Discover Smith Mountain Lake
SUMMER 2016
13
12
the lake formed. Understandably, they just could not grasp
the scope of the awesome hydroelectric project. Most opted
for the sure thing...cash in hand.
Others, like Woodrow, saw opportunity. Shortly after
buying back his father’s farm, the electric company paid
him $39.50 an acre for flooding rights to some 27 acres.
Woodrow ended up with about three-fourths of a mile of
shoreline. He sold-off 16 or so acres as waterfront lots,
and developed nine waterfront acres into a campground.
He built a small cement
block building where he
could sell food, snacks
and fishing supplies. He
added docks for boaters,
picnic tables and gas
pumps. His campground
offered vacationers a
spigot for running water,
electrical hook-ups for
their trailers (he had
the first electric and
telephone service on
the lower Blackwater
River), and outdoor
grilling pits. He did all
the construction himself.
“He could do anything,”
says Barbara Smith, a
daughter-in-law. “He
even put up a cinder
block building with toilets and sinks and showers for the
campers.”
Over the years he also built two small cabins next to the
water that he rented to fishermen, and a small log cabin,
where he and Mable lived during the summer months. In
the winter, they returned to the homeWoodrow had built
for them in Glade Hill, where they reared their six children:
four girls and two boys.Woodrow loved fishing, and caught
some beautiful stripers right off the pier as he waited in a
lounge chair for boaters to come by and gas up.
The campground was called Smith’s Paradise, and it all
couldn’t have happened at a better time for Woodrow. He
was suffering from chronic asthma, and had developed an
allergy to hay, wheat, corn, and even cows. He also had
suffered a heart attack. He was forced to give up farming,
and like every other farmer around, he had a lousy disability
plan. He knew he would always have to make his own way
in life and as usual, he turned to the land to help him. He
went from chopping tobacco to pumping gas and selling
bait to fishermen, and
vending snacks and soda
pop to 4-H’ers. Gas was
27 cents a gallon when
the Smiths first opened.
They saw it go to $1.27
before they closed the
marina at the end of the
season in 1983.
“We used to get the
biggest kick out of the
4-H kids,” said Janet
(Smith)
Robertson,
Woodrow’s
oldest
daughter. “They’d row
over in their canoes and
take the longest time
deciding which candy
they wanted to buy.”
Smith’s
Paradise
is
located right across
from the 4-H Center, between markers B37 and B38. All
the Smith kids and grandchildren would pitch in during the
summer months to keep the campground running smoothly.
Ask any of the old-timers in this area, and they will
remember Smith’s Paradise. In fact, that is how that point is
still identified, by both street signs and local residents.
It is estimated that over the years, some 30,000 or more
families camped at Smith’s Paradise. They came from all
across the United States, includingAlaska and Hawaii.There
were also campers from several foreign countries such as:
Russia, Germany, England, the Philippines, and Italy. The
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