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Several members of the community took time out of their afternoon last Thursday to hear a presentation on the history of the old Rockbridge County Courthouse and Courthouse Square before offering some suggestions on how to improve the latter.
Jesse Lyons, the project manager for the Courthouse Square project, opened the meeting, noting that an advisory committee had been formed to offer some input into the project, consisting of adjacent property owners and representatives of various groups within the city and Rockbridge County, including the VFW and the Blue Ridge Garden Club.
“We decided it would be very important to get as much input as possible from various folks,” he said. “Everyone’s been very supportive and we really appreciate it. It’s been nice to find the partnership, and the property owners have been very interested in an improvement of some kind.”
Rebecca Logan, executive director for Main Street Lexington, which is overseeing the project, told The News-Gazette that the goal was to get as much input as possible, not just from residents of Lexington, but from county residents as well.
“It’s a community space. It’s the county seat, so we want to be mindful that the community has enough input and opportunities for input,” she said. “It’s not just a Lexington city thing. We’re very mindful of that.
“We don’t really know yet exactly what that’s going to look like, which is why we wanted to get the community involved so that we get some input from everybody and it’s not just us making decisions in the dark,” she added.
Following Lyons’ opening remarks, local landscape architect Arthur Bartenstein gave a presentation on the history of the courthouse and showed examples of what other localities had done with their old courthouse buildings to offer possible ideas for what could happen in Lexington.
Prior to the new courthouse being built in 2009 on the corner of Nelson and Randolph streets, a county courthouse had stood at the intersection of Main and Washington streets since the late 1700s. The 1797 building was the town’s third courthouse since being founded in 1777 as the county seat for Rockbridge County. Two or three times a month, members of the community would gather in Lexington for Court Day, which offered a chance for people to socialize, conduct business or even watch the proceedings in the courthouse. In the 1890s, a fourth courthouse was built, this one designed by William McDowell. That building, which still sits on the intersection of Washington Street and Main Street, served as the Lexington- Rockbridge County courthouse until the new one was built.
Most of the people in attendance offered written suggestions for improvements to the square following the presentation. Bob Hopkins, a member of both the VFW and the local George C. Marshall chapter of the Military Officers Association of America, proposed one suggestion during the meeting – moving the World War I cannon, which currently sits on the northern end of the courthouse square, to behind the Veteran’s Memorial on Main Street. Prior to the construction of the memorial in 2000, the cannon served as the war memorial. In its current location, Hopkins noted, the cannon “doesn’t get appreciated much at all.”
“It was brought here to honor Rockbridge County veterans from World War I and stood as the main thing in the veteran’s memorial for another 80 years,” he said, “and it would be altogether fitting and proper for it to be removed from its current location and put on the backside of the Veteran’s Memorial we have today. That would be ideal.” He added that the local veterans’ organizations would be willing to help pay for all or part of the cost of moving the cannon.
Hopkins also expressed concern that the memorial wasn’t being as well maintained as it could be. Unlike the rest of Courthouse Square, the Veteran’s Memorial is owned by Rockbridge County, not the city of Lexington. Hopkins suggested that the county either transfer ownership of the memorial to the city, or work out an agreement with the city to ensure that the memorial is maintained. Lyons told Hopkins that the issue had been raised with the county, though no action has been taken at this time.
Members of the community who would like to offer input on the project going forward will soon be able to do so through the Main Street Lexington website (www.mainstreetlexington. org) until Dec. 1.
