which runs northeast-southwest in western Loudoun . Like the Indian and Potomac maps , the Short Hill map also highlights numerous historical Indian sites , including a burial ground adjacent to the Potomac River . As this is written , Short Hill is the site of controversy for the second time in the last two years , because an application recently filed by AT & T proposes construction of a 150-foot-high telecommunications tower and adjacent 50 ’ by 50 ’ equipment compound atop the hill . The earlier proposal was rejected by Loudoun County , to the relief of a large number of local citizens , but as this is written , the outcome of the latest proposal is unknown .
Scheel has also created a map of a key portion of the Potomac River from the location of a bridge between Lovettsville on the Virginia side and Brunswick in Maryland . That map highlights the locations of several Indianmade underwater fish traps that remain even now on the river bottom in several places , including the crossover between Lovettsville and Brunswick .
Scheel could not be the mapmaker that he is without also being a historian with special appreciation for the early maps drawn of Loudoun and the Virginia histories written long ago . Those maps have become valuable information sources for his own map work , historical understanding and writing . He has also taught seminars for Loudoun school teachers about Indian history and other important components of colonial history in Loudoun . Scheel ’ s overall contribution to local knowledge of the history of Loudoun County is unique among our citizens , and worthy of the community ’ s deepest appreciation .
Pamela Lane Baldwin owns WeatherLea Farm in Lovettsville , which she and her late husband Malcolm Baldwin purchased in 1993 . She with daughter and son-in-law , Rebecca and Jeffrey Fuller , help tend their small grape vineyard for Walsh Family Wine and a flock of sheep , host weddings and welcome guests at their intimate B & B called Shepherd ’ s Cottage . Before retiring to the farm , Pamela was a Foreign Service Officer with USAID .
WANDER is part of an reforestation effort that calculates our paper consumption and the equivalent tree quantities of paper consumed and collects appropriate funds to help reforestation organizations plant the appropriate number of trees . Our consumption goes to a reforestation project on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation in South Dakota that is home to the Oglala Lakota , a tribe that is part of the Great Sioux Nation . The local workforce of Indigenous Americans is trained to care for and plant tree seedlings .
A Mission to Survey Loudoun ’ s Roads
BY LEE LAWRENCE
Yardley Taylor ( 1794-1868 ) was a devout Quaker and family man who lived his entire life in western Loudoun County . He had many interests but made his living as a nurseryman . He specialized in apple trees , which grew well in Loudoun ’ s climate and soil . Taylor was also a mail carrier in the county , going up and down roads and byways delivering mail . It was perhaps on these long preamble routes where he first came up with the idea of mapping Loudoun . His eventual map would feature roads , farms , towns , rivers and creeks , and points of interest in the large , diverse county .
Taylor surveyed and published a 36 ” x 51 ” colored map of Loudoun County , completing it in 1853 . That same year , he wrote a 31-page
Yardley Taylor , “ Geologist , Historian of Loudoun County , surveyor , devoted friend of internal improvements and a very earnest man …” shown near the end of his long and eventful life . Courtesy of Loudoun Museum , Leesburg , Va .
38 wander I fall • winter 2021