Carolina Business Articles

Vance County - Home To The Beauties Of Kerr Lake

Weekend Festival Celebrates Drag Racing And Muscle Cars

 By Christine Bonin

      Located an hour north of the hectic Raleigh/Durham area is peaceful Vance County, home to one of North Carolina's major tourist attractions, beautiful Kerr Lake - an area determined to celebrate their history while keeping an aggressive eye to the future.

      Kerr Lake is the largest man-made lake east of the Mississippi, built in the 1950's as a means of flood control for eastern North Carolina. Since that time, it has become one of the State's largest parks and tourist attractions, with over 850 miles of shoreline stretching across Vance County and the North Carolina/Virginia border.

      More than 1.6 million people visit Kerr Lake each year, enjoying the natural beauty of its shores and the pristine quality of its waters. The lake offers a multitude of activities from swimming and sunbathing, picnicking, and of course, boating. With 7 separate camping facilities featuring over 700 family and group campsites, all with easy access to modern bath facilities, the lake is a popular overnight destination. The wide-open waters are home to a variety of fish - from large mouth and striped bass to crappie, catfish and bream. The county regularly hosts at least 30 fishing competitions a year, as well as sailing regattas. The county also sponsors the extremely popular Fourth of July "Parade of Lights on Water," ending the evening with a display of fireworks that dance and sparkle on the smooth waters.

      But visitors have more options than just lake-oriented activities. Henderson, Vance County's seat and largest city between Raleigh/Durham and the Richmond/Petersburg area, is a beehive of retail and dining activity. Shopping includes large stores such as Belk and J.C. Penney, along with a myriad of nationwide and local retail offerings. The county's newest addition, in the North Park Commercial Center, is Lighthouse Entertainment, a recreational complex featuring entertainment options for the young child, including a 4,800 square foot bounce room divided into two bounce areas and theme party rooms.

      Bustling Henderson has historically been the economic center of Vance County. In 1785, Samuel Reavis is credited with building the first permanent residence. Reavis' son, Lewis Reavis, opened a store close to the stagecoach road in 1811 when he began to notice an influx of settlers to the area.

      With the completion of the Raleigh & Gaston Railroad in 1835, the economic development of the area took flight, and the collection of farms and small businesses adopted a formal name in respect of Lewis Reavis' good friend, Judge Leonard Henderson. Businesses sprang up on Garnett Street, along with warehouses and shipping facilities built by the railroad. Under the leadership of great businessmen such as D.Y. Cooper, the tobacco industry blossomed and, by 1872, Henderson had become a booming tobacco market.

      Even though the surrounding area generally experienced stagnation during and after the Civil War, Henderson continued to thrive and flourish, due to its central location between tobacco-rich areas to its west and cotton-rich areas to its east.

      Realizing the need to preserve and restore its wonderful history, Henderson sought designation as a North Carolina Main Street City, gaining the status in 1986. Major efforts are currently underway to revitalize the downtown with a complex that embraces Henderson's past while providing residents an accessible center for training, education and performance arts, under the tutelage of the Embassy Square Foundation, a private, nonprofit corporation dedicated to raising funds from private, state and federal sources.

      "Our State and Federal legislators have been very supportive," explains the Embassy Square Foundation Executive Director, Kathy Powell. "We hope to be a role model for other small communities. A complex like this is normally only found in larger urban areas."

      The first phase of the project includes the 40,000 square foot H. Leslie Perry Memorial Library and art gallery, slated for completion in early Spring 2006, complete with computer kiosks. The second phase of the project will include a performance arts center with construction to begin once the Foundation reaches a donations goal of close to $3,000,000 by the end of this year. The Little Architectural Firm designed the structures, winning awards for integrating the 1920's era feel of Henderson's historic buildings with a sleek modern edge.

      Every 3rd weekend of October, close to 35,000 visitors from around the country converge in the streets of Henderson to celebrate motor history and North Carolina's rich drag racing heritage. The festival, dubbed "Show, Shine, Shag & Dine," features many entertainments, including an antique/classic car show, the adrenaline rush of a live muscle car burn-out only appreciated when experienced in person, and, of course, shag-style dancing in the streets accompanied by live bands.

      Coupled with the weekend long festival is the extremely popular "East Coast Drag Times Hall of Fame" event, honoring drag car legends and showcasing nostalgia drag cars.

      "Drag racing is a big part of motor history in our state," explains Nancy Wilson, Director of Tourism for Vance County. "North Carolina has more drag racing tracks than any other state. We are protecting that piece of our history." During the festival, drag car racing legends are available for autographs and discussions, and the weekend is capped off with a formal ceremony inducting those legends into the Hall of Fame.

      The Corbitt Truck Show and Reunion, also held concurrently the 3rd weekend October, presents a turn-of-the-century Henderson success story told through the display of classic trucks and tractors produced by the local Corbitt Company. With roots as a buggy business in 1899, by 1907 the Corbitt Company was making crude high-wheeler automobiles. While they gradually became more sophisticated, R. J. Corbitt found it hard to compete with the large northern firms and focused on trucks. These conventional assembled trucks were quite successful in the South and gradually gained acceptance in other parts of the country. During the twenties, Corbitt's vehicles were marketed in over twenty foreign countries. Corbitt gained government contracts in the thirties, and his vehicles saw action in WWII. The most productive peacetime year in the firm's history was 1946, delivering over six hundred units. R. J. Corbitt retired in 1952 and shortly thereafter the Corbitt Company was sold to the United Industrial Syndicate of New York, and liquidated. A comeback was attempted in the late fifties, but failed, and the proud Corbitt name was lost.

      With entertainment ranging from popular lake activities, to shopping, to muscle cars, Vance County offers residents and visitors a multitude of recreational opportunities. Through efforts to protect their history, Vance County has uncovered strong roots based on economic strength and foresight, characteristics that will carry them proudly into the future.

      Christine Bonin is a freelance writer in Cary, NC. She can be reached at bon2l3@bellsouth.net.

Reprinted from Carolina Business online version