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From history to convenience, from great terrain to great seasons and in many contexts in between, we’re lucky to live where we’ve chosen to. Here’s a savory set of reasons why.
Whether you’ve lived here all your life or just arrived last week, you owe it to yourself to take a few moments, sit back and relish in why we love this place.
1. Roanoke has a (Mill) Mountain within the city limits. Where else can you leave downtown on foot, climb a series of trails to a summit with a panoramic view of the city, and get back to work within the space of a long lunch break?
2. For any A-to-B trip across Roanoke, motorists can find numerous alternative routes. The late Beth Handley, a longtime Roanoke Times editor, often told new reporters that Roanoke had three barriers: Interstate 581, the Roanoke River and the railroad. Learn their crossings, and you can get anywhere really fast.
3. Roanoke elected a black mayor when many other southern cities still struggled with the question of civil rights. As pastor of High Street Baptist Church, Noel C. Taylor played an important role in helping to peacefully integrate Roanoke businesses in the mid-’60s and was elected to city council just a few years later. He was appointed as mayor when Roy Webber died in 1975, then consistently won re-election and served until 1992. Although a Republican, he was never challenged by a Democrat and only once by an independent.
4. Who would have thought a graduate of Cave Spring High School would become basketball’s most hated man? Yet that is what J.J. Redick did, first at Duke University and then with a series of teams in the NBA. But he has improved his stats every year in the league, to the point that that he’s outlasted the hate and achieved a grudging respect among fans.
5. Roanoke has extensive connections with Elvis Presley, the acclaimed king of rock’n’roll. He played the Star City early in his career in the ’50s on a bill headlined by Hank Snow. It would hardly be his last visit. He returned to Roanoke numerous times, contributing to his commemoration by Mini-Graceland, a tiny replica of his Memphis home at the bottom of Mill Mountain. After a show in 1976, a year before Elvis died, Roanoke Times reviewer Russell Leavitt wrote, “When he’s up there—giggling more these days than gyrating maybe—you just can’t take your eyes off him.” Roanoke never did.
6. Roanoke has become a hotspot for presidential politics. That can be a blessing and a curse—who really wants more campaign ads on TV?—but it does give the region an up-close look at the candidates. In 2008, Barack Obama, Joe Biden and Sarah Palin all made campaign stops here. Four years later, Obama and Biden were back, the former making his famous “If you’ve got a business, you didn’t build that” pseudo-gaffe and the latter buying a stack of huge Benny Marconi’s pizzas for campaign volunteers, and they were joined by Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan, multiple times. It’s not just candidates—journalist Gary Younge of the UK Guardian spent three weeks in Roanoke during the ’08 election and returned for an update in 2012. With Virginia still a key battleground, expect to see presidential candidates yet again in 2016.
7. Exploring the museums clustered in downtown Roanoke will take the better part of a weekend or even a week, depending on how deep you dig. Just within a few blocks you’ll find the Virginia Museum of Transportation—an underrated kid pleaser—as well as the O. Winston Link Museum, the Taubman Museum of Art and several different museums (pinball!) within Center in the Square.
8. Roanoke is close to everything. Four hours to Washington, D.C.—and if you don’t like the drive, you can take a train. Four hours to Asheville. Four hours to Charlotte. Three hours to Richmond. And minutes from thousands of acres of public land for hiking, hunting, fishing and other outdoor recreation.
9. It’s just far enough away from everything. Roanoke remains a largely undiscovered gem, and while plenty of advocates are trying to change that by marketing its upsides to a national audience, the rest of us can enjoy the relative anonymity and privacy. There’s nothing better than knowing a great secret before everyone else discovers it.
10. Roanoke’s size and distance from major cities means that residents freely choose their pro sports allegiance without geographic concerns. Sure, there are lots of Redskins fans, but also plenty of Steelers, Panthers and even Patriot backers, too. The same goes for baseball and the rest of the pro sports panoply.
11. The Roanoke Valley’s freshwater fishing can’t be beat. Whether pulling rainbow and brown trout at a bevy of stocked streams within an hour of the city, searching for striped bass in Smith Mountain Lake or catching a record muskellunge in the New River, there’s plenty of opportunity to get your line wet.
12. Hockey returns to Roanoke for the 2016-17 season. A team in the Southern Professional Hockey League will play at the Berglund Center for the first time since the woeful Roanoke Valley Vipers lasted only a single season. Even during Roanoke’s decade-long pro-hockey drought, amateurs kept the flame burning. Hockey fans can still watch Virginia Tech hockey at the Berglund Center, as well as the annual Guns & Hoses game between police officers and firemen—which at least once devolved into raucous fisticuffs. For a taste of Roanoke’s pro hockey past, search YouTube for minor-league journeyman Dave “Moose Morissette,” who starred for the Roanoke Express in the ’90s—then watch out for that killer right.
13. Carvins Cove is home to the United States’ second-largest municipal park, and it’s one that Roanoke is constantly improving, adding new trails to an existing 60-mile network and providing boat rentals for visitors to float and fish on the reservoir.
14. Roanoke developers have consistently challenged conventional wisdom. Sometimes they should have listened—we’re looking at you, South Peak—but other times their willingness to ignore long-standing stereotypes has paid off, transforming downtown’s west end from a sea of vacant warehouses into refurbished apartments chock full of lively millennials, and the corner of Tazewell Avenue and Williamson Road from a parking lot into the site of downtown’s first new construction in decades.
15. Richmond claims iconic civil rights lawyer Oliver Hill, but he grew up in Roanoke’s Gainsboro neighborhood. Hill represented students in Prince Edward County in one of the cases that eventually was wrapped into Brown vs. Board of Education. The 1954 decision in that case by the Supreme Court of the United States integrated schools and did away with the concept of “separate but equal.” Hill never forgot his upbringing in Roanoke, and he returned numerous times to speak up until his death in 2007.
16. You always see someone you know at the grocery store.
17. Danny Karbassiyoon grew up and played soccer in Roanoke—right up until he was signed by international powerhouse Arsenal, an English Premier League team familiar to anyone who’s read Nick Hornby’s “Fever Pitch.” In his debut game, Karbassiyoon came off the bench and scored the game-winning goal over Manchester City.
18. Any time there’s a refugee crisis, Roanoke tends to receive a dose of international migrants. They come due to the concentration of services and support within the city, and they add to the city’s international diversity. It’s not surprising to hear several different languages spoken in as many blocks. Much of Roanoke’s heritage came from migrants, including a significant number of Lebanese and Syrians who arrived early in the 20th century.
19. Many of those migrants have brought international flair to Roanoke’s restaurant scene. You won’t find just Mexican and Chinese food, but kitchens cooking fare from Thailand, Lebanon, Vietnam, Brazil and more.
20. If the city collects diverse nationalities, then Roanoke’s numerous community gardens are the melting pot. They offer the chance not just to grow food in a shared space, but to rub shoulders with your neighbors, who may have traveled to western Virginia from the other side of the world. The Hurt Park garden is known as especially diverse, a place where Bosnians work next to Somali Bantu, who work next to Hondurans and native Roanokers. Contact the Roanoke Community Garden Association for more.
21. Roanoke has a long history of independent coffee, with H&C Coffee—the subject of that neon sign downtown—setting the standard when it opened in 1927. Mill Mountain Coffee & Tea raised the bar in 1990, and Floyd’s Red Rooster Coffee Roaster upped the ante even more when it opened in 2010 and began building a larger presence, with customers in Richmond and Washington, D.C.
22. Hikers rightly revere the Appalachian Trail, and some of its most beautiful sections run through the Roanoke region. Find 52 miles in Botetourt County, 15 in Roanoke County and 26 in Craig County. The Roanoke Appalachian Trail Club maintains a total of 113 miles. The trail hits highlight after highlight, running past Dragon’s Tooth to the oft-photographed McAfee Knob—which recently got a Hollywood moment appearing on the movie poster for “A Walk in the Woods”—and Apple Orchard Mountain, the highest point on the trail northbound until it hits New England.
23. The Grandin Theatre originally opened in 1932, and you can feel the history when you walk into the beautifully restored main theatre. Despite its signature architecture, the Grandin’s main draw remains its films, which range from blockbusters to arthouse flicks, with regular free Saturday matinees and occasional midnight movies.
24. Groundbreaking developer Ed Walker reinvented Roanoke by bringing different people to the table and using historic tax credits to renovate the Hancock Building, the Cotton Mill, the Patrick Henry and other vacant buildings into apartments craved by millennials and empty nesters. Not only that, but he started urban brain festival CityWorks (X)po—and his nest of hair can go toe-to-toe with Donald Trump’s any day.
25. Salem hosts minor-league baseball at one of the most beautiful stadiums in the country. There’s nothing like taking in a Salem Red Sox game while the sun sets over the mountains. It’s worth paying attention to who’s on the field, too. Past Salem players have included Moises Alou, Matt Holliday, Tim Wakefield, Larry Walker and plenty more who left an impression on the big leagues.
26. Roanoke’s railroad heritage has bled into the arts, yielding a blend of grit and grace. The most notable example would be O. Winston Link, the black-and-white photographer whose iconic photographs can be viewed in the museum named for him on Shenandoah Avenue, but the theme extends well beyond Link’s legacy. The influence and geographic proximity of the railroad keep the arts grounded in such a way that neatly sidesteps the pretension pervading many a local art scene elsewhere.
27. The legendary Mid-Atlantic Wrestling territory run by Jim Crockett Promotions, considered by a certain segment to be pro-wrestling’s platonic ideal, ran Roanoke as part of its circuit, with Ric Flair, Blackjack Mulligan, Wahoo McDaniel and others regularly wrestling in the Star City. Sandy Scott, who tag-teamed with his brother George as the Flying Scotts from the ’50s through the ’70s, liked it so much he retired in Roanoke until he died in 2010. Boris Zhukov, who wrestled in Mid-Atlantic as part of a faction with Sgt. Slaughter, went on to wrestle as a Russian in the AWA and WWF before settling down in Burnt Chimney. And Handsome Jimmy “Boogie Woogie Man” Valiant, 73, continues to run his wrestling camp down the road in Shawsville.
28. Versatile vocalist Jane Powell started singing in Roanoke before before embarking on a decades-long career that included once stealing the show opening for Ray Charles. She still regularly performs a mix of styles—R&B, jazz, reggae, gospel, blues and more—at the Jefferson Center and elsewhere. Apparently music runs in the family: Her nephew Byron “Poe” Mack has been a cornerstone of Roanoke hip-hop for a solid decade now.
29. Roanoke’s historic restaurants present diners with a portal to the past, even while the food remains as tasty as ever. Whether it’s Parker’s Seafood—approaching its 100th anniversary in 2019—the Roanoker Weiner Stand, the Texas Tavern, the Hotel Roanoke’s Regency Room, the Roanoker Restaurant or the relative newbies established during or after World War II—the Dogwood Restaurant, Paul’s Restaurant, the New Yorker Deli and Aesy’s Confectionary—you can still eat in a restaurant your grandparents may have frequented when they were your age.
30. Big Lick wasn’t officially founded until the mid-nineteenth century, but the Roanoke Valley can claim roots going back to before the Revolutionary War. Gen. Andrew Lewis and Col. William Fleming both have connections to the region, and both participated in the Battle of Point Pleasant, an October 1774 fight with a confederation of American Indian tribes in what’s now West Virginia that served as prelude to the War for Independence two years later.
31. Most Roanoke neighborhoods contain a healthy number of backyard gardens. You’ll find beans, squash, peppers and more—but the seasonal highlight remains the arrival of homegrown tomatoes. If you don’t have a garden, you probably have a coworker who brings his or her extras to the office.
32. Most history of the film industry understandably focuses on Hollywood, but for a short while in the ’20s, the Magic City served as part-time home to one of the most influential directors of the time. Oscar Micheaux made movies specifically for black audiences, including six filmed in Roanoke. The connection gives the city an indirect connection to actor Paul Robeson, who collaborated closely with Micheaux and who is the namesake for a popular variety of heirloom tomato grown in many a Star City garden.
33. Many white Roanokers wouldn’t dare cross the tracks to go hear music at the Dumas Hotel in the iconic African-American business district around Henry Street during the early and mid-20th century. It was their loss. Louis Armstrong, Count Basie, Duke Ellington, Nat King Cole and other legends stayed and played there while at the height of their powers. The historic building remains an artistic fulcrum today in its new life as the Dumas Center for Artistic and Cultural Development.
34. Former City Manager Bern Ewert led the charge for Design ’79, a massive civic initiative that reclaimed downtown from urban blight and resulted in the conversion of the Market Building into a food court, the establishment of Center in the Square and the revitalization of the city core. More than three and a half decades later, that investment continues to pay dividends, especially with a recent round of new investment that has injected new energy downtown. Today, Bern’s son Aaron has taken up the mantle, serving as the public face of the Bridges, a mixed-use development by the Roanoke River that already has provided a new music venue and apartments.
35. Two of football’s most prominent faces in the late ’90s and early ’00s got their start playing at Cave Spring High School. Twins Rondé and Tiki Barber played in the NFL for the Tampa Bay Buccaneers and New York Giants, respectively. Both played in multiple Pro Bowls. Rondé won a Super Bowl with his team in 2003; Tiki played in one in 2001 and lost, but had the consolation of retiring as the Giants’ all-time all-time rushing and receptions leader.
36. WDBJ7 has made its home in Roanoke since 1935, when it first went to air as a joint operation between the Times-World Corporation (publisher of The Roanoke Times) and WDBJ radio. Over the years it’s made famous personalities like fitness guru Artie Levin and “Cousin” Irving Sharp. Last year, when reporter Alison Parker and cameraman Adam Ward were killed during a live shoot, the community embraced WDBJ7 more tightly than ever, including outreach from rival WSLS.
37. Construction of the Roanoke Valley greenway system began as a spinoff from a project to reduce flooding in the Roanoke River. Now it’s expanded to where you can soon ride/walk/run for 11 uninterrupted miles along the river, take a jaunt up Mill Mountain or even walk to Valley View. So far, the flood-reduction thing seems to be working out, too.
38. Lindsay Almond spent much of his career as a lawyer and judge in Roanoke before he was elected as governor in 1957. Almond campaigned as a staunch segregationist, but once in office he changed course and moved to end Massive Resistance—Virginia’s refusal at the state and local level to integrate its schools. Almond’s change of heart cost him his reputation: He was reviled both by segregationists for his decision to integrate and by progressives because of his campaign stance.
39. The legacy of Linwood Holton, another governor who spent his early career in Roanoke, rests on more solid ground. In 1970 Holton became Virginia’s first Republican governor since Reconstruction, and he supported integration by placing his children in mostly-black Richmond public schools.
40. Virginia’s mountains boast a four-season climate—an annual cycle that includes a hot summer, cold winter and perfectly balanced spring and autumn that is easy to take for granted but is much desired by the many who live in places where it’s hot all the time or cold all the time, or where seasons break down into only two categories: rainy and dry.
41. Roanoke sure misses Gary Jackson’s presence at the Kirk Avenue Music Hall, where he booked up-and-coming and established musical acts for five years. The good news is that he’s working just down the road at Harvester Performance Center, in Rocky Mount, where he continues to bring in an even higher-profile line-up, including the likes of Indigo Girls, the Wailers, the Steep Canyon Rangers, Arlo Guthrie, Dave Rawlings and Gillian Welch.
42. You can buy local milk or local ice cream, or even have it delivered to your door from Franklin County’s Homestead Creamery in Burnt Chimney.
43. The New River Valley has jumped into the worlds of innovation and entrepreneurship with a splash that’s sent waves north to Roanoke. With support coming from Virginia Tech’s Corporate Research Center and the Co-Lab in Grandin Village, a variety of start-up companies are breaking new ground in the regional economy.
44. Virginia Tech’s inclusion in the Atlantic Coast Conference gives Roanokers a chance to consistently see the best college basketball teams in the country play at Cassell Coliseum. Tech ranks highly in several other ACC sports—the women’s soccer team is nationally ranked, and its football team often appears in the top 25.
45. While many localities have let libraries languish, local governments in the Roanoke Valley have refurbished and reinvented theirs. These new, cutting-edge facilities aren’t just a place to catch up on the latest best seller; they’re also hubs for children and grown-ups alike to meet, play, use computers and find films and audiobooks.
46. Roanoke’s countercultural history is worth remembering and celebrating. Salem Avenue was home to several gay bars before the movement went mainstream (or vice versa): the Park and Backstreet Cafe remain open, after more than three decades each. Another LGBT hotspot was and remains Cuba Pete—the bar attached to the original Macado’s restaurant in downtown Roanoke. Even when LGBT individuals hid their identities, they gathered in a restaurant that’s since become a popular destination for college kids and families alike.
47. Roanoke sits adjacent to the Crooked Road Heritage Music Trail, a formal recognition of western Virginia’s deep connection to traditional mountain music. Check out a dance or performance at the Floyd Country Store, explore the stories behind the songs at the Blue Ridge Institute & Museum, and be sure to catch Ralph Stanley while you still can.
48. The Mountain Junkies call the Roanoke Valley home. Josh and Gina Gilbert started their trail race company in 2007, and it’s attracted a growing number of runners for 5K, 10K, half-marathon, 25K and marathon races at trails in the region’s loveliest places. Whether running the nighttime Into the Darkness Trail Run at Explore Park or screaming down the Star Trail in the Mill Mountain Mayhem 10K, Mountain Junkies are likely running on a trail near you.
49. U.S. Rep. Bob Goodlatte of Roanoke County has served in Congress for nearly a quarter of a century. Love him or hate him, he wields considerable power due to his seniority and status as chairman of the influential House Judiciary Committee, giving the Roanoke Valley an important place on Capitol Hill.
50. Short waterfall trails are the punk songs of hiking: You get a lot of bang for your buck. Hikers will find numerous examples in the Roanoke region, from the Cascades in Giles County, Apple Orchard Falls in Rockbridge, Bottom Creek Gorge in Floyd and Douthat State Park’s Stony Run Trail.
51. Find local-grown food from a variety of farmer’s markets—more of which pop up each year—or through a CSA (Community-Supported Agriculture) share offered through many regional farms or an aggregator like Floyd’s Good Food - Good People.
52. Although Roanoke City Council tore itself asunder in the ’90s and ’00s battling over the fate of Victory Stadium, built in 1942 and demolished in 2006, the city today has two outdoor performance venues. The city-built Elmwood Park Amphitheater has hosted Sheryl Crow, Old Crow Medicine Show and Joan Jett in the last two years, while the newer Dr Pepper Park at the mixed-used Bridges development is just getting going.
53. Salem has laid claim to championship college football since 1993. Each year, it hosts the NCAA Division III Football Championship, more commonly known as the (Amos Alonzo) Stagg Bowl. Roanokers can tailgate and cheer without allegiance, although many have come to love the Mount Union Purple Raiders of Alliance, Ohio, which now have appeared in the game for a decade straight, and won again in December.
54. Find educational opportunities ranging from a classic liberal arts education at Roanoke College and Hollins University to targeted workforce development at New River and Virginia Western community colleges. The region’s higher education system includes a centralized base at the Roanoke Higher Education Center, as well as the nationally renowned land-grant university of Virginia Tech.
55. Thanks to the movie “Lawless” and the book upon which it was based, “The Wettest County in the World,” Southwest Virginia—and Franklin County, specifically—has secured a spot in moonshine history. There are plenty of modern options for drink, too, though, including wineries, breweries and even distilleries—just don’t mix them in the wrong order.
56. After a rainy, rugged 2013, the organizers of Floydfest, a music and arts festival just off the Blue Ridge Parkway, focused on its strengths—a diverse mix of bands in a beautiful setting with a community feel. As a result, last year’s edition felt like a victory lap, with Emmylou Harris, Drive-by Truckers, Shovels & Rope, and Trampled By Turtles. The names already released for 2016 look like another great mix.
57. No matter where you travel in the world, the Mill Mountain Star beckons you. It’s visible on the descent to Roanoke-Blacksburg Regional Airport, and it gleams at motorists along Interstate 581. For those who reside in the Roanoke Valley, it’s a sign that we’re back home at last.