Viscose Radford Plant-Viscoe Road, Bridge

[NW Mailing List]

AB:
The name change of the road was simply a local thing. That's what it 'gravitated' to over the years. It happens when there is no operating facility to correct it (keep it right). The correct name should have been Viscose. In addition to the original buildings, the property is now an industrial park that can be reached via VA Rt. 114.
The girder bridge you saw was probably the AV bridge. The next bridge down would have been Plum Creek on the main line if you were in Radford Yard. I too have discharged a firearm in Radford Yard (early '60's) but at a quail!
And, yes, you saw the remains (very little by '65) of the tie treating plant, mentioned in a couple of books. It exploded in the early hours of a 1950's morning awakening this writer!
Maybe farmer Jeffries can add something to this.
Charlie Long



-----Original Message-----

>From: NW Mailing List <nw-mailing-list at nwhs.org>

>Sent: Jan 23, 2007 7:58 PM

>To: NW Mailing List <nw-mailing-list at nwhs.org>

>Subject: Re: Viscose Radford Plant

>

>

>The MapQuest image leave me guessing...  Why is the name of the road spelt "Viscoe" rather than "Viscose" ?  The foix paux of the the map maker, or of the political patronage hack in charge of naming roads?

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>There is an interesting website dealing with the Viscose Corporation, put up by one of the descendents of the man who brought the Viscose process here from England.

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>I recall being in Radford one day about 1965, with nothing to do.  As I recall, I was working an away-from-home local, or maybe the Radford-Bluefield Short Run, and staying on the caboose (as most of us did back then.)  In my idle hours, I walked to some place that had been pointed out to me as the former railroad tie processing plant, or perhaps proposed location for an unbuilt tie processing plant.  There was a trackless open deck girder bridge across a creek or river and into the concrete abutments were cast a date in the late 1940s (1946 or 1949, if I recall correctly.)  Being young and deficient on good judgment, I took a pistol shot at the numerals on the northeast abutment, and the bullet riocochetted back in what sounded like very close proximity to my head.

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>Could this be the same place now identified as the proposed Viscose site...?

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>This was about the time that Tom Gravitt, the 70+-year-old clerk in the Radford Station overindulged on his daily ritual of going across the street at lunch hour and knocking off a quart of cold ice cream, and had to be hospitalized.  How in the world anyone could eat a quart of ice cream daily and stay as thin as a rail was always a mystery beyond my comprehension...  Anyone remember Tom?  

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>--adb