“Pamplin—The Way It Used to Be”: The Art of Gloria Richardson
At left: Gloria Richardson and her painting, “Three Depots.” Photo by Ronnie Lankford.
A lively crowd was in attendance Saturday evening at the Pamplin Depot Library to view the paintings of Gloria Richardson. The exhibit opened at 6:00 pm, and those in attendance had the opportunity to speak with the artist as they viewed the 26 paintings on display. Refreshments were served.
A lifetime resident of Appomattox, Richardson’s work focuses on a fondly remembered portrait of the town. Titled “Pamplin—The Way It Used to Be,” her work recalls a vibrant railroad town and the simplicity of rural living.
“The town means so much to me,” Richardson told the Appomattox News, “I’m just an old soul, anyway, and it disturbs me to see it going down and deteriorating.”
Richardson’s paintings, however, are both a reminder of Pamplin’s vital past and a prayer for its eventual restoration.
“…I can’t go back by these stores,” she said of downtown Pamplin, “but I can do this. I’m gonna save it this way. It’s like time traveling to me.”
Richardson’s trip back in time evokes the world of busy railroad depots, old-time baptisms, and a thriving downtown Pamplin. Paintings of Elon Baptist, Pamplin Methodist, and Beale Memorial Presbyterian churches are displayed beside paintings of red brick storefronts and the local high school. Other paintings depict the rural beauty of the woods and streams of Appomattox County.
Today, much of the area’s lovely farmland has fallen out of use and the empty storefronts of downtown Pamplin are dim reflections of Richardson’s memories transformed into paintings. But there is hope. The Pamplin Depot, in fact, had been scheduled for destruction over ten years earlier. Before that could happen, however, Delegate Watkins Abbitt and future Pamplin Mayor Robert G. Mitchell became involved.
“Folklore has it that the railroad was going to knock it down [Pamplin Depot] with a wrecking ball …,” Mayor Mitchell said. “They say, ‘Well, they were on the way.’ Well, I don’t know about that, but nonetheless, it’s a good story.”
Thanks to the work of Delegate Abbitt, Mayor Mitchell, and a VDOT (Virginia Department of Transportation) grant, the Railroad Depot has become an important cultural center in Appomattox County. In 2007 the Pamplin Depot Library received a Community Achievement in the Arts Award from the Longwood Center for the Visual Arts in Farmville, partly for hosting similar art events.
Mary Scanlon works at the Pamplin Depot Library and helped organize the event.
“We have been doing this since the library opened five years ago,” she said of the event. “We will continue to do them, [but] we are not on a regular schedule at this point.”
After the reception at 8:00 pm, the crowd shuffled into a larger hall in the Pamplin Depot for a performance by local favorites Deja-Moo (pictured here). The band played for an hour, performing lively fare like “Wagon Wheel” and “July” to an enthusiastic audience.
Richardson’s paintings remain on display at the Pamplin Library Depot.
Thanks for covering an oft-neglected, though much deserving part of Appomattox County. Pamplin was quite the local hub until the trains stopped running in the fifties, and then went into a slow decline. Even in the 70s it possessed a certain vitality, so it is indeed sad to see what has happened over the past 30 years. I am glad to know that Gloria continues to preserve the memories. During the 80s my family commissioned her to finish a painting started by my grandmother, the subject of which was an old Pamplin home owned by my family. I am glad she continues to paint and preserve a way of life that has vanished.