HISTORY OF THE BOTTOM CREEK GORGE COMMUNITY

I'm going to steal today (well, steal with permission) from a lovely book written about the community that used to live on the top of the mountainside on what is now owned and protected forever by the Nature Conservancy, for which most residents (old and new) of Bent Mountain are grateful.  The land owned by Floyd Virginia Land called the Knolls adjoins this protected 1,657 acres that boasts the second highest waterfall in Virginia forming the headwaters of the Roanoke River.

The book was written by Genevieve Craighead Henderson who grew up "on the creek" and is a tribute to her parents, relatives and friends who sacrificed and worked the then remote land, perhaps in a better time.

"Residents of this area have also stood at the top of the mountainside and looked across Bottom Creek Gorge at the beautiful waterfall -- Noah Hall did on summer days as he, with his horse or his hoe, worked out a small corn patch or a few rows of green beans on the hillside opposite the falls and probably wished for a cool dip in the rushing water far below."

"As you stand by the edge of Bottom Creek and watch the clear mountain water rushing by, and try to see the "endangered species" of fish, remember you are not the first to do so.  Bottom Creek boys did this many years ago, some even catching rainbow trout to be cooked by their mothers for supper.  When fishing season opened,many of these same boys stood along the banks of the creek and watched the "city slickers" in the hip waders and fancy fishing equipment pull fish after fish from the dark green pools of water along this creek.  Sometimes the girls got to go fishing, too, but with a string on a pole and a safety pin!  Lucky was the young boy who found a real fishing line and hook that had gotten tangled in the brush along the edge of the creek and left behind by a fisherman with more money than patience. Even more lucky was he when he slipped back to the creek after dark, along paths around the boulders only familiar to the local residents, and threw this new line and hook (and juicy worm that was dug along the patch to the creek) into "the big kettle" or "the little kettle" where the big fish had been hiding all day."

Thanks, Genevieve.  I think I needed to go back to that day of simply fishing today.