Bill Blackwell sees promise in the corn mill he bought in 2003 and a potential that could help Weldon fulfill its goals of becoming a tourist destination, the main goal identified in the Small Town Economic Prosperity program the town is in.

Curiosity seekers stop by to see what his plans are, including the actor Robert Patrick, who was touring the area with friends on a motorcycle trip and artist Henryk Fantazos.

“It’s amazing how people are attracted to this building,” Blackwell said today. “There is a natural attraction to this building.”

That may be because the building goes back to 1892 when it was built by hand by the Roanoke Navigation and Water Power Company. The Works Progress Administration made the last attempt to improve the building in 1938, converting it to a town community center.

In the middle of the 1960s the town closed the building and, according to a chronology, it was left to the elements, the swimming pool filled with construction debris from demolished buildings.

In 1993 Adventures in America bought the building after the town deeded the property to the Roanoke Canal Commission. In 2002 Adventures in America gutted the annex and all windows, doors, floors and roof were removed, leaving only exterior walls.

Through his Riversedge Holding Company formed in 1999, Blackwell bought the old Coca-Cola bottling building and in 2003 bought the corn mill.

“It was my opinion that Weldon and the property on the Roanoke River had a value that was unrealized, that this building and property filled an unrealized potential,” Blackwell said.

An architect who helped him with plans for the building advised him, “‘Don’t look at the building through the prism of Weldon but the prism of the Roanoke Valley.’”

Terms with the town when Blackwell bought the building were to have vines and growth removed, which has been done and within two years have a business enterprise that excludes storage being located there. A business would have to be maintained for 18 of 24 months.

Blackwell appeared before the town board in 2004 with a master plan and architectural perspective. The chronology notes a 2007 tour of the building by former Mayor Johnny Draper and Public Utilities Director Donald Crowder garnered “high praise for the work to that point and no comments about decisions concerning construction.”

Blackwell was pulled from the project in 2007 for two years after becoming a partner in Riverside Mill but last year returned to work on the grist mill.

With no pressure from the former town board, Blackwell was surprised when he received a letter from the town to appear before the town board Monday, which he did. “I feel the board has the responsibility to conduct the town’s business. I appreciate the opportunity to discuss this in an open forum.”

During that meeting board member Earl Smith and Mayor Julia Meacham said they believed Blackwell hasn’t lived up to terms of the rehabilitation agreement.

Blackwell, who is in the process of moving Riversedge into the building, which sits on 7 acres of property overlooking the river, contends he is running a business from the grist mill, a business he started in 1999 when he formed Riversedge.

When Blackwell bought the building the walls were plastered, joists were damaged and there was no roof on the small annex. “We suffered severe roof damage from Hurricane Isabel in 2003 which slowed the progress considerably.”

He reclaimed lumber from the building and other buildings in Halifax and Northampton counties to redo the floors and ceilings. “Anything we could we reclaimed.”

The worked uncovered some of the more intimate history of the building such as the still visible fingerprints of children who probably worked in the brickyard. “The bricks were made in Weldon. The whole building was built by hand. It has been a community icon all these years.”

The rehabilitation also uncovered names carved in the mortar, many artifacts covered in dirt which have been saved and one mystery. “Brick pits were found under ground. They were a mystery. We don’t know what they were.”

While Blackwell plans to run his property development company from the building, he still believes its best use is for social activities and plans to have it zoned for such purposes. “There is so much deep, rich history in Weldon that in the past hasn’t had a funneling mechanism. Weldon’s future is in uncovering its history and realizing the imprint the river has made on the psyche of the town.”