Real Estate Boom Left its Legacy

"The Light Artillery Blues and the Zouaves were out in force. They made a stirring sight as they paraded across the bridge," reported Lynchburg's newspaper, The Daily Virginia, the day after the opening of the bridge linking Rivermont and the downtown business area. The time was 3 p.m. on April 17, 1891, cannon boomed, steam whistles shrieked and a crowd of cheering Lynchburgers promenaded across Rivermont Bridge - 1,157 feel long, 144 feet high, 60 feet wide.

The citywide celebration, followed by a dinner at the Opera House, was called Rivermont Day in honor of the company that financed the bridge running from the western end of Main Street across the gorge of Blackwater Creek and into Rivermont - Lynchburg's first planned community.

Leading the procession across the bridge was Maj. Edward S. Hutter, principal organizer of the Rivermont Co., and its president, C.M. Blackford.

The Rivermont Co. had put up $75,000 for construction of the bridge and Major Hutter, a civil engineer, was partly responsible for engineering the wood and steel edifice. The Daily Virginian termed it "a stupendous feat" the "brings a lovely outlying district into immediate contact and connection with the city proper."

Indeed, the sole purpose of erecting Rivermont Bridge was to bring the "lovely outlying district" into closer contact with the city.

The Rivermont Co. was at war with the West Lynchburg Land Co., which had a streetcar line to the downtown area and large holdings in what is now the Fort Hill and West End area.

The bridge was essential to the development of what was then largely farmland in the Rivermont area.

The bridge was the high point of the real estate boom that swept Lynchburg, along with the nation around 1889.

Some people were predicting that Lynchburg would be the Pittsburg of the South. More than half a dozen companies were formed to promote any enterprises that appeared to have any reason for being established within the city.

Land speculation was rampant throughout the state and excursion trains carried crowds to Salem, Roanoke, and Buchanan for real estate promotion festivities. Excursions were run to Lynchburg for the same purpose.

While both the Rivermont and the West Lynchburg Land companies ended up in receivership, they left a legacy - Randolph-Macon Woman's College (Now Randolph College) and Lynchburg College.

The Rivermont Company donated 20 acres and $100,000 for buildings for the woman's college.

The nearby springs did not attact the anticipated tourists of the Westover Hotel, which the West Lynchburg Land Co erected as a summer resort, the company failed to pay off an 1891 bond issue, and a receiver was appointed.

The hotel later was sold to Virginia Christian College, now Lynchburg College and the old hotel, which was a rambling Victorian structure was a viable part of the college's complex of buildings and served as a women's dormitory for more than 30 years before its demolition in 1970.

The planners who build the first Rivermont Bridge wouldn't have dreamed of the area's present vitality. Today some of the most beautiful homes in Lynchburg are here and this continues to be one of the most desireable neighborhoods in Lynchburg.