The Beginning

My fascination with my hometown began as a child. Maybe it was the beautiful houses, maybe it was the sounds of the mills which I would hear late at night, or maybe it was because I was the grandson of the first president of DCC. Whatever the reason, I have spent years trying to learn more and more about the town where I grew up.

My first insight into the deeper history of Danville came in late elementary school/early middle school. I used to go to my father's office at the Chamber of Commerce where I found some file cabinets full of old newspapers, pictures, and other random things. I would spent entire afternoon reading newspaper articles on the Wreck of the Old 97 alone. But the one thing that truly stands out in my mind is finding a city plan book from, I believe, 1965.

Did you know that there was a proposed Olympic sized swimming pool for Ballou Park? Me neither...at least not until I read that plan book. I still can't picture where they would put it.

Speaking of Ballou Park, there is an interesting anecdote about the roads that run behind Linden Drive, Forest Circle, and to a lesser extent, Parkview Place (Forest Hills). The roads that are closed off, such as the one that runs past the reservoirs used to be well traveled roads. As a matter of fact, that's exactly why they are closed today. Until about 1980, people would spend their Sunday afternoons driving through Ballou Park. Residents of the houses that face the road (Herndon Place), and those whose houses backed up to it (Linden Drive, Forest Circle, and Parkview Place) would have to bear the noise of what was dubbed the Sunday motorcade. What was supposed to be a day of rest and relaxation for those people became a day of constant disturbance. Thus, they petitioned to have the roads closed.

The road in the park that runs behind my old house, after ~19 years of sparse use.
 

Where the road intersects with another closed road. The amount of grass has expanded year after year.

 
I learned this from my own mother, who grew up in the same house in which I grew up. And to a lesser extent, my father who told me that he remembered his first experience with it around the time he and my mother were married (August, 1980).

And thus concludes my first anecdote on the history of Danville.