Remembering Cindy Jackson (1969-2023), Comic Book Librarian, Great Co-Worker and Wonderful Friend.

 

Cindy Jackson surrounded by boxes of comic books in Special Collections and Archives, VCU Libraries, ca. 2010. She’s holding the first issue of MAD magazine published in 1952.

 

Remembering Cindy Jackson

I want to divert from Richmond history with a remembrance of Cindy Jackson, my longtime co-worker and friend who died at age 53 in 2023. Cindy would have turned 57 this Tuesday,  June 30^th. Cindy managed the comic book collection in the Special Collections and Archives department at the James Branch Cabell Library of VCU Libraries for over twenty years. When Cindy died, there were several online articles about her role as a comic book librarian. These were terrific tributes full of praise for her knowledge about comic books and how helpful she was to library patrons and those in the comic book community. I will provide some links to these articles and other salutes to her at the bottom of this blog entry. I want to share my thoughts about Cindy, who was a generous, thoughtful person. She had many more interests and hobbies than just comic books.

The Special Collections and Archives department at the James Branch Cabell Library, VCU Libraries, has a vast variety of materials that make up its Comic Arts Collection - one of the largest in the nation. It is one of several subject areas that the department collects and preserves. Other collections include the book arts, rare books and periodicals, Richmond history, the history of health care in Virginia, and VCU's University Archives.

I had been working in Special Collections and Archives for about four years when we hired Cindy as a student worker in 1996. After she graduated from high school in Hopewell, she attended J. Seargent Reynolds Community College and then transferred to VCU majoring in Information Systems. She later received a master’s degree in English. Her first job in our department was organizing and indexing the large collection of comic book related and popular culture periodicals donated to the department by M. Thomas Inge. In the early 1970s, Dr. Inge helped establish the Comic Book collection at the library when he was an English professor at VCU. The Inge collection of periodicals numbered over 500 individual titles. By 1999, she completed the list and it’s available on the Internet Archive HERE. She did a great job.

At this same time, she began working on our reference desk, helping students with questions and retrieving materials for patrons and reshelving books and other materials. She became very knowledgeable of the many different types of collections Special Collections houses. In fact, she knew our book and manuscript collections better than most of the heads of our department we had over the years.

Cindy holding a rare copy of All Negro Comics No.1, published in June 1947. It was one of several rare comic books acquired and donated by a long time donor who had asked Cindy what her top ten list of comic books she wanted for the collection. 

 

Over time Cindy became the de facto coordinator of the comic book collection. She became the main staff member who added newly acquired comic books to the collection and updated our comic book database. When she started in the late 1990s, we had about 10,000 comic books (the number varies according to different sources, but this is the number I remember). This did not include the many books or journals we had about comic books, comic strips, etc. – the full focus of what we eventually called our Comic Arts collection. In 2005 (on Christmas Day), she became a full-time employee at the library. The comic books numbered well over 100,000 by the time she died. She bagged and boarded most of them. She KNEW the collection. We had one wealthy comic book donor who began donating materials to us around 2010. In the last few years before Cindy’s death, he would ask her on an almost annual basis what her top ten wish list was for particular comic books. She would share her list with him and he acquired many of those rare items. He was an avid comic book collector and knowledgeable about comic book history. He told me once that Cindy “knew what she was talking about” with her lists – that she always selected not only rare comic books for him to purchase but important and significant ones in comic book history.  

One of our many rare books in Special Collections and Archives – the 1930 first edition of The Maltese Falcon.

Cindy had many other interests. She was an avid reader – she was Always reading a book - and enjoyed our large collection of rare books. One example was a 1930 first edition (once owned by Hunter Stagg) of Dashiell Hammett’s The Maltese Falcon. She was a fan of Hammett and named the last cat she owned Dashiell. She owned many cats in her lifetime. She was a fan of trashy novels and quality fiction. Some of her favorite professors were ones she met in the English department as she pursed her graduate degree in literature. She told me several times her family owned a first edition of Gone with the Wind.

 

A Calvin and Hobbes comic strip from 1985. Cindy had her own collection of books at home. She was especially fond of her many Calvin and Hobbes books - she loved that comic strip. One of her Calvin and Hobbes books was published in German given to her by her friend, and former co-worker, Kelly Burrows.

She was a big music fan, had many albums and CDs. I remember her saying that her oldest brother, John, turned her on to rock music of the 1960s and 1970s. In high school, she saw a good number of shows by the Dave Matthews Band in Richmond. I know she was a big fan of Nirvana, Foo Fighters, and Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers amongst other bands. She even turned her father on to Tom Petty and Sheryl Crow. Oh yes, she introduced him on to Seinfeld too. She was very southern in that she referred to her house in Hopewell as “Daddy’s house.” After the death of her mother, a longtime nurse at a Hopewell hospital, she lived with her father until he died.  

She was a big fan of the Batman, especially the revamped version that appeared in graphic novels. She was an avid TV watcher and would always recommend shows to me. Her taste ran from comedies like The Big Bang to horror shows like The Walking Dead. Her office was decorated with comic book paraphernalia and other popular culture items – including a growing collection of Funko Pop figures, including one of the character Daryl Dixon of the Walking Dead. She even had a large Batman piece of art created by a local artist specifically for Cindy. It showed Batman peeking into her office window.

Cindy was also a sports fan. She, her father and two brothers enjoyed NASCAR and attended races often at the Richmond Raceway. She liked watching college basketball. Her favorite team was Duke. She loved movies – I think she saw the first Twilight film a good ten times in the movie theater. She confided to me that her favorite film at one time was The Shawshank Redemption.  We even celebrated her birthday one year with a Shawshank Redemption themed birthday lunch.

Cindy loved to cook and share recipes. She especially liked to make baked goods and often shared her recipes with other library staff. She and I often talked about food and what we wanted to get for lunch at work. I remember one year when I kept bringing up how much I wanted homemade, southern style cornbread, she bought me a new iron skillet for Xmas and gave me her recipe for her version of cornbread, which included a tablespoon or two of Duke’s mayonnaise. The gift included all the ingredients needed for the cornbread including a bottle of Duke’s.

She loved her parents and her two brothers. She spoke of them often. And of her niece and sister-in-law. Her brother Stephen would call almost daily at around 2 pm after Cindy’s late lunch so they could catch up on their day.  

In the department, Cindy was the person who ordered our office and archival supplies. She loved going through those kinds of catalogs. She was very efficient and always seemed to get us the best Stuff. I often asked her to address envelopes for me because my handwriting was awful while her penmanship was clear and precise.

Cindy always had cool looking U.S. Postage stamps and was always sending out mail to her friends and pen pals on wonderful looking stationary. She made a great pen pal friend in Australia. As a kid, Cindy was a Garfield comic strip fan, and I know she had and used Garfield postage stamps.

She was friends with many staff members from departments throughout the library including many staff in Starbucks and those working on the Information desk with whom she would chat with as she made her in and out of the building. She was especially fond of Dave Morrison, the building manager, and Gregory Kimbrell, who organized events in the library. She was on a first name basis with professors from several VCU departments and with many of our long time library donors. Edgar MacDonald, the Cabell Scholar who we considered a staff member in Special Collections and Archives, enjoyed his conversations with her. And he relied on her for helping him with his computer problems – he often said she “worked miracles.” She was also helpful to students on their projects – and not just on comic book topics but on other subject areas of we had holdings of in our department. Over the years, we employed dozens of student workers in the department, including interns and part-time workers. Many of them helped Cindy over the years with the management of the comic books and with projects like setting up exhibits. They were lucky to have worked with her too.

Cindy and I spent a lot of time working together at the Special Collections and Archives reference desk, which gave us a chance to get to know each other incredibly well. Whenever I struggled to articulate a vague thought or remember the name of an actor or some well-known personality, she could decipher my meaning from just a few words. It was like she could read my mind.

Her last year was a tough one. She had a stroke in January of 2022 and had to leave work to recover at home. She was in and out of the hospital that year. I hoped her health would improve. I kept wishing a nurse or doctor would spend more time with her to help in her rehabilitation. I last spoke to her just before Christmas in December of 2022. She was in the hospital. She died early the next month. Her brother Stephen was so helpful to her that last year (let alone years before that). And I was so glad that there was an outpouring of love and remembrances of her after death was announced. She would have been very touched and appreciative of the many things people said and wrote about her. I think she leaves two legacies – the Comic Arts collection (which they should name after her) and the friendships she made during her life.

O

The James Branch Cabell Library on the Monroe Park campus of VCU. The Special Collection and Archives department is located on the fourth floor of the library.

 

One of my favorite memories of Cindy was when I would get to the Cabell library early – which was not often -- and see Cindy sitting on the low concrete wall in front of the library not far from Floyd Ave. where she parked. This was usually just before the library opened at 7:30. She would be surrounded by little birds and several squirrels. She would feed them before she entered the library. They would often follow her as she walked down the sidewalk to the library. I told her a few times that she looked like Mother Nature surrounded by happy animals. She liked that.

Often, long time co-workers become good friends. I was lucky to know Cindy, to benefit from her work as a colleague, and to have her as a friend. I still miss her, and I know I am not alone in that feeling. Right now, the Special Collections and Archives department is undergoing a major expansion and renovation to the space it occupies on the fourth floor in the Cabell Library. Cindy used to joke that Special Collections and Archives would keep growing and eventually take over the flour floor – well, she was right. They are close to doing that with these renovations. The department will be closed until 2028. After they reopen, visit the department and ask for a comic book or a graphic novel. Or donate a comic book or a related item in her name. That would be a wonderful way to remember and celebrate her life and work.   

- Ray

Below are links to articles and other online sources about Cindy and her work with the Comic Arts Collection at VCU. 

In early 2023, State Senator Ghazala F. Hashmi (now the Lieutenant Governor) filed a Senate Resolution honoring the life and legacy of Cindy. It's an excellent salute to her work and legacy. You can read it HERE. My guess is that managers at the VCU Libraries' were responsible for sponsoring that effort. 

Later in 2023, a book entitled Comic Books, Special Collections, and the Academic Library was published. It was edited by Kate Morris and Brian Flota, librarians at James Madison University. The book is dedicated to Cindy. The dedication reads:

Dedication

We would like to dedicate this book to Cindy Jackson, a highly respected member of the Comics Librarian community, who passed away at the age of 53 as this book was being completed. In her role at Virginia Commonwealth University, she oversaw the growth of one of the largest and most important academic library comics collections in the United States. Cindy was instrumental in guiding the editors of this book when they initially began collecting comics at James Madison University. She, along with Yuki Hibben and Andrea Kohashi, wrote the first chapter of this book, "Collecting Comics: Transcending Barriers and Building Community."

After Cindy died there were several online articles about her life and work. They included one by VCU News, Cindy Jackson, who oversaw VCU’s Comic Arts Collection, dies at 53 which was very thorough; another by VCU Libraries entitled: Queen of Comics Cindy Jackson, who oversaw VCU’s Comic Arts Collection, leaves legacy that was also good. She used to call herself jokingly the Queen of Comics. The Commonwealth Times published Influential, passionate VCU Comic Arts Collection Specialist dies at 53. There was also an excellent post on Facebook about Cindy that can be accessed HERE. In 2011, Cindy and Celina Williams, a long time worker in Special Collections and Archives who worked with Cindy on the comic book collection, were profiled by Rich Griset in Style Weekly in a cover story called Secret Powers: The massive comic-book collection on the campus of VCU isn’t just one of Richmond’s best-kept secrets, it’s one of the largest in the country. Lastly, VCU News has done several stories on the comic book collection over the years and often they included Cindy in the articles. They can be found HERE. 

“Richmond, on the James River, in Virginia” - An Engraving from "The Slave States of America" published in 1842.

 

“Richmond, on the James River, in Virginia” appears opposite page 413 in James Silk Buckingham’s second volume of The Slave States of America (published in London by Fisher, Son & Co. in 1842). Buckingham (1789-1855) was a British journalist and social reformer. The Slave States of America serves as both a travelogue and a critique of the American institution of slavery published just decades before the Civil War. One chapter of the book, about 20 pages, devotes itself to describing life in Richmond. Although published in 1842, Buckingham's travels in the south, including Richmond, took place primarily in 1839. 

Image from the Contents of the book showing subjects discussed in the chapter on Richmond. 

Read the chapter on Richmond HERE.

This steel engraving print of the city was composed by William Henry Brooke (1772-1860) - his name appears on the bottom left of the image. F.S.A. indicates he was a "Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries of London." 

The engraver was William Henry Capone (active c. 1832–1855). His name is seen on the bottom right. Capone was an English line engraver and printmaker and specialized in travel drawings and topographical sketches into steel plate engravings. 

From left to right one can see: Benjamin Henry Latrobe's Virginia State Penitentiary building, Robert Mill's Richmond City Hall, and Thomas Jefferson/Charles-Louis Clérisseau's Virginia State Capitol. 

There are two different copies of Vol. 2 of The Slave States of America available on the Internet Archive. The image above is taken from THIS version - which is listed on the site as "The slave states of America [microform]." A second version, simply titled "The slave states of America" is available HERE. The print seen in the first version is a better quality image although its cropped. You can see the entire print in the second version but it has a good amount of foxing. 

I hope you follow the link and read the description of the city. In the future I will post an essay on Buckingham's visit to Monumental Church. 

- Ray

Where was the Marshall Reservoir?

A once-infamous landmark has disappeared entirely.

In the early 1800s, the municipal water supply of the city of Richmond was best described as crude. Water for homes ran from a series of springs in the hillsides (two of these springs were in Capitol Square) or was provided by wells dug in backyards or street corners around the city. Any water that was transported was conveyed in wooden pipes made of hollowed logs. In 1829, Richmond hired Philadelphia engineer Albert Stein to design a new water system for the city using the most modern technology, and a site for a new reservoir was found on high ground just west of Hollywood Cemetery in what is today the Randolph neighborhood.

Albert Stein (1785-1874) was the Philadelphia engineer who designed Richmond’s nineteenth-century water system. From Watering the City of Richmond, 1930.

The north side of what was named the Marshall Reservoir was decorated with walks and beds, plantings, and shade trees. A reporter from a local newspaper was pleased at the result after touring it in 1870:

 

The Marshall reservoir-grounds, in charge of Mr. Baker, are in good condition and improving. The place is a delightful one to spend a hot afternoon. There, in the Summer-house, fanned by the breezes from the river, gladdened by the forest green of Hollywood on one hand and fields of grain on the other…one may sit in peace and be reinvigorated and refreshed.

 

Lystander Rose was appointed keeper of the reservoir, and he continued the policy of beautification. The public wasn’t permitted to walk along the top of the reservoir walls, but considerable gardens and paths around the base of the impoundment were clearly enjoyed by Richmonders and improved the appearance of the otherwise hulking structure.

 

Illustration from the Richmond Dispatch, May 7, 1885, showing the location of Marshall Reservoir west of Hollywood Cemetery, the adjoining smallpox hospital, the “Dead House,” and cemetery where 150 smallpox victims were buried. Note the series of walkways and beds along the Ashland Street side of the reservoir

 

Keeper Rose always started his day at Marshall Reservoir by walking around the top of the embankment and looking for debris that might have collected in the water overnight. His vexed expression must have changed to horror when he made his way toward something floating at the far end of the pool on the morning of March 14, 1885. On investigation, it was the body of a very pregnant woman named Lillian Madison. Rose’s reservoir would soon become nationally famous as the murder scene in the trial and eventual execution of Lillian’s cousin, Thomas Cluverius, for her death. As a promising young lawyer, Cluverius would be ruined by scandal if it became known he was the father of his 23-year-old cousin’s child.  He lured Madison to the reservoir, punched the weakened woman in the head and threw her in the water. The name of Richmond’s old reservoir would forever be associated with the story of the young man and his hapless cousin who died with their child. In the aftermath of the horrific murder, authorities agreed that would be an excellent time to drain and clean the reservoir, and tons of accumulated mud – the same mud found clenched in Lillian Madison’s fists - was removed, the walls and floor of the brick-lined pool were washed, and the reservoir refilled.

 

The aged Marshall Reservoir receives its second cleaning since 1832. From the Richmond Times-Dispatch, August 24, 1910.

 

In the nineteenth century, one of the few tools authorities had to combat the smallpox epidemic was isolation of both the living and the dead victims of this disease. As if the Cluverius murder didn’t cast enough melancholy over this lonesome corner of the city, adjoining Marshall Reservoir to the east on the Clark Springs property was the smallpox hospital. This building was part of Richmond’s rudimentary health care system, administered in various hospitals and homes around the city. The facility included a “dead house” which held the bodies of those who succumbed to the disease until they could be buried, and in the far corner of the property, a cemetery for smallpox victims. In 1885, a reporter described the cemetery as “Here, 150 white headboards stare you in the face. At best, on the brightest day, it is a lonely place.” That cemetery was mentioned in a Richmond newspaper as late as 1953, but gives no clue as to what, if anything, was done with the bodies of the smallpox victims. The Richmond City Council ordered that the smallpox hospital building itself be burned down in 1886. “The people of that section will rejoice that the pest-house (and eyesore) has been removed,” commented the Times-Dispatch.

 

This slight rise, now the Clark Springs School ballfield with its one, massive magnolia tree, is the approximate location of the Marshall Reservoir. In the foreground, broken bricks litter an adjacent vacant lot.

 

The reservoir in Byrd Park was completed in 1876, but Marshall Reservoir still complemented the larger facility by serving the growing West End of Richmond. By 1911, however, the walls were exhibiting leaks and the old reservoir was said to present a threat to nearby structures. Three years later, engineers from the National Board of Fire Underwriters appeared before City Council and urged the abandonment of Marshall Reservoir if only for fire safety reasons. The old impoundment was becoming inadequate to properly supply water pressure. The reservoir was still operating in 1921 when it reopened to the public after being closed during World War I. “The grounds afford a beautiful park for people of the neighborhood and a delightful and safe place for the children to play,” reported a newspaper.

After almost a hundred years of service, Marshall Reservoir was finally taken off the city water system and drained in 1923, but the site immediately came to the attention of backers of a new stadium for the city. A plan was put forward to remove the western wall of the reservoir and expand it in that direction and use the remaining three walls as the base for stadium seating. This proposal was debated for a couple of years, but the theatricality of the site was not lost on another organization: the Klan. On August 27, 1927, Richmond Klan No. 1, Knights of the Ku-Klux Klan held an “initiatory ceremony” in the drained reservoir. “The event will be a public affair, provisions having been made for those interested to line the wall of the reservoir, while the work of the candidates is being conducted in the bowl of the reservoir.”

 

The Klan takes advantage of the amphitheater-like dry reservoir to stage a rally. Richmond Times-Dispatch, August 27, 1927. 

In the 1930s, and with the advent of Depression-era programs like the Civil Works Administration (CWA), Americans were able to stave off financial ruin and find jobs and, as a result, Richmond benefited greatly from the CWA work done in its parks and cemeteries. “Why, we are now tearing down the old Marshall Reservoir at Harrison and Dance streets, something we have wanted to do for a long time but lacked the money,” reported a director of Parks and Administration in 1934, who added, “About 250 men are working on this.” Dirt from the reservoir walls was used to partially fill Shields Lake, which was judged dangerously deep for a public swimming facility. Hundreds of cubic yards of the material filled gullies and valleys in nearby Riverview Cemetery, and tons more was hauled to Monroe Park in a renovation of the grounds. The eventual loss of CWA funding meant a stop to the work, leaving the south wall still standing for some time, but that, too, finally disappeared with the wheelbarrows and dump trucks.

Any mention of the Marshall Reservoir invariably included references to the 1885 murder of Lillian Madison. Richmond News Leader, February 9, 1934. This archival image was digitally repaired to reduce noise and sharpen details using artificial intelligence.

 

The now-flattened reservoir property was made into Clark Springs playground and served generations of Richmond kids until it was announced a new 600-pupil elementary school would be built on the site. The new Clark Springs School opened in September 1967.

So, where was the Marshall Reservoir? The once-massive embankments have been completely removed and virtually no trace remains of its 20-foot walls. Finding the site is complicated by the changes to this part of Richmond. Reservoir Street, now South Harrison Street, no longer follows the path it did in the early 1900s, and several of the small neighborhood streets that once surrounded the reservoir to the west are completely gone.

By juxtaposing old maps with modern ones and using the slight bend in what was called Ashland Street (now Lakeview Avenue), we can locate the site of Marshall Reservoir. Today South Harrison Street (formerly Reservoir Street) curves through the site, with the western half covered by houses and apartments and the eastern half by the outfield of the baseball field at Clark Spring School and a part of Riverview Cemetery.

 

On top, a 1920 map of Richmond, on the bottom, an aerial view from Google Earth, showing the approximate location of the vanished Marshall Reservoir. The large building with a white roof is Clark Springs School, and to the right of that are the roadways of Hollywood Cemetery.

Today, beyond the school ball field, near the corner of Dance Street and South Harrison Street stands a large, lone, magnolia tree. It is an attractive idea that it is a survivor of the decorative plantings and part of the landscaping that turned such a functional piece of city equipment into an attraction. Adjacent to the ballfield, a city-owned vacant lot has broken bricks embedded in the grassless surface, and it isn’t too much of a stretch to imagine this is debris left from the lining of the reservoir.

Even with the complete removal of Marshall Reservoir, what transpired here makes this empty area even more melancholy. The thought of Lillian Madison, pregnant and exhausted, looking up through the snow at the black bulk of the reservoir looming in the distance and hoping this foreboding location was somehow going to be her salvation is heart-wrenching. Marshall Reservoir may be utterly erased from our cityscape, but the memory of what developed after Keeper Rose walked its perimeter on that cheerless March morning in 1885 will always be a part of Richmond’s long and colorful history.

 

-Selden

 

The Shockoe Examiner explored the murder of Lillian Madison at the Marshall Street Reservoir in a story in 2010.

 

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Richmond’s Short-Lived Airfield in the West End: The Meteoric History of Westview Airport

Richmonders, like most Americans, had few illusions as to the path to war the world was taking in 1941. The largest headline on the New Year’s Day issue of the Richmond Times-Dispatch screamed, “Hitler Promises Reich Total Victory in 1941.” By June, Richmond papers were filled with stories reflecting the coming tide of disruption, conflict, shortages, and for many, the loss of a family member in a land far away. Maps printed amid the headlines helped readers follow the waves of German forces that seemed to be pressing all over Europe.

One concerned Richmonder was Matt P. Will, who was a real estate developer whose can-do motto was “Where there’s a Will, there’s a way to build.” He subdivided and built large projects in the West End such as Glenburnie, Sauer’s Garden, River Road Hills and homes in the wonderfully self-named Willway Gardens.

 

The unique signage of one of Matt Will’s 1940s developments (now known as Willway Avenue) is still in place beside Patterson Avenue.

 

Born in 1897, Will served in the Navy in World War I and was head of the civil air patrol in Richmond in World War II. In addition to his extensive real estate ventures, his military background and his interest in aviation, Will saw a practical need for airfields located on the outskirts of Richmond. These small air strips would provide the basic pilot training that a war in Europe would soon demand. They could also act as assets to the Richmond’s largest airport, Byrd Field (now Richmond International Airport) and be highly useful in the case of aborted takeoffs or emergency landings. Will also may have seen a small airport as a valuable asset to his developments in the future, perhaps imagining a post-war day where commuter traffic by private plane to other cities would be served by small, suburban airfields like his.

A rare 1941 image shot from a passing plane by an amateur filmmaker, showing cars and an airplane parked around the two-story control tower at Westview Airport. From Abandoned & Little Known Airfields: Virginia, a valuable resource for researching vanished airfields all over the country.

In February 1941, the Richmond Times-Dispatch reported that the new Westview Airport, located on high ground near Horsepen Road, was ready to open. Matt Will was now listed as the President of Westview School of Aviation. Plans included a “passenger air station” with repair shops, hangars for storing planes, and a 1900 ft. runway. Will was careful to note that about a third of the students in his school were enrolled to prepare for service in the military. The new airport officially opened June 15, 1941, bringing the total number of Richmond airports to five: Byrd, Central, Hermitage, Westview, and Westwood.

Matt Will had a wonderful public relations opportunity in July 1941 with the announcement that the largest convention of the nation’s model airplane enthusiasts, contestants, and designers would meet in Richmond and fly their planes at Westview Airport. A variety of dignitaries would attend along with what was projected to be 10,000 airplane fans. Among them were the executive secretary of the Academy of Model Aeronautics, a group from the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics, past flying champions, and perhaps not surprisingly, interested representatives from the military. The one-day event on September 9, 1941, brought 10,000 contestants from all over the Eastern United States and was judged a huge success, highlighting local flyers and their planes, the advantages of small airports, and promoting the model plane sport. The event at Westview Airport also drew the interest of many young men to aviation – an important development in the face of a looming war.

Perhaps Westwood Airport’s finest hour: a major meeting and competition of model aviation enthusiasts that brought thousands to Matt Will’s airfield in 1941. Notice the airport control tower in the distance on the left. Richmond Times-Dispatch, April 8, 1941.

Not everyone was delighted with having Will’s airport in their area. A letter to the Editor of the Times-Dispatch the same September as the model plane convention called Westview “A menace to the welfare of several thousand people around it,” and attacked the violation of Henrico County zoning laws, claiming the construction and use of the facility were out of code and illegal. Sides were drawn up around the controversy, with the American Legion joining the nearby Rollingwood and the Westhampton Civic Associations endorsing the idea of Westview being used for military training for the duration of any crisis. Letters to the Editor in Richmond newspapers reflected both outraged homeowners and appeals to patriotism in the vital training of young pilots

Across the river in Chesterfield County, community groups near Bon Air steadfastly fought a proposal to build an airfield near Huguenot Road and successfully used the zoning issue to prevent county approval. September 1941 also saw the U.S. Army take control of Byrd Field, forcing private flight instructors to fly to Westview and leave their planes there, no doubt to the increasing consternation of local residents. Matt Will’s personal enthusiasm for aviation may have dimmed a bit after he wrecked his own plane on the edge of the Westview airfield one afternoon in September 1942, but nevertheless scrambled unhurt from the wreckage.

The unrelenting zoning issue finally brought the end to Will’s airport. The last straw was the strong opposition to the facility voiced by the residents of Duntreath, a tiny but apparently influential neighborhood consisting of several blocks of homes clustered around the Tuckahoe Presbyterian Church. After a lifetime of only sixteen months, Westview Airport was dead. A small article in a Richmond newspaper noted on October 12, 1942, that all operations had ended and the airplanes belonging to the Westview aviation school had been removed to other airfields. All private instruction by the training school had ceased. The Richmond News Leader soon reported, “Matt P. Will, president of the Westview School of Aviation, also announced that in accordance with the orders of Henrico County Engineer Tazewell Ellett, work on tearing down the hangars at the field was completed today.” The buildings were hauled off, the runways became overgrown and the West End’s airport was largely forgotten, but Westview had made its small contribution to aviation in Richmond.

A map roughly locating the single strip of the Westview Airport, aligned with Mallory Road in the area behind the Home Depot at Broad and Horsepen roads. From Virginia Airports: A Historical Survey of Airports and Aviation from the Earliest Days, by Vera Foster Rollo, PhD, and Norman L. Crabill, (Richmond: Virginia Aeronautical Historical Society, 2003).

The end of World War II in 1945 saw servicemen and women flooding home, producing a national housing shortage and subsequent construction boom. With 1,600 buildings permitted in the city in 1946, construction in Richmond reached its highest peak since 1924. “Another major housing development on the old Westview Airport property on Horsepen Road is now well under way,” reported the Times-Dispatch in July 1949, “and will be completed sometime this Winter.” The new development of 384 apartments and homes would be called “Crestview,” perhaps in recognition of the plateau Matt Will had chosen for his airport before the war.

In addition to apartments, dozens of houses were constructed in “Crestview,” like this house which still stands on the corner of Vanderbilt Avenue and Harvard Road. It is shown here in its original 1947 Henrico County real estate record. This home is typical of the development that swept over the Westview Airport site during the post-World War II building boom.

The level, open acreage inherent to airfields was ideal for developers as the population of Richmond and the surrounding counties swelled, overtaking what was once rural land. Today, all of Richmond’s early little airports have disappeared. Hermitage Airport was finally consumed by suburban homes. The Shockoe Examiner recounted an unusual sort of airplane crash in Richmond’s West End of a flight that originated at Hermitage Airport in 1945. 

Today, there is no trace of the considerable facilities of Central Airport, which was near Mechanicsville. The site of the little Parnell Airport, which was south of Richmond near Bells Road, is now covered with warehouses. There were airstrips on large estates outside of Richmond, and the Virginia State Police once operated their own airfield at their headquarters on Midlothian Turnpike, but these are all either overgrown or completely obliterated by new construction.

This commons area behind “The Village at Horsepen” development is probably the site of the now utterly erased Westview Airport.

The apartment blocks that were hastily constructed after World War II at Crestview have been removed, but many of the small frame and brick homes in the neighborhood remain. The land where the apartments stood has been again scrubbed clean and replaced by a development called “The Village at Horsepen.” Behind the new buildings a six-acre recreation area spreads over a plateau – probably the same area picked by Matt Will as ideal terrain for his airport. Where a control tower, extensive hangars and garages once stood, today there is only a passing jogger and fitness trails. Where once the throaty roar of airplanes racing down the runway filled the air, today there is only the sound of children playing in the distance.

- Selden

 

George Seay (1888-1961), Iceman - One of the last Richmond Ice Wagon Delivery Men.

The 700 block of E. Baker Street in Richmond's Jackson Ward. The image shows George Seay, Richmond ice wagon delivery man and Nellie, the horse, August 1956. Image by Edith K. Shelton from her collection of photographs and slides housed at the collection of the Valentine Museum. 

If you are a fan (and member) of the Facebook group “Old Images of Richmond," you might be familiar with the Richmond images taken by Edith K. Shelton (1898-1989). Christopher B. Coleman is the moderator of the Facebook group and often posts images taken by Shelton. These street scene images by Shelton are found on the Valentine Museum’s Collection Database search page where one can search the many collections of the Valentine. Shelton’s collection of images (dating from the 1940s through the 1970s including 1,600 black and white photos and 3,000 Kodachrome slides) were donated to the Museum in 1991 and are available online thanks to the Valentine. Coleman sometimes pairs images from the Shelton collection with images of what that scene looks like today. Older buildings from the original Shelton images are routinely replaced by new buildings or parking lots. Shelton's images give us a glimpse into Richmond's past. The collection documents the city's architecture and streetscape. It is a treasure trove for researching the city's history. 

Some of the most popular Shelton images are the ones that include merchant wagons pulled by horses or mules. Of those, the 1950s color images of “Ice Man” George Seay and his horse Nellie are my favorites. The images of his colorful wagon on the city streets can make you feel like you have been transported back in time. Seay delivered ice to the homes and merchants that still needed large blocks of ice. This line of work had all but disappeared by the 1930s and 1940s when most people in Richmond had replaced their ice box with electric refrigerators. I wondered who this man was - so I did a little digging into various records (city directories, census records, etc.) and old newspapers available online.   

 

The 700 block of N. 9th Street shows an ice wagon driven by George Seay and pulled by Nellie, March 1956. Image by Edith K. Shelton, Valentine Museum. Shelton documented her work with note cards for each image and recorded the date, location, and other data which are included in the Valentine's searchable database. 

George Seay (1888-1961)

George Seay probably first came to the attention of most Richmonders in a column by Charles McDowell, Jr. (1926-2010) in the July 28, 1957 issue of the Richmond Times Dispatch. McDowell was a longtime reporter and popular columnist for the newspaper. He had a national audience as well as a contributor to several national television shows on PBS.

In his column, McDowell reminds his readers about a previous column ["Richmond, Never a One-Horse Town," Richmond Times-Dispatch, July 14, 1957] where he wrote about the two most commonly produced horse-drawn ice wagons that were once often seen on Richmond streets. One source of these wagons was the ornately colorful Knickerbocker wagons made in Philadelphia by the Knickerbocker Ice Company. Another source of ice wagons in Richmond were made by local carriage maker Julius A. Grasberger (1860-1929) who operated his company from the late 1880s until the mid-1920s. His wagons were also colorful and attractive. McDowell writes in the July 28th column:

"Now, two weeks later, we know that a horse-drawn ice wagon is still making its rounds every day in old Jackson Ward, It definitely isn't a Knickerbocker and it almost definitely isn't a Grasberger, but it is a horse-drawn ice wagon 30 or 35 years old. The faded lettering and decorations on its sides show the fancy influence of earlier wagons, however.

The wagon is operated by an independent seller of ice named George Seay and is pulled by a pleasant gray horse named Nelly [Shelton spelled the horse's name Nellie]. Mr. Seay buys his ice every day, and bought the wagon itself several years ago, from the Richmond Ice Company (which relies on trucks for its own deliveries).

Mr. Seay said he preferred his horse and wagon to a truck for delivering ice. Asked why, he said, "Because I can use Nelly to plow, too." He and Nelly do plowing for a number of fairly regular customers on the outskirts of the city.

Although he knows the wagon was old when he bought it, Mr. Seay hasn't looked into its pedigree or worried much about it. But J. A. Woodson, who has worked for the Richmond Ice Company for 25 years, has some ideas about the wagon. He is sure it isn't a Knickerbocker and he is pretty sure it isn't a Grasberger. He thinks it was built by the Richmond Ice Company itself, probably about 30 or 35 years ago." -Charles McDowell, Richmond Times Dispatch, July 28, 1957.

This was the original image that appeared with the Charles McDowell column from 1957. The image was reproduced in the Richmond Times Dispatch on Sept. 25, 2018. 

Here is another view of George Seay, his ice wagon and Nellie. This is from the Library of Virginia's Adolph B. Rice Studio Collection - many of the images in the collection are available online Here. The image in the collection is labeled as "Horse and Richmond Ice wagon" with the date "January 9, 1958."

Above is a newspaper advertisement for the City Ice Delivery Corporation from the April 26, 1925 issue of the Richmond Times Dispatch. Their motto, "Try Our Service, It Will Please You," which appears on top of the wagon is also seen on one side of Seay's wagon in many of Shelton's images. It appears on other wagon vendors in the collection. According to newspaper accounts, the company was established in 1920 and was a consolidation of a few different ice companies in Richmond. In just a few years, after another merger of ice companies, it became part of the Richmond Ice Company, a firm that lasted a few decades. It was this company, the Richmond Ice Company, that Seay bought his ice from. 

An ad for the City Ice Delivery Corp. from the Feb. 15, 1920 issue of the Richmond Times-Dispatch. The ad. shows 27 men, all whom appear to be white, who delivered ice for the company. Each man had  different wagon route in the city. The text of the ad includes: "Our wagons are now covering every sector of the city regularly, and we have a special delivery service to take care of hurry-up phone orders." The wagons would be replaced with trucks over the course of the next two decades. The need for delivery men reduced as more and more people acquired electric refrigerators. 

George L. McGee, a Richmond iceman, was profiled in an article by Bill Marmon entitled "Richmond Keeps Share of Cooling Nostalgia - Hark, the Iceman Cometh, but Image Altered" that was published in the July 26, 1961 issue of the Richmond News Leader. The article begins with:

The old-time ice industry is melting away.

The day of the iceman with couple of blocks of house-to-house residential customers is past. Home refrigeration and automatic vending machines are gradually making his job obsolete.

The article goes on to say that the Richmond Ice Co. ended regular iceman delivery routes in 1956 but still sold ice to "about 30 independent peddlers" (like George Seay) who had heir own routes. McGee began his work as an ice man in 1920 with his own horse and wagon route. He replaced his wagon for a truck in 1950.

"The business is not what it used to be," said McGee. Some icemen resent the presence of the vendors but McGee said, "Icemen can't possibly cover the whole city. The vendors are good for the ice business."

Shelton's images of iceman and other wagon vendors is another way her collection documents the city's past. The color images are especially appealing and might offer a more accurate portrayal of the city and of the men and women seen in those images. 

There are at least six images in the Valentine Museum online database that are labeled showing George Seay, his ice wagon, and his horse Nellie. But there are more images by Shelton of ice men with horse drawn carriages that are not labeled as having Seay in them. Some appear to be Seay, while others are labeled as other sellers of ice or different wares. 

This image from the Shelton collection is dated circa 1945 of a horse drawn wagon at the corner of Harrison and Franklin. Shelton wrote on the back of the image "E15-3 / S.E. Harrison + Franklin / Berkley Apts." There is no mention of Seay in her notes on this image but the wagon seems to match the one used by him in other images. It could be Seay but with a different horse. 

This image by Shelton is labeled 1013 St. James Street, in Jackson Ward, and dated April 1956. Shelton does not indicate the driver or horse but it certainly appears to be Seay and his horse Nellie. It is another example of several images in the collection that might include Seay but lack that notation. 

Records on Ancestry.com (birth, death, and marriage records, census data, military records, city directories, etc.) and digitized historical newspapers helped me find a little more about Seay. 

George Seay was born Dec. 22, 1888 in Amelia County, Virginia. The 1900 census lists seventeen-year-old George living with his parents, Warner Seay (1859-1918) and Ella Taylor Seay (1867-?), and with his five brothers and one sister. They were living in "Leigh, Amelia, Virginia" - which is in the western part of Amelia County, near Route 616 (S. Genito Road). His father's occupation is listed as "Farm Laborer." Maybe the Seay family lived on a farm.

The 1910 census lists George, age 24, living at his father's house in "Giles" on Genito Road in Amelia County. This is most likely Giles Mill, a rural neighborhood 10 miles north of Amelia Court House, the county seat of Amelia County. George is listed as a laborer. He is living there with his wife, Amy Wiley (1889-?), whom he married in Richmond in March of 1910. The state marriage register document lists his occupation as "factory hand."

Seven years later, George was inducted into the army on Oct. 29, 1917. He was initially assigned to the 155th Depot Brigade at Camp Lee, near Petersburg, where the brigade underwent basic training and processing. The brigade was transferred to Company C, 367th Infantry Regiment, part of the 92nd Division, a segregated African American unit. The 367th Infantry served in France during World War I and were known as the "Buffaloes." George served overseas from Oct. 1918 to March 1, 1919. 

One interesting record available on Ancestry.com is entitled "U.S. Army Transport Service Arriving Deporting Passenger Lists, 1919-1939" named the ship that brought Seay and other troops in his regiment back from France. The record states that George returned to the United States (they landed in Brooklyn) on March 1, 1919 aboard the ship the SS Sobral . He was discharged March 25, 1919. 

A state divorce record shows he divorced his wife for "desertion" in July of 1927 after 17 years of marriage. They were living in Richmond by this time. I could not determine when he first moved to Richmond. He hardly makes any appearances in city directories. It appears he never had any children. The 1940 census states that he had lived in New York City in 1935. That record also said he was married, but I found no evidence that he married again. His occupation in the 1940 census is listed as a laborer in "building construction." His draft registration card from 1942 lists him living in Richmond and as unemployed. 

In the 1950 census, he is listed as a widower and his occupation as "Ice Man" for a "Retail Ice Co." That is the earliest indication he was a ice delivery man. 

Image from the 1950 census listing George Seay's Occupation and Industry.

George died at the age of 72 on Dec. 8, 1961. His death certificate listed his last occupation as "Huckster." He died from cancer at the "Veterans Hospital," most likely the McGuire V.A. Hospital in Richmond. His obituary from the Dec. 12, 1961 issue of the Richmond Times-Dispatch reads:

SEAY - Departed this life Dec. 8, 1961, George Seay, of 702 North at Sixth St. He is survived by two brothers, Robert Seay and Warner Seay; two sisters, Mrs. Nora Bobitt and Mrs. Emma Crump; devoted friend, Miss Merdith Thomas; eight nieces, five nephews, one sister-in-law, other relatives and friends. Remains rest at the A. D. Price, Jr.. Funeral Home. Funeral services will be held Wednesday, 2:30 P. M., from Flower Hill Baptist Church, Amelia, Va. Interment church cemetery. Family and friends kindly assemble at the funeral home Wednesday, 12:45 P. M. 

George Seay was buried not far from where he was born. The Flower Hill Baptist Church building in Amelia Court House still stands but I am not certain if the congregation is active.

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There are other men identified in the Shelton image collection using horses and wagons delivering ice, coal, fish, etc. They too deserve some attention. I may profile some of those other men in a future post. 

Thanks to the staff at the Valentine Museum for answering my questions about the Shelton Collection. Their Collection Database search page is worth exploring. 

-- Ray B.