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North Fork
History of North Fork, part two
By Beth Lucas
Last week, we recounted the growth of business at North Fork, due to the generosity of historian Eugene Scheel from the "Loudoun Discovered" series.
We left off at about 1870, with several shops, a livery/blacksmith/undertaker business, a barber and the post office located at the village's center on North Ford Road between the intersections of Lincoln and Shelburne-Glebe Roads.
We even had a local doctor, Mahlon Baldwin, practicing from the Civil War until 1900. His prices were quite reasonable, with the delivery of a baby costing ten bucks. His son Adrian picked up the office reins and practiced here until 1928.
In 1903, the Schooley Store closed and two more arose. Claude Van Sickler's store was open until 1914, but burned to the ground on that year's Easter Sunday. Meredith Embrey ran a smaller store until 1927.
The old log North Fork School was replaced by a one-room frame schoolhouse on land owned by Samuel Simpson, which land today is owned by his descendant. It served from 1870 and was used for about ten years. In 1929 the school was converted into a house. By 1885 there was a two-story school with a belfry constructed at North Fork, but by 1910 only the downstairs was in use, and it closed in 1926. It was replaced by a two-room school where Margaret Cockerill and Helen Nunnally Simpson taught, serving the children for the last time in June, 1933. The building burned down in 1938. Older kids went up to Lincoln High School after primary grades, and many of our own kids have been taught in that same building, now Lincoln Elementary.
The Cole and Ratcliffe Store closed in 1907 and the post office was moved to a little room at the back of Hick's cobbler shop. In 1920 the post office moved to a new building constructed on the foundation of the burned Van Sickler store. Several folks ran it, but Welton M. Rose Jr. took over duties in 1936. By 1949, Charles Trail was running the store and the post office, stamping the last North Fork letter in 1954. The store continued for about a year, and was then converted into a home.
So business by 1979 was pretty much nonexistent, as it had been back in 1856. The large meetinghouse was converted into a home, but done so in such a way that it could be easily turned back into a church building once more. North Fork Baptist Church has seen many pastors, with William Tiffany Sr. serving from 1982 to 1991. In 1993, the Rev. Parker Thompson became pastor and has been there ever since with the flock.
North Fork celebrated the nation's Bicentennial by dedicating the Swinging Bridge over the North Fork of Goose Creek. The bridge is located east of the end of North Fork Road, down the hill and across the deep ravine, a way for people to walk from North Fork to Mt. Gilead without getting their feet wet. Crossing it is not for the faint-hearted, as it sways considerably. The Marks brothers, who lived up on Mt. Gilead, used to drag their bikes across it regularly on their way to visit North Fork friends.
So today, we have no stores, post office, livery or wheelwright nearby. But what we do have here in this little community is friendliness and a desire to help our neighbors. This shows when folks get sick, are snowed in, or just can't find that last cup of sugar for a recipe. We have a great history here, but none as great as the history of good-heartedness that we are making now.
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