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Lindbergh Fritter was a vocal supporter of recreation programs while he served on the Stafford County Board of Supervisors. The board named a park on U.S. 1 in North Stafford for Fritter in 1979.
A Stafford County water tower at Ferry and White Oak roads is nicknamed Dolly Parton Fredericksburg Vice Mayor Gordon Shelton proposed a footbridge across the Rappahannock Canal near Fall Hill Avenue years ago after he saw two women almost get hit by speeding cars. The bridge bears his name. |
Former Supervisor Alvin Bandy said he doesn't remember how Dolly got her name, but he remembers his excitement when the tower was finished during a water crisis in the late 1960s or early 1970s.
"I climbed up on top of it, I was so glad to get it," said Bandy, a longtime county official whose name graces the school administration building and another water tower in the county.
While local officials had no control over the tower's nickname, their policies on naming government structures can stir controversy. Witness the flap earlier this year in Spotsylvania County over the naming of two new schools.
When the School Board decided to name its two newest elementary schools based on their geographic locations, the Spotsylvania Preservation Foundation Inc. complained that it should have chosen historic names.
Its proposals included naming one for Spotsylvania native Matthew Fontaine Maury, an officer in both the U.S. and Confederate navies and one of the founders of oceanography.
Fredericksburg-area localities have different notions about how to name public properties.
The Stafford Board of Supervisors and School Board have no official policy, but the School Board has traditionally named middle schools after educators who had significant impacts on the system.
In Fredericksburg, the city's Memorials Advisory Commission makes recommendations to the City Council and conducts research when a name is being considered.
All four city school buildings are named for famous local residents, including a president, a Revolutionary War hero and two black educators. City teachers plan to use the figures' admirable traits to try to instill character in students next fall.
The Spotsylvania Board of Supervisors has no policy either and has named a number of buildings and parks for county officials and residents over the years.
The former Spotsylvania High School building was renamed the Marshall Center for Supervisor Emmitt Marshall and his father, the late Solon Marshall. The elder Marshall was a supervisor for 12 years; his son has been on the board since 1980. Marshall Park also is named for Solon Marshall.
Marshall said the names are an honor: "It shows the people who were in power respected us."
Marshall's counterparts on the county School Board haven't named many schools for people, living or dead. Two schools named for people--R.E. Lee Elementary and John J. Wright Middle--have been around since Spotsylvania's was a wee little system.
With the county's explosive population growth, the School Board has had the opportunity to name a number of schools in recent years. The results: Courthouse Road and Brock Road elementaries and Thornburg and Ni River middle schools.
Detect a pattern based on geography? That trend continued with the naming of the two new elementary schools opening this fall: Harrison Road and Parkside.
Parkside isn't actually near a park--yet. School Board member Charles C. Cowsert said naming the school for the proposed park might prompt the county to hurry and build it. His motion passed 4-2.
The Spotsylvania Preservation Foundation Inc., known as SPFI (pronounced "spiffy"), sent a letter after the April 9 vote suggesting that school names be historic instead.
"We suggest that using cultural and historic names would be a way to commemorate our county's heritage as well as reminding students about the county's history," wrote then-SPFI President Merl Witt. The group suggested properties not be named for county politicians until they've been dead for 50 years to avoid any conflict of interest.
SPFI offered three alternatives for both schools.
For Parkside:
Manahoac, the name of an Indian tribe that lived in the area. A fourth-grader suggested the name.
Anderson Mill, which was on the Ni River before the Civil War. The mill was part of the Frazer estate in this area, known as Frazer's Gate.
Bunker Hill, an estate with land that dates back to a 1672 land transaction. It has been called Bunker Hill since May 1863.
For Harrison Road:
Catharine Furnace, an industrial site incorporated in 1836 that made farm and household equipment.
Hazelwild, a circa-1850 home close to the school site and associated with a farm that has had a preschool for much of the 20th century.
Maury, for the "Pathfinder of the Seas," whose name is already on a former Fredericksburg school.
The School Board discussed revising its naming policy before voting, but took no action. The policy, which was adopted in 1987, allows naming a gymnasium, stadium or other school facility for a person, but not an entire school.
School Board member Martin A. Wilder Jr. pointed out that Spotsylvania has had a number of prominent residents worthy of having a school named after them, including the late civil rights leader James Farmer.
In May, the board named parts of schools for 12 people. The list included the John M. Garnett III Auditorium and Lee Broughton Stadium at Spotsylvania High. Garnett and Broughton serve on the School Board.
Before the May vote, two board members asked that the decision be put off until a new committee had time to revise the naming policy. Garnett agreed the policy needed work, but said the recommendations should be voted on because they were submitted in January.
The board approved the names 4-3, but the debate likely isn't over. Spotsylvania plans to build a middle school and a high school over the next two years.
Staff reporters Kim Anderson, Jonathan Hunley and Elizabeth Waters contributed to this story.
