Raining Apples

Not many peaches were picked on that hot and rainy August day, so we were able to leave the packing house early that evening. I was only eight, and you can call it child labor, but my parents taught me about responsibility and having a work ethic early in life. I will always love them for that!

As we drove home, my mother passed a man walking up the road. He was known as the local drunk and with the rains she commented that she should stop to pick him up, but she passed him by thinking that he'd seek shelter with a friend a little further up the road. Good thing she did, because his house would be swept away later that night by the flood waters brought to us courtesy of Hurricane Camille, which had been downgraded earlier that day to a tropical storm.

My father went to bed that night expecting to get the crews out early to catch up on the peach harvest. The migrant crew would also be arriving, so they would be a much needed help. I went to sleep as well, no worries as I was only eight.

At daybreak my parents woke my sister and me to tell us to look out the window that they needed to explain to us what had happened that night. Huh? As I looked out the window across the valley that had been peach and apple trees, there was a roaring river. I remember thinking that this was what the Mississippi River must look like. A few years later, I saw the Mississippi and was disappointed. How does a little creek that you can step across become a raging river overnight?

My parents explained that we had had a lot of rain and the area had flooded. Since the storm had knocked out our electricity, they had no idea of how bad the flood was elsewhere. We lived at the beginning of the valley and the creek. They were very concerned about the people downstream.

We walked along the higher fields and ridges to get to our neighbor's house about a half-mile away. We found that they were okay, but the valley looked much worse as the creek built momentum going downstream. My father sent the women and kids back to our house and the men continued trying to walk out of the valley. That evening the men returned saying that the destruction was horrific, many homes were lost and people were missing.

The following day, the men hiked across the mountain hoping that the otherside where our main orchards were would be in better shape and that they could get our bulldozer and push in some sort of path up the five mile stretch where we lived, known as Davis Creek. Where Davis Creek met US 29. Photo courtesy of Tom Gathright I know my mother was worried and we watched hoping to see the men that evening. In the dark we saw some lights and knew that they had made it back. They brought back a generator and we were able to save much of our food supply. I'm sure that I never heard many of the details of that day and the weeks to come, but what I did know was that we were extremely lucky and there were many people much less fortunate.

The first time I rode down the road that my father had built, I couldn't believe the size of the boulders scattered throughout the valley as well as all the trees that were tossed around in the low areas. Then I saw remnants of homes and one of ours where an employee lived. The Coffey House on Davis Creek. Photo courtesy of Tom Gathright The front and side walls had washed away but the house remained, like a big doll house where you could reach in and place the furniture. Fortunately, those guys survived, but the home and family upstream were gone.

Thinking that the migrant crew could be getting in anytime, we walked up to where the migrant camp that had just been built was suppose to be. The creek now flowed over the concrete floor and all that remained was one cinderblock in the corner. Fortunately the migrants were not there that night. I never heard where they went or what they did, but there was no harvest that year or for a few years to come.

Memories of that first journey outside of Davis Creek will always be with me. Today, I can point to sites where homes use to stand and even remember the faces of some of the children that lived there. I can remember where piles of debris rested and still see the Mennonites who helped with the search and rescue phase as well as the cleanup, painstakingly searching through the piles with hopes of finding another missing person.

I'll never know how my father mustered the courage to continue farming in that valley. The memories as well as the destruction had to have been overwhelming. The land had to be cleared of all of the debris, the boulders pushed aside and in many cases, soil brought in, as the creek had washed much of the valley down to the bedrock. Maybe that is where I get my determination!

Over the next few years, my father brought back the land and replanted the orchard. There were a few young winesap trees that he had been able to salvage, and he replanted them in a small block back in the valley.

Six years later, the orchard was beginning to bear fruit. As he mowed that little section of winesaps sometime in mid-August, the winesaps were still small and green, but one of the trees had large golden fruit on it. Thinking that this was strange, he stopped the mower and tried one of the apples. He thought it was pretty tasty, so he brought a couple back to my mother and then gave a few to friends. Everyone loved this apple, but no one could tell him what variety it was.

Knowing that it was in the section of replanted winesaps, he assumed that there had been some mix up at the nursery when the trees were packed and shipped, so he asked George Williams, a horticulturist at Virginia Tech to tell him what variety it was. After reviewing the fruit and the tree, George determined that it was a chance seedling; that is the tree had grown from a seed. Chance seedlings are very rarely good, because the apple seed is a cross between at least two varieties. For example, if you plant the seed from a Gala apple, you will not get a Gala apple tree. You'll get a Gala crossed with another variety. Chance seedlings sprout all the time in apple orchards and are treated as any weed would be.

The only reason that this chance seedling had lived long enough to bear fruit was because of Hurricane Camille and that my father thought it was another winesap tree. My father decided to attempt to grow more of these trees and see if he could market the fruit. Since the flavor of the apple is a little spicy, he decided to name it after my mother, Ginger. When peeled the apple does not turn dark and it is great for eating out of hand or for cooking. Many years have past since then, but the Ginger Gold apples are now grown in every apple growing region around the world and can be found in August and September of each year in the major grocery stores and farm markets.

So much tragedy came from Hurricane Camille, but there was a little ray of sunshine. My family cherishes this story as it is just proof that good things can come from bad, you just have to continue to move forward and never give up hope!

Here's an article in The Hook (Charlottesville newspaper) for more information on Hurricane Camille and its effects on central Virginia.

Camille photography courtesy of Tom Gathright.

Raining Apples

All information in this newsletter is deemed accurate but not guaranteed.

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