AND VIRGINIA TECH
A gunman opened fire in a Virginia Tech dorm and then, two hours later,
in a classroom across campus Monday, killing at least 30 people in the
deadliest shooting rampage in U.S. history. The gunman was killed,
bringing the death toll to 31
Total is now 33 with 26 wounded.
I am just reeling.
This is my home town. Its where I grew up. I know the buildings where this happened. The campus was my playground. I practically lived in the library and gym. Even though I've been in California for decades, I am always a Virginian.
My brothers went to school there and a number of nieces and nephews. One is a student now and one is starting in summer. The nephew who is graduating happened to be off at a seminar in Lynchburg when this happened. My brother who has the son entering in the next term was there with his son in that very building taking some sort of placement test just two weeks back, and they had to vacate the building because of a bomb scare!
Blacksburg when I was growing up was a bucolic town in the Blueridge, with more people and more acreage at the campus than in the town. That has changed somewhat, but its still a great town, albeit larger. Now it will go down in our social consciousness as the largest mass shooting in history. Until, of course, another comes along.
One thing I have not seen mentioned by the press reports is that Blacksburg got its start in a massacre. The Draper Meadows Massacre was as much a cause celebre in its day as the Virginia Tech tragedy is today. In 1755, a band of settlers in Draper's Meadows were slain or captured by a band of Shawnee Indians raiding from Ohio, likely at the instigation of the French, since this was the time of the French & Indian War. Draper's Meadow Settlement was the first permanent English colony west of the Alleghenies.
The Wikipedia article says that four were slain and five were taken captive. I always heard, growing up, that four survived, five were captured and 21 slain. But the hew and cry about the massacre caused a influx of new settlers who grew into the town of Blacksburg. The small Methodist Seminary they started applied for a land grant from the federal government and amazing won out over larger more established schools. Virginia Tech is now one of the largest land grant universities in the US.
Drapers Meadows was situated nigh where the Duck Pond is on campus. The duck pond is where we teenagers used to go to park. It is notably in my personal history as the place I touched a woman's breast for the first time. It is also notable that I got the Catalina stuck in the mud by the pond that very night and had to call my Dad to come and tow us out. I was so embarrassed, even more so, since I had told my parents that we had gone to a movie. I tried to apologize to Dad on the way home, for the trouble I caused him, the movie fib, the fooling around in the dark with the opposite sex - I didn't know what. My Dad said, "Its about time. We were beginning to worry about you."
Last time I was back was 6 or 7 years ago, and I walked around the campus showing my wife where I grew up. Nearby on a back street was the bookstore where I hung out: Books, Strings and Things-- and where I first encountered the love of books, first dreamed of owning a bookstore. It was also a venue for great mountain music, bluegrass, and pickers of all stripes. I understand Books, Strings and Things had a long run but is no more. After a checkered career (teaching, movie Propmaster, cartographer, museum Director, etc.), I opened up a bookstore dealing in old and rare books in California. Only recently, after 15 years of bookselling, have I moved on, selling my shop and teaching art more full time now.
My hometown Blacksburg, born in blood and violence, now drenched in blood once again.
Sad Regards,
and hope you all are doing well.
