NORFOLK AND ITS NEIGHBORHOOD
Just as New York looks newer than Boston, but is actually older, Norfolk
looks newer than Richmond. Business and population grow in Richmond, but
you do not feel them growing as you do in Norfolk. You feel that
Richmond business men already have money, whereas in Norfolk there is
less old wealth and a great deal more scrambling for new dollars. Also
you feel that law and order count for more in Richmond than in Norfolk,
and that the strict prohibition law which not long ago became effective
in Virginia will be more easily enforced in the capital than in the
seaport. Norfolk, in short, likes the things New York likes. It likes
tall office buildings, and it dotes on the signs of commercial activity
by day and social activity by night. Furthermore, from the tops of some
of the high buildings the place actually looks like a miniature New
York: the Elizabeth River masquerading as the East River; Portsmouth,
with its navy yard, pretending to be Brooklyn, while some old-time New
York ferryboats, running between the two cities, assist in completing
the illusion. In the neighboring city of Newport News, Norfolk has its
equivalent for Jersey City and Hoboken, while Willoughby Spit protrudes
into Hampton Roads like Sandy Hook reduced to miniature.
The principal shopping streets of Norfolk and Richmond are as unlike as
possible. Broad Street, Richmond, is very wide, and is never
overcrowded, whereas Granby Street, Norfolk (advertised by local
enthusiasts as "the livest street in Virginia," and appropriately
spanned, at close intervals, by arches of incandescent lights), is none
too wide for the traffic it carries, with the result that, during the
afternoon and evening, it is truly very much alive. To look upon it at
the crowded hours is to get a suggestion of a much larger city than
Norfolk actually is--a suggestion which is in part accounted for by the
fact that Norfolk's spending population, drawn from surrounding towns
and cities, is much greater than the number of its inhabitants.
Norfolk's extraordinary growth in the last two or three decades may be
traced to several causes: to the fertility of the soil of the
surrounding region, which, intensively cultivated, produces rich
market-garden crops, making Norfolk a great shipping point for "truck";
to the development of the trade in peanuts, which are grown in large
quantities in this corner of Virginia; to a great trade in oysters and
other sea-food, and to the continually increasing importance of the
Norfolk navy yard.
In connection with the navy Norfolk has always figured prominently,
Hampton Roads having been a favorite naval rendezvous since the early
days of the American fleet. Now, however, it is announced that the cry
of our navy for a real naval base--something we have never had, though
all other important navies have them, Britain alone having three--has
been heard in Washington, and that Norfolk has been selected as the site
for a base. This is an important event not only for the Virginia
seaport, but for the United States.
Farmers who think they are in a poor business will do well to
investigate Norfolk's recent history. The "trucking" industry of Norfolk
is said to amount in the aggregate to twelve or fourteen million dollars
annually, and many fortunes have been made from it. The pioneer
"trucker" of the region was Mr. Richard Cox. A good many years ago Mr.
Cox employed a German boy, a blacksmith by trade, named Henry Kern. Kern
finally branched out for himself. When, in 1915, he died, his real
estate holdings in Norfolk and Portsmouth were valued at two million
dollars, all of which had been made from garden truck. He was but one of
a considerable class of wealthy men whose fortunes have sprung from the
same source.
Many of the truck farms have access to the water. The farmers bring
their produce to the city in their own boats, giving the port a
picturesque note. At Norfolk it is transferred to steamers which carry
it to New York, Philadelphia, Boston, Providence, Baltimore and
Washington. Lately a considerable amount of truck has been shipped west
by rail, as well.
Hundreds of acres of ground in the vicinity of the city are under glass
and large crops of winter vegetables are raised. Kale and spinach are
being grown and harvested throughout the cold months; strawberries,
potatoes, beans, peas, cucumbers, cabbage, lettuce and other vegetables
follow through the spring and summer, running on into the fall, when the
corn crop becomes important. Corn is raised chiefly by the peanut
farmer, whose peanuts grow between his corn-rows.
While the banks are "carrying" the peanut farmers, pending their fall
harvest, the activities of the "truckers" are at their height, so that
the money loaned to one class of agriculturist is replaced by the
deposits of the other class; and by the same token, of course, the
peanut farmers are depositing money in the banks when the "truckers"
want to borrow. This situation, one judges, is not found objectionable
by Norfolk and Portsmouth bankers, and I have been told that, as a
corollary, these banks have never been forced, even in times of dire
panic, to issue clearing house certificates, but have always paid cash.
Norfolk has grown so fast and has so rapidly replaced the old with the
new, that the visitor must keep his eyes open if he would not miss
entirely such lovely souvenirs of an earlier and easier life, as still
remain. Who would imagine, seeing it to-day, that busy Granby Street had
ever been a street of fine residences? Yet a very few years have passed
since the old Newton, Tazwell, Dickson and Taylor residences surrendered
to advancing commerce and gave place to stores and office
buildings--the two last mentioned having been replaced by the Dickson
Building and the Taylor Building, erected less than fifteen years ago.
Freemason Street is the highway which, more than any other, tells of
olden times. For though the downtown end of this lovely old thoroughfare
has lapsed into decay, many beautiful mansions, dating from long ago,
are to be seen a few blocks out from the busier portion of the city.
Among these should be mentioned the Whittle house, the H.N. Castle
house, and particularly the exquisite ivy-covered residence of Mr.
Barton Myers, at the corner of Bank Street. The city of Norfolk ought, I
think, to attempt to acquire this house and preserve it (using it
perhaps as a memorial museum to contain historical relics) to show what
has been, in Norfolk, as against what is, and to preach a silent sermon
on the high estate of beauty from which a fine old city may fall, in the
name of progress and commercial growth.
To the credit of Norfolk be it said that old St. Paul's Church, with its
picturesque churchyard and tombs, is excellently cared for and properly
valued as a pre-Revolutionary relic. The church was built in 1730, and
was struck by a British cannon-ball when Lord Dunmore bombarded the
place in 1776. Baedeker tells me, however, that the cannon-ball now
resting in the indentation in the wall of the church is "not the
original."
When I say that St. Paul's is properly valued I mean that many citizens
told my companion and me to be sure to visit. I observe, however--and I
take it as a sign of the times in Norfolk--that an extensive,
well-printed and much illustrated book on Norfolk, issued by the Chamber
of Commerce, contains pictures of banks, docks, breweries, mills, office
buildings, truck farms, peanut farms, battleships, clubhouses, hotels,
hospitals, factories, and innumerable new residences, but no picture of
the church, or of the lovely old homes of Freemason Street. Nor do I
find in the booklet any mention of the history of the city or the
surrounding region--although that region includes places of the greatest
beauty and interest: among them the glorious old manor houses of the
James River; the ancient and charming town of Williamsburg, second
capital of the Virginia colony, and seat of William and Mary College,
the oldest college in the United States excepting Harvard; Yorktown,
"Waterloo of the Revolution"; many important battlefields of the Civil
War; Hampton Institute, the famous negro industrial school at Hampton,
nearby; the lovely stretch of water on which the _Monitor_ met the
_Merrimac_[3]; the site of the first English settlement in America at
Jamestown, and, for mystery and desolation, the Dismal Swamp with Lake
Drummond at its heart. But then, I suppose it is natural that the
Chamber of Commerce mind should thrust aside such things in favor of the
mighty "goober," which is a thing of to-day, a thing for which Norfolk
is said to be the greatest of all markets. For is not history dead, and
is not the man who made a fortune out of a device for shelling peanuts
without causing the nuts to drop in two, still living?
[3] The _Merrimac_, originally a Federal vessel of wooden construction,
was sunk by the Union forces when they abandoned Norfolk. A Confederate
captain, John M. Brooke, raised her, equipped her with a ram, and
covered her with boiler plate and railroad rails. She is called the
first ironclad. While she was being reconstructed John Ericsson was
building his _Monitor_ in New York. The turret was first used on this
vessel. It is worth noting that at the time of the engagement between
these two ships the _Monitor_ was not the property of the Federal
Government, but belonged to C.S. Bushnell, of New Haven, who built her
at his own expense, in spite of the opposition of the Navy Department of
that day. The Government paid for her long after the fight. It should
also be noted that the _Merrimac_ did not fight under that name, but as
a Confederate ship had been rechristened _Virginia_. The patriotic
action of Mr. Bushnell is recalled by the fact that, only recently, Mr.
Godfrey L. Cabot, of Boston, has agreed to furnish funds to build the
torpedoplane designed by Admiral Fiske as a weapon wherewith to attack
the German fleet within its defenses at Kiel.
And yet the modernness on which Norfolk so evidently prides herself is
not something to be lightly valued. Fine schools, fine churches and
miles of pleasant, recently built homes are things for any American city
to rejoice in. Therefore Norfolk rejoices in Ghent, her chief modern
residence district, which is penetrated by arms of the Elizabeth River,
so that many of the houses in this part of the city look out upon pretty
lagoons, dotted over with all manner of pleasure craft. Less than twenty
years ago, the whole of what is now Ghent was a farm, and there are
other suburban settlements, such as Edgewater, Larchmont, Winona and
Lochhaven, out in the direction of Hampton Roads, which have grown up in
the last six or eight years. The Country Club of Norfolk, with a very
pleasing club-house on the water, and an eighteen-hole golf course, is
at Lochhaven, and the new naval base is, I believe, to be located
somewhat farther out, on the site of the Jamestown Exposition.
Norfolk is well provided with nearby seaside recreation places, of which
probably the most attractive is Virginia Beach, facing the ocean. Ocean
View, so called, is on Chesapeake Bay, and there are summer cottage
colonies at Willoughby Spit and Cape Henry. On the bay side of Cape
Henry is Lynnhaven Inlet connecting Lynnhaven Bay and River with
Chesapeake Bay. From Lynnhaven Bay come the famous oysters of that name,
now to be had in most of the large cities of the East, but which seemed
to me to taste a little better at the Virginia Club, in Norfolk, than
oysters ever tasted anywhere. Perhaps that was because they were real
Lynnhavens, just as the Virginia Club's Smithfield ham is real
Smithfield ham from the little town of Smithfield, Virginia, a few miles
distant. On the bank of the Lynnhaven River is situated the Old Donation
farm with a ruined church, and an ancient dwelling house which was used
as the first courthouse in Princess Anne County; and not far distant
from this place is Witch Duck Point, where Grace Sherwood, after having
been three times tried, and finally convicted as a witch, was thrown
into the river.
The several waterside places I have mentioned are more or less local in
character, but there is nothing local about Fortress Monroe, on Old
Point Comfort, just across Hampton Roads, which has for many years been
one of the most beautiful and highly individualized idling places on the
Atlantic Coast.
The old moated fortress, the interior of which is more like some lovely
garden of the last century than a military post, remains an important
coast artillery station, and is a no less lovely spot now than when our
grandparents went there on their wedding journeys, stopping at the old
Hygiea Hotel, long since gone the way of old hotels.
The huge Chamberlin Hotel, however, remains apparently unchanged, and is
to-day as spacious, comfortable and homelike as when our fathers and
mothers, or perhaps we ourselves, stopped there years ago. The
Chamberlin, indeed, seems to have the gift of perennial youth. I
remember a ball which was given there in honor of Admiral Sampson and
the officers of his fleet, after the Spanish War. The ballroom was so
full of naval and military uniforms that I, in my somber civilian
clothing, felt wan and lonely. Most of the evening I passed in modest
retirement, looking out upon the brilliant scene from behind a potted
palm. And yet, when my companion and I, now in our dotage, recently
visited the Chamberlin, there stood the same potted palm in the same
place. Or if it was not the same, it was one exactly like it.
The Chamberlin is of course a great headquarters for army and navy
people, and we observed, moreover, that honeymooning couples continue to
infest it--for Fortress Monroe has long ranked with Washington and
Niagara Falls as a scene to be visited upon the wedding journey.
There they all were, as of old: the young husband scowling behind his
newspaper and pretending to read and not to be thinking of his pretty
little wife across the breakfast table; the fat blonde bride being
continually photographed by her adoring mate--now leaning against a pile
on the pier, now seated on a wall, with her feet crossed, now standing
under a live-oak within the fortress; also there was the inevitable
young pair who simply couldn't keep their hands off from each other; we
came upon them constantly--in the sun-parlor, where she would be seated
on the arm of his chair, running her hand through his hair; wandering in
the eventide along the shore, with arms about each other, or going in to
meals, she leading him down the long corridor by his "ickle finger".
* * * * *
I recall that it was as we were going back to Norfolk from Old Point
Comfort, having dinner on a most excellent large steamer, running to
Norfolk and Cape Charles, that my companion remarked to me, out of a
clear sky, that he had made up his mind, once for all, that, come what
might, he would never, never, never get married. No, never!