Brandy Station documentary completed
Longtime Culpeper resident Donnie Johnston is breathing easier these days. His near two-year project documenting the history of Brandy Station is complete.
"I've lived here all my life," said Johnston of his passion to capture all that is Culpeper County and have it archived either in print or video.
Johnston is a veteran when it comes to putting together self-motivated historical projects. Another of his documentaries focused on Civil War events at Raccoon Ford. Another on the plantations located in Auburn.
Civil War buffs will appreciate what Johnston has discovered about the Battle of Brandy Station but there's much more. "People always think, okay, 1861-1865, but there is more to it than that." Looking wistfully across the railroad tracks in front of Bailey's Store, Johnston points to an area that once held cattle. Cattle, that many of the old timers can remember, would cause havoc for their parents.
Many of the people that I interviewed for this documentary, I know," laughed Johnston. "There are a lot of good stories and it's important to get those stories from people that are still alive to tell them."
Johnston figures that this project, which took him roughly 500 hours to finish, equates to about five hours of work for every one minute of completed product. Many of those hours were spent in hunting down old photographs. A local historian herself and former teacher in Fauquier County, Page Mitchell, was instrumental in giving Johnston a good start to his collection of pictures. "It's been very, very interesting," said Johnson, "and folks like Page and BB Mitchell helped a lot." Johnston collected over 300 old photographs for this project.
Johnston also got some sponsorship help from Paul Bates who owns a body and repair shop. "It turned out real well," said Johnston, "with help from others that are interested in this history."
A staffer with the Freelance Star in Fredericksburg, Johnston is a familiar face at local town and county meetings. In addition to working as a writer, he also punts as a radio announcer. During the sports seasons, he is busy with his photography business taking many of those school sports group and individual shots that fill many a kitchen refrigerator and proud parent's desk. He also does weddings.
And then there's his farming. "I've got 800 tomato plants coming the first week of May," laughed Johnston, "so getting this project finished was perfect timing, it also coincides with the celebration of Culpeper's Remembrance Days.
While Johnston's DVDs of the Brandy Station project will be for sale, he also plans to donate many to the Culpeper County Library.
"This little community...there's just a lot of history that people don't know about. I like to get the real history...the good with the bad...about how it really was from people that lived it. It's all good," smiled Johnston.
While this local historian may be suffering from a bit of creative fatigue now, it won't be for long. "It usually takes me a week or so when I complete a project, I think that I'll never do it again, and then something else will spark my interest, and I'm picking up a new project, it's all worth it, I love history."