We Begin the Construction Phase

Cloe goes everywhere that Kevin goes







In July 2007 we began to clear and prepare the site. Warren Construction Company brought in its heavy equipment and began to shape the site and take down all the small trees and brush and build the road. Kevin Combs operated the Trac Hoe and was an expert at his job. He always had his faithful companion Cloe with him.



We then began to talk with the Watauga Health Department and the Planning and Inspections Department on placement of the buildings, where to dig the well and how the septic system would work. Alan McKinney came out in October 2007 to help us plan the system.

Alan McKinney checks out the soil for the septic system

Dave Johnson digs the test holes for Alan McKinny while Dale Townsend looks on.

After lots of negotiations and tests and holes dug we were given plans for our septic system which included a 1,500 septic tank, a 1,000 gallon pump tank and station, seven eighty foot trenches, a pump station distribution box, trenches up the hill and through the woods. The well site was laid out and the construction of this over sized system was begun.

The chapel foundation was started by Galleher Construction Company in February 2008. Mike and Debbie Galleher are members of Holy Cross Church and run an amazing contruction company that does very high end work around Watauga County. He and his crew are amazing and they always give us quality work for the best price possible and they actually donate part of their fees back to the conference center.

Steve Tester lays the block foundation while Dale Townsend looks on in March 2008

Bishop Taylor visits the site in March 2008

The well was dug by Dewey Wright in February 2008. We dug a 200 foot well through 36 feet of dirt, 70 feet of granite, 2 feet of shale and the rest was granite. The well yielded 4 gallon per minute.

The Hermitage Project Moves Forward

Once the fund raising efforts were moving forward in a positive way and we had pledges committed which would complete the project we began conversations with the local building inspectors, contractors, excavators and others.

We had initially identified a 13 acre parcel of property off Dutch Creek Road which had been saved out of the conservation easements placed on the adjacent conference center land. This piece of land was beautiful and very pristine and consisted of deeply sloped land full of large oaks and rhododendrons.

Photo is of vestry of St. Paul's Wilkesboro visiting the first site during their anual vestry retreat.

Due to restrictions and requirements of the Planning and Inspection Department of Watauga County the road and infrastructure requirements would have environmentally hurt this beautiful pristine forest and negated the peace and tranquility we were trying to bring with our retreat houses. In addition the costs associated with road requirements and underground utilities would have used up over half of our funds and required us to scale back the project.

We began looking at other sites on the Valle Crucis property and found another beautiful site on top of Bishop's Ridge approximately 1/2 mile off Upper Crab Orchard Road in the Matney area. We explored using this piece and again found that in order to bring the road up to code and bury the utilities the costs would have been exorbitant. In addition most people to whom we showed the site expressed feelings of stress at being "so far off the road" and "so isolated". We decided that to begin someones private retreat by introducing an element of stress was probably not a good thing. However, when looking at this site we were able to identify numerous mature cherry and hickory trees. We contacted a local portable sawmiller Elwood Crestinger who came over from Tennessee in December 2007 and sawed these trees into boards which were then allowed to air dry over the winter and then were taken to their mill and kiln dried for 3 months and then tongue and groved. The cherry would become the walls in the chapel while the hickory would be used for the flooring. It was very cold up on Bishops Ridge!

So on to plan C. We had an old field that had been used in the 1960's as the site of the Earth Studies Program at ASU. Since that time the field had been allowed to grow up in weeds, briar's and small trees. It had the old but dismantled wind tower on site. It was right on Upper Crab Orchard Road, which is a dead end road, at the top of our property. The Conference Center also has 2 employee houses close to the site. And the best thing was that we would not have to spend as much of our funds on the infrastructure which would allow more of the funds to be used for the hermitages and chapel.

Photo of our property manager Dale Townsend with contractor Kevin and his constant companion Cloe

We began to show this site to friends associated with the project and they all liked it and felt good about its potential for our hermitage project. It was decided to move forward.

The History of the Hermitages at the Valle Crucis Conference Center

For many years the Valle Crucis Conference Center board and staff had recognized the need for us to be able to provide private spaces for those who wished individual retreats. Many times during the year we would get phone calls and requests from individuals seeking places to retreat. We could always place guests by themselves in an open building not being used by our other groups but this often made those guests feel uncomfortable at using an entire building for just themselves.




In September 2004 the board formed a task force to look at this opportunity to expand the ministry of The Valle Crucis Conference Center into this new and exciting area of private retreats. The Rev. Jeanne Finan, Jim Banks, Betty Haywood, The Rev. Thomas Morris, Karen Kassinger, The Rev. Brian Cole and the Executive Director Tom Eshelman met to outline and begin the process at their first meeting on November 4, 2004.

At this first brainstorming meeting many ideas were thrown out and written up on newsprint. Over the next year these ideas were discussed and discussed and discussed until what we thought was a final plan was formulated and presented to the the board in 2006. We were to learn during the process that our thoughts and our plans would change many times before the end. But this was a good thing as we gained new insights and thought through the process. We were working in "God's Time" not our time.

A survey of clergy and laypersons was developed by the task force to see if indeed there was a need for private retreat houses. The task force began collecting data from other retreat centers to see what was available in this area and throughout the country. The survey was distributed to clergy in our Diocese as well as lay persons at our Mission and Ministry Conference.

After 1 1/2 years of meetings and study it was found that, yes, there was a need for private retreat spaces for individual retreats and the recommendation by the task force to the board of directors was to move forward with the project and develop a case statement to use in our fund raising efforts.




After much discussion it was decided to build 2 single retreat houses and a duplex retreat house that was accessible for those with accessibility issues and perhaps needing a care giver to accompany them on retreat. There would also be a small chapel for meditation and prayer and which could be used for spiritual direction if needed. A site on the Valle Crucis property was identified and preliminary estimates were gathered for road construction, utilities and retreat house and chapel construction. An architect donated his time and came up with an initial set of plans to use in the case statement and a budget was developed.




The task force also decided to call the cabins "hermitages" to further indicate their intended use as single private and silent retreat spaces.




The case statement was printed and bound copies were made and fundraising began in February 2006 with our first donations being received in March 2006 with pledges from each Valle Crucis Board Member as well as each member of the task force.



Bihsop Taylor and Fr. Richard Rohr both gave us quotes to use in the case statement.



"To be a Christian is to pray, prayer is at the heart of
our relation to God in Christ. Because it is so central
to our identity, we must be intentional about our
prayer life and nourish it. I have found the need to
go on solitary retreats. We know that Jesus often
went away to pray and be alone with God. However,
in our busy crowded world, solitude is a scarce
commodity. Having space for private retreats at
The Valle Crucis Conference Center is a tremendous
gift to our diocese and the wider Church. Thomas Merton
used to say that it is important to have one sane place
in a crazy world. The hermitages are such a place."
–The Rt. Rev. G. Porter Taylor
Bishop of Western North Carolina

"In a time when religion itself has become so busy,
verbal, and even contentious, the perennial Christian
tradition of the hermitage is finding a strong new
appeal and plenty of short term hermits! There
seems to be no other way for many of us to
clean the lens, stop the tongue, quiet the ears, and
soften the heart for God and for the world. We live
in such an ego controlled culture that we need to
go to a place where our egos mean very little and
profit us not at all. Treat yourself to ‘the one thing
necessary’, and although it will feel risky at first, no
other form of retreat will ever quite satisfy you again."
–Fr. Richard Rohr, O.F.M.
Founder, Center for Action and Contemplation
Albuquerque, NM
Author and Conference/Retreat Leader




The Janirve Foundation in Asheville was approached as a major donor but unfortunately they were not able to match their giving requirements with this project. We were disappointed but knew this project was a worthwhile one and forged ahead. A grant application was made to the UTO to sponsor the accessible duplex hermitage but they were not able to make a grant for the project.




However churches around our Diocese and individuals were approached and were extremely generous with their gifts. Most of the money was raised for the project by the beginning of the summer 2008. Everyone who was approached and shown the case statement were excited about this project and almost all of them were able to make a donation and 100% of all pledges made for this project were received which is remarkable in any fund raising effort.




Local residents and the owners of the Mast General Store, John and Faye Cooper made an extremely generous donation to fund the chapel as St. Anthony's Chapel, to be named after the Rev. Lee Frontis Anthony who was a priest at Holy Cross Church from 1917-1919. He died at the age of 30 on January 5, 1919 in the influenza epidemic of 1919 while ministering to the people of Valle Crucis. John and Faye also wanted to build the chapel in memory of their son, John Earl Cooper III who died at a young age on October 19, 1988.




St. Paul's Episcopal Church in Wilkesboro, NC, under the leadership of the Rev. Thomas Morris, agreed to sponsor one of the hermitages in memory of their long time rector and his wife, the Rev. Frank and Martha McKenzie. The parishioners also raised additional funds to help with the landscaping for the project.




The Church of the Good Shepherd in Cashiers NC under the leadership of the Rev Dr. Virginia Monroe agreed to sponsor another of the hermitages.




In addition the family of The Rt. Rev. William G. Weinhauer offered for all the memorial gifts for our former bishop to be used for the project. These funds paid for the road into the project and that road was named Weinhauer Way in his memory and in honor of his wife Jean.




The Episcopal Foundation of Western North Carolina was approached and made a very generous challenge grant of $25,000 once we had reached $300,000 in pledges. This amount was reached and exceeded in record time as donors made their gifts. Three churches within our Diocese made pledges of $10,000- $15,000. Five individual donors pledged $10,000 - $15,000 with 12 others pledging $5,000-$10,000. With over $360,000 pledged we felt assured we could reach our goal of $420,000 from individual donors. By the summer of 2008 we had reached our goal.








A local architect, Dennis Lehmann donated his time to draw up the plans for the chapel and local builders and friends Mike and Debbie Galleher agreed to build the porches and underpinning for the hermitages as well as the chapel at a very favorable rate.