Every peopled place which endures for any length of time builds up a collection of tales, fondly told, heard, and passed along from person to person. Most of these have at least some foundation in fact - some have been altered by wild flights of someone's imagination
The oldest story, which has been told and published repeatedly, concerns Harrison G. Otis, who first saw the area's possibilities as a lumbering distribution center. It is said that he passed through the town on the Orange and Alexandria one night, and when he stuck his head out of the train window, he heard a hog squeal. On investigation, he found that it was because of the profusion of grapes which grew in the area. Otis concluded that if the grapes were sour enough to make a hog squeal, they would be fine for the manufacture of wine. So he came back, in 1868, to the place or. the railroad where one house and an old sawmill stood, purchased land and planted a large vineyard. He was in the business for quite a while, having at one time the entire hillside west of Clifton in grape vines. L
It did not take long for the post village of Clifton to become a social and religious center. The flood plains of Popes Head Creek are spacious open fields when they are dry, and have been used for playing fields and religious revivals. One such revival was covered with great detail in the pages of the Alexandria Gazette in 1875.
Captain M. Eldridge, a deputy internal revenue collector, while returning from an inspection trip in the Shenandoah Valley, stopped off at Clifton Station to inspect the Methodist Camp Meeting in progress to see if any infraction of the internal revenue laws was going on there. He found both M. Payne and J. L. Detwiler selling cigars at booths, without proper licenses. They paid the fine for this infraction to the collector, but while he was writing receipts, J. H. Hunsberger, S. H. Detwiler, Joseph Anderson, and Rev. Charles King asked for proper identification. When the agent was unable to produce it, he was placed under arrest and was much frightened when forced to walk across a stream on a log on his way from the campground to the railroad station.
The next day, Captain Eldridge complained to the Alexandria Gazette about the mistreatment he had received in Clifton, saying that "the campground looked more like an illicit distillery than a camp meeting, and less like a religious assemblage than any place he ever saw." A letter signed "K." was sent from Clifton to the Washington Republican attesting to the propriety of the entire proceedings, the high number of penitents resulting, and the excellent attendance by men, women, and children.
A few days later, the Alexandria Gazette published a long letter from "Charles King, Superintendent," which included his explanation of the challenge of Eldridge's authority:
So long as there are so many thieves in the country and persons claiming to be United States revenue officers who issue Government licenses in lead pencilling, and borrow the paper on which to write them, the camp meeting police must be excused for exercizing their authority... we don't want Eldridge thrown into Popes Head Creek, the stream over which he had to pass. The police would be unwilling to accommodate him in this pure stream... The order of the meeting has been most excellent; Presbyterians, Episcopalians and Baptists have mingled harmoniously together.2
A story which was reported as a news item in the Fairfax Herald appeared in 1891, and had to do with popular, portly "Grandpap" Mayhugh. The headline and story were as follows:
Almost a Fatal Accident
On Monday last while playing the role of sportsman under the game law, Mr. F. G. Mayhugh, one of the most prominent citizens of Clifton, received nearly the whole charge of shot from a gun in the hand of a friend, who mistook him for a rabbit... His face and breast, being so broad and so well supplied with adipose, received the charge without serious consequence.3
Then there's the little legend of the "lockup" (jail) that was built with volunteer labor and inexpensive materials the year after Clifton became an incorporated town in 1902. The story goes that it cost only $12.75. Unfortunately, the jailhouse was burned down by a lady tramp one dark night and has never been replaced.4
An attempted robbery caused quite a sensation in town and is still remembered. About 1920, when Robert R. Buckley was postmaster and the post office was in the small building next to Buckley Brothers' store, a thief broke in on a weekend. He filled his pockets with stamps and small change. In the middle of his departure, he climbed out of a post office window and dropped dead. He was found Monday morning and since no one knew who he was, the townspeople chipped in and gave him a $25 funeral.5
The old barber shop on Chapel Road once served as an out-kitchen for the Payne house, and was moved across the street in 1918 to be used as a home for a train agent. An occasional explosion of an over-fermented bottle was testimony to the agent's wine making in the attic, which continued even after a barber shop was established on the first floor in 1938.6
J. M. "Matt" Fulmer, a Pennsylvania "Dutch" German was the strong man of the town. He took his oxen to Bull Run and helped haul tfie heavy logs to build the crib dam across the stream for the Bull Run Power Company. The story is told that he would yoke up himself and his ox for heavy work and cuss out the ox for not keeping up. He was also mayor of the town and occasionally street repairman. As people paid their taxes, he would repair the streets and render a bill to the Town Council. 7
The favorite tale in recent times is the one about the Clifton Gold Mines. They were incorporated by two men from Washington, D. C. and one from Clifton in 1932
...to carry on the business of mining, milling, concentrating, converting, smelting, treating, preparing for market, manufacturing, buying, selling, exchanging and otherwise producing - and dealing in - gold, silver, copper, lead, zinc, brass, coal, iron, steel and all kinds of ores, metals, and minerals, and the products and byproducts thereof of every kind and description...
One of the incorporators was a man from Clifton, one Mert McCain, who had a reputation for being a real genius with machinery. He was determined to be the first successful inventor of a perpetual motion machine. Some thought if anyone could do it, he could - he was a real mechanical wizard. He also had a bad case of "gold fever" - went about in the woods all around Clifton digging holes, looking for gold.
The natives didn't know too much about the company, but in the depressed economy of the time, Clifton men were glad to be employed, at good wages, to build the large ore reduction plant beside the railroad behind Buckley Brothers' store. The wooden building still stands.
The incorporators chose the location in Clifton because of the railroad access and proximity to the gold ore bed at Union Mills. Years before, Mr. John Detwiler had the ore assayed, but at that time the vein was judged so poor that it would not be profitable to extract the gold.
The building was finished and lots of complicated machinery was installed, built by McCain. He was positive it would extract more ore than any traditional equipment was capable of doing.
Once the building was completed and the machinery was in place, the townspeople watched for the next step - processing. But the machinery did not run - except occasionally. The occasions seemed to coincide with the appearance of a big Cadillac with New York license plates, filled with well-dressed, obviously well-to-do, gentlemen. They were escorted through the plant by the incorporators, shown the operational machinery chugging away, and the gold ore which had supposedly been extracted from a rich mother lode (it was suspected by Clifton's interested observers that the small 'amount of ore used for demonstration was obtained elsewhere for "salting" purposes).
The swindle seemed to work rather well, for it continued for several years, with a carload of investors from New York appearing on the scene every few weeks. But all good things eventually come to an end; gradually the visits tapered off and then ceased altogether. The courthouse records tell the end of the story. The Clifton Gold Mines, Incorporated, Virginia charter was revoked in 1938 because of failure to pay the annual registration fee and franchise tax for the years 1936 and 1937.8