What once was, is no longer....

I had off on Friday so we decided to do some exploring so we could become accustomed to area towns in Virginia. We went to the “Northern Neck” of Virginia which is the area of land above us. I never gave any of this much thought nor realized that there were so many distinctions as to how the land is broken up into regions until hearing folks around here refer to the different areas in this manner. If you look on the map, there are land areas, like “fingers” on the coast of Virginia. Urbanna, where we live, is part of what’s known as the Middle Peninsula. The area we decided to check out, to the north of us, starts with White Stone, out on the coastal area of Virginia and we drove as far north as Edge Hill, just below King George (this is where you get your maps out and follow along). What a pretty drive through the countryside ! Quaint little towns sparsely scattered along Route 3 and as we drove there were many sheep and cows to keep Boomer entertained. Through White Stone, Kilmarnock, Warsaw….on we drove. We went to the Belle Isle State Park, which was desolate for this time of year but pretty nevertheless. Just before we turned off the highway to follow the signs to this park, we saw one of those historical markers along the road and I pulled off so we could read it. The marker told of a town, called Queenstown, that existed long ago in the area but is no more. It got me to thinking…..how does a town, vibrant with occupants, businesses, etc. come to the point of not existing any longer ? A friend of ours back home has studied the ghost towns in Pennsylvania and hopes to someday write a book about them so it was interesting to come across this marker. Do people who carried on with their day to day lives, like you and I, one day decide to move to another town ? Did a sweeping disease take the lives of the inhabitants and wipe out the town ? Seems odd that something that seems to have such permanence, like a town, would just disappear one day.

Perhaps it is like the town where I grew up…..Bungy..(pronounced “Bung-ee”). I have never seen proof of its true existence. No town structure, no post office, no court house. Have just always been told, as we pass through a specific area, that this is Bungy. We lived on Bungy Road so surely it must have existed. Our Grange Hall and church were in Bungy or were they ? Perhaps Bungy was just a self proclaimed “town” or a figment of someone’s imagination. There wasn’t the presence of some sought after mineral, like gold, to bring folks to this area to set up a town and inhabit it. The name itself, Bungy…doesn’t even give some clue as to the origin of this “town”. What was it…the town from which Bung originated ? Doesn’t seem likely since bung is a verb and means to “stop”. Maybe someone had the grandiose vision of there being a town there someday and wanted everyone to “stop” and live there. I don’t think that the presence of a grange hall, church, and about four houses constitutes a town. In someone’s mind it must have.

Someday, a hundred years from now, will a historical marker be placed nearby telling of the demise of “Bungy”….a place I know of but cannot attest to ?