Support our Thermal Belt troops

Our daughter brought home a young man, Don, this past weekend, a friend from college. Don seemed to be just a polite, nice young man, until our conversation turned to his current plans.

In November, he will enlist in the Marines. He knows what lies ahead. He wants to serve, to grow up.
We had friends over and everyone who learned of Don’s plans immediately felt a parental instinct. How much we all wish to see him safe and sound, with his own family, ten years from now. He is so young.

My parents’ tight group of childhood friends included a young man named Virgil.
Virgil survived World War II, like my father and our lifelong family friends. But the next generation never knew Virgil. Virgil re-enlisted for Korea, enticed by a pay incentive which he thought he needed to start a family. He died his first day on the line. Five decades later, his buddies still sharply feel the loss.

We recently received a chain email urging us to “support the troops,” noting how while we are in comfort, our servicemen are suffering, away from home, for us. It supposes to shame all who are “anti-war” for “making fun” of soldiers, for “judging” that our servicemen and women are making the world a “worse place.” How absurd.

Well, we can’t think of a single person, for or against the war, who is not adamantly for the men and women who leave the politics to others and simply go.

Sherry Eades and Jenna Marlow have started an effort here in the Thermal Belt that will give us all a chance to show our support. They have launched “Operation Support Your Soldiers,” hoping to compile a list of area servicemen and women, then to hold fundraisers to buy each of them phone cards and Christmas presents. If you have a relative serving, anywhere, call Sherry, (828) 243-9313.

“Support shows they are not alone,” Eades says. “There are people behind them, thinking of them.” Amen. — JB

Another Overmountain Victory

The inaugural work of the newly formed Marjorie M. and Lawrence R. Bradley Endowment Fund of Polk County is quite a feat.

The Bradley Fund, run by the Polk County Community Foundation, has agreed to purchase and thus preserve for public use the historic Alexander’s Ford property.

The 164-acre tract features 5,000 feet of frontage on the Green River and “an exceptionally well-preserved section of a colonial road” once trod by the Overmountain Men in 1780. It is a treasure for Polk County.

It is unclear just how the work of creating a park at Alexander’s Ford will be accomplished. The foundation, famously tight-lipped, has indicated that it would like the county to one day buy the property, finding grants for land acquisition and park development.

The list of potential sources of funds for this project, with national park potential, is extensive: the National Park Service, the N.C. State Historic Preservation Office, the Overmountain Victory National Trail Association (OMVNTA), the Clean Water fund, battlefield protection funding, as well as Rutherford County, to name a few.

It appears, for now, small steps may be taken. The actual Overmountain Victory Trail can be studied and certified, permanent easements put in place, and minimal public uses made of the property, such as scout campouts.

But, to take the larger steps, Polk County will likely need the assistance of a dedicated group of citizens. Perhaps another Friends organization will be formed.

Already, the excitement is spreading. National Park Service Supt. Paul Carson is speaking to the Tryon Rotary Club in November and the OMVNTA is holding its national meeting in Polk County next March.

One day, perhaps, Alexander’s Ford will provide residents and visitors a window into our heritage here on what was once the “edge of Western Civilization.” –JB

New Friends for Harmon Field

Harmon Field needs friends.

Polk County’s one and only multi-purpose park facility has come a long way in the last decade, with numerous improvements and expansions. But there are certainly many more improvements that might be made, if money and public enthusiasm were brought to bear.
That’s where the Friends of Harmon Field can help.

Benny Smith, chairman of the Harmon Field Board of Supervisors, proposed a non-profit corporation be formed to assist Harmon Field in every way, from volunteer clean-up and maintenance days to fundraising for improvement projects. That proposal was approved unanimously last week by the other board members, Karen Killough, Frank Ortiz, Tom Foster and Bennie Goodwin.

The Town of Tryon and Harmon Field board are now taking names of area residents, and a meeting to form the Friends organization will be held in the near future.

The Harmon Field board has exercised a fine stewardship of the field’s special tax district revenues, using these for operations and maintenance. With the help of the Town of Tryon administration, Harmon Field has also won state parks grants and donations for projects, most notably the purchase of the old Tryon Middle School property and former library, now the Harmon Field Community Center. The Hendersonville YMCA is considering placing a YMCA branch at Harmon Field to offer recreational programming, day care and in later phases, perhaps a pool.

In addition to helping establish those facilities at Harmon Field, a Friends group might bring tangible community backing to projects such as a suggested water park “splash pad” or a beach along the river, or perhaps simply a water fountain at the tennis courts.

The library, hospital and Tryon Fine Arts Center have all benefited greatly from a group of Friends. Harmon Field will certainly benefit as well. — JB

This is not politics

We do not believe the charges against Chris Abril are a political conspiracy.

We agree with all of those now lamenting the personal disaster which has befallen a man we have come to know and like. Television and news stories, online comment postings and sidewalk conversations are filled with personal testimonies on behalf of Abril.

However, that this could be a political conspiracy emanating from the office of Abril’s political opponent, Sheriff David Satterfield, as some suggest, stretches credulity.

It is certainly true that there are political manipulators hanging around every courthouse who are perfectly willing to employ slander as a political tool.

That such manipulators might gain access to the power of police authority is the stuff of nightmares and intimidation. If our entire legal system is corrupt enough to turn on a good man just to defeat a local candidacy, to bring false witness against him, then we are all in trouble.

What is happening to Chris Abril involves our state legal system from the top down. Accusers apparently came forward in March. The State Bureau of Investigation investigated and presented a report to the State Attorney General’s Special Prosecutions Division, which took the case to a panel of Polk County citizens, a grand jury. We trust that our fellow citizens, grand jurors, have done their best to be honest and fair to all involved, with full knowledge of their responsibilities to Abril and to his accusers.

We must all remember that the grand jury has determined only that the SBI’s evidence is strong enough that the state should be allowed to proceed to present its case. Polk County citizens will determine guilt or innocence.

Until that day, while the legal system works, we offer up our hopes and wishes for all involved. Innocent, or guilty, we simply wish healing and redemption for Abril and for any who may have been harmed 20 years ago. — JB