoke County nine years ago, this has been a burning question of mine. At the Hardee’s at Cove and Peters Creek roads, there is a gentleman who waves at every car with a bright smile on his face. He never appears in a Hardee’s uniform, but he stands on the corner waving to each passer-by. I see him on the way to my son’s school each morning and I now find myself looking for him.

Sometimes I see him as early as 7 a.m.I am curious as to who he is and what has inspired him to do this? Any resident of that part or the county/city knows exactly who I’m talking about. Cars often honk at his familiar greeting and I can tell that he brings joy to many passers-by. Thanks, Katie Wright Roanoke County

A: Thanks for the question, Katie. “The waving guy,” as our kids called him when they were little, has been waving from that corner for 25 years — long enough to become a regular Roanoke institution. The newspaper has written about him before, in fact, though long before your arrival.

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And you can also read the original 1995 story on William Faison here…