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But the nearby countryside ot Virginia and Maryland proved too tame for the young adventurer. From his father, he learned of Stony Man Mountain. The senior Pollock was a major shareholder in the Miners Lode Copper Co., a failed copper mining and smelting venture in the wilds of the Blue Ridge. The 5,371 acres claimed by the company had been abandoned to mountaineers and trespassing entrepreneurs from the valley who were stripping the heights of chestnut and oak tanbark, toppling chestnuts for railroad ties and pasturing cattle on hillside meadows.
Mr. Pollock’s father suggested a collecting and hunting expedition to the old mining territory.
“I started out in October of 1886, at the age of 16, with my collecting outfit, shotgun and beagle hound for Page County, Virginia, with no further information than that the tract was located on a mountain called Stony Man,” Mr. Pollock wrote.
With a local landow ner who had once boarded mine workers as his guide, Mr. Pollock walked through Kettle and Dry Run canyons to the towering Stony Man peak.
“Climb, climb and climb; up, up and up, as though we were going into the sky,” he wrote. “The wind blew hard, and it was cold, but I did not feel it, and what a view! ... I raved and shouted and probably would have yodelled if I had known how to yodel.”
He proclaimed it a veritable paradise on earth. “Then and there I made up my mind to consecrate my life to the development of this, my father’s land.”
The collecting of small animals forgotten, he returned to Washington where he put on his first show. “Waving my arms and gesticulating, I pictured, in the best language I could command, the beautiful scenery I had observed.”
His theatrics persuaded the senior Pollock and two business partners to visit Stony Man; they returned convinced that its sparkling springs, glorious sunsets and majestic views — within 90 miles of the capitol — could be turned into a profitable resort.
From the start, young Pollock recognized the importance of winning friends among the mountain people. While work progressed on a sawmill, a livery stable and a road to the camp site, he worked to overcome the suspicion and distrust of flatlanders. He visited their homes, told funny stories, plucked his banjo and sang. He let them fondle his corduroy coat with its blue mackinaw lining.
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