Day 3 June 20, 2010
On this day we drove north through the Shenandoah National Forest to Page County, Virginia. An internet cousin of mine had visited our ancestral farm in Page County and sent me photos and a map of the property. I knew it was now called RiverDale Farm and an internet search gave me a possible phone number. The very elderly lady who answered said the property is now owned by her nephews and she would try to get permission for us to go onto the property. Several days later she called me and since she was unable to contact her nephews she said to me, “Honey, you are coming a long way to see this property, so you just drive on in and if a man working his cows tries to stop you, you just tell him Aunt Mary Jane said he was to let you see the cemetery and the fort.” So when we found RiverDale Farm we headed down the mile long entrance to the barns, the houses and the cemetery. At the cow gate (and here was where Aunt Mary Jane emphasized that we MUST not let the cows out or she was in for a heap of trouble), we walked through knee-high grass and dodged a field full of cow patties to get to the cemetery surrounded by a three foot high slate wall. The twelve foot tall monument to our German immigrant ancestor Philip Long and six gravestones were in waist high weeds, but someone had recently taken a machine and cut the stalks & weeds up to the stones for us. Aunt Mary Jane must have sent the boys in with a bush hog!!! After taking many photos and then a moment to enjoy the awesome scenery of the Valley area, we headed back to the car. While Jim brought the car, I walked to the Old Fort Long area which had three or four large barns, a car shed, the Old Fort stone house, the slave quarters and the main house (aka the “mansion”). Although no one was home, the Price family had left all the gates unlocked so we could get to the houses. This was the Long Family history from 1720’s to 1879--the stone fort built about 1750 to protect them from the Indians, the slave quarters where their slaves lived who worked the farm and the big house aka “the mansion” built for my great-great-grandparents, Isaac, Jr. and Elizabeth when they were married in 1856 all surrounded by amazing fields filled with bales of hay. (If we had lived in that stone fort for generations we would have called the brick house a mansion, too!). This property was sold in 1879 when Isaac moved his family to East Belmont in Albemarle, Virginia. Leaving the farm we drove to find the Massanutton Monument honoring the founders of the Valley, including Philip and Paul Long, then the Fort Philip Long plaque. To cool off we toured Luray Caverns then stumbled onto the Heritage Museum where we saw the original lock from the stone house at Fort Long. Many thanks to the Virginians who went above and beyond for us, especially Aunt Mary Jane Price. MA
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