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A main artery of southwest Roanoke County began as an agricultural necessity.
Molly Koon
Location
Back Creek section of southwest Roanoke County
Features
U.S. 221, portions of which are named Brambleton Avenue and Bent Mountain Road, weaves through the populous Back Creek section of southwestern Roanoke County following a course determined by the state when the highway was constructed in 1932. From the intersection at Va. 419 (Electric Road), it moves from a dense commercial center south to the foot of Bent Mountain where pastoral views remain much as they were a half century ago.
History
When Robert Poage settled along what was called the Traders’ Path in 1747, he was on the Virginia frontier. The Back Creek area was still part of Augusta County with the county seat at Staunton. The frontier was opened for homesteading in 1730 by the Commonwealth’s Colonial governor. Poage was soon joined by other settlers and over time small villages developed—Cave Spring, Poages Mill, and Haran—clustered with stores, churches, schools, post offices and tradesmen.
By the late 18th century, surveyors had converted the former Traders’ Path into a central road that mostly followed the contours of Back Creek. Road builders were required by Botetourt County (and then in 1838 by Roanoke County) to construct beds at least 15 feet wide with any necessary bridges and allow for “summer roads” used by farmers to access their fields and homes. Tithables, an early form of taxes, were collected from users to pay for the construction and maintenance. The first documented road construction occurred in 1772 when Robert Poage, Leonard Huff and James McKeachy were authorized to survey a road “from Tosh’s Ford to the top of Bent Mountain.” According to Botetourt County records, their road bed was completed in 1773. The road was re-surveyed in 1783. Such activity suggests significant settlement and trade were occurring in the region.
By 1832, the state authorized a charter for the Jacksonville and Bent Mountain Turnpike Company. The company’s purpose was to construct a turnpike between Jacksonville (present-day Floyd) and Cave Spring. The turnpike was to be no less than 15 and no more than 30 feet wide with grades not to exceed three and one-half degrees. By 1849, sufficient capital had been raised for work to commence. The turnpike served the section for a half-century.
Following the Civil War, the Back Creek area became highly developed with orchards. The orchardists were so successful that their apples were sent to New York and Europe. To access these markets by rail, orchardists needed to get their produce to Roanoke, a two-day trip. Even when a rail depot at Starkey was built in the 1890s, poor roads hampered travel. Agricultural commerce was so successful that an electric railway through the region was proposed in 1904 with the chartering of the North Carolina and Virginia Electric Railway Company. The company envisioned a line from Roanoke to Floyd Courthouse. From there, the line would continue south into North Carolina. Though unrealized, investors in Roanoke and Floyd capitalized the project, underscoring the need for better transportation in the section. By the 1910s, the old Bent Mountain Turnpike became a state highway (Route 205) in an effort to address concerns. The highway, however, was prone to flooding from Back Creek and meandered inefficiently along former wagon paths.
Finally, in 1932 the state highway department created what is today’s U.S. 221, using convict labor. The portion of 221 in southwest Roanoke County between Cave Spring and the foot of Bent Mountain was overseen by a Mr. Higginbotham, who also supervised a temporary convict camp near present-day Apple Grove Lane. Previous generations of Back Creek residents recalled Saturday afternoon baseball games at the convict camp as well as the rock-crushing equipment brought in to produce gravel.
The construction of Route 221 enabled the rise of small businesses. Marvin “Fats” Reed operated a gas station and convenience store at the intersection with Martins Creek Road from the 1940s through the 1970s. Just south of Reed’s store was another store and gas station run by the Finnell family, who also opened a swimming pool behind the store in the late 1940s. Maynard Rierson had a store and gas station along the highway just north of Back Creek School for forty years (today’s Country Way), and the Poage family built the Poages Mill Service Station using rocks from Back Creek in the 1930s across from the Poage farm that remained in their family for decades. These stores, along with schools and churches, were landmarks of rural life in the mid-20th Century.
Significance
U.S. 221/Bent Mountain Road has been the main artery through southwest Roanoke County for nearly a century. Cave Spring Middle School (formerly Cave Spring High School), Hidden Valley High School, and Back Creek Elementary School are served by the highway as well as some of the county’s largest subdivisions. Over the past half-century a highway that was created to serve a mostly agricultural region now has high-volume traffic. While the road has remained largely unchanged from its 1932 configuration, the past two decades have prompted needed improvements.
What Happened?
The 1970s and ‘80s were decades of substantial residential development, as family farms and large orchard tracts were converted into subdivisions such as Canterbury Park, Falcon Ridge, Forest Edge, Carriage Hills and Bridlewood, to name a few. With the opening of Va. 419 in 1970, the Cave Spring section of U.S. 221 became highly commercialized necessitating the later widening of the highway to four lanes from 419 to its intersection with Crystal Creek Drive. This four-lane configuration was extended in 2013 to the Cotton Hill Road intersection, a $20 million project that included two bridges and the razing of the 150-year-old Harris home place.
What the future holds for Route 221/Bent Mountain Road is uncertain. Several years ago, Roanoke County purchased the Poage farm. At the time, county officials indicated the site was needed for a new school. There is also a list of anticipated improvements to the highway in the Virginia Department of Transportation’s capital plan, but these may take years to accomplish due to funding constraints.
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