Sweaty hands and a short attention span prevent me from doing this type of painstaking preservation work, but hats off to those who undertake it for us and our future generations.
The Graffiti House at Brandy Station is not unique because soldiers, out of boredom and in an effort to leave their mark, often scribbled on hospital walls. Mills has plied his trade on several of these houses, including one in Woodstock in Shenandoah County.
Mills not only enjoys his work but is often fascinated by what he uncovers.
“I like the personal things, like the note in the other room that it snowed on a particular day,” he says.”
I liked this little aside by the restoration tech:
“Up North we don’t know anything about the war,” he says. After a pause, he adds, “But then our houses weren’t burned and our crops destroyed.”