Go Directly to Old Marshall Jail
Marshall NC is a mountain town somewhat like Floyd but with two stoplights.
Like it’s neighboring Madison County town, Hot Springs, it has a red railway car in it, trains going by and the ancient French Broad River, along with some cool shops (including my son’s wife’s Carolina Flowers Mercantile), an old-time dance hall, a brewpub and an island.
But what is really cool about the town is the Old Marshall Jail, the historic renovation and storytelling project that my son Josh Copus (and others) have been working on. Josh, a potter, has chronicled the building progress on the Old Marshall Jail webpage. He writes, “We got into renovating the old jail for a lot of reasons but at the forefront was the love for old buildings and the belief that we could give this place a new life that is relevant to contemporary society.”
It’s a hotel in the works, for one thing, with three large rooms and several bunk rooms upstairs. There’s a lobby, a bar and a deli restaurant being created downstairs and a large deck by the railroad tracks that is overlooking the river outside. Everything is themed with the community’s rural history as seen through the jail, once a hub of the town.
White paint has been removed from the building’s original bricks and they’ve been brought back to life. The addition of one hotel room (seen in green) was straight forward to build with sheetrock, not like the rest of the project, which has been refurbished and repurposed with jail material, lots of metal. There’s a archway patio entrance with shovels and planters made with jail material pictured above in front of Josh.
The space includes installations throughout, bricks made by Josh’s mobile brick factory, stamped with stories that he took from interviews and the words and designs of everyday people in the Marshall community and beyond.
One of Josh’s first influential jobs as a teenager was at the Floyd landfill and recycling center. I think he got the bug for reusing materials and seeing junk as the ingredients for art making back then. Check out the old radiator fence (pictured above) that he made for the Old Jail patio.
We had a great weekend visit. Joe likes the break from the weekly zoom substance abuse day program that he runs and to get his hands on to something, like this jackhammer. He has had a hand in some way in all Josh’s projects.
Lunch break!
Here is the “after” picture that captures the results of Joe’s hammer drilling, the installation of bricks stamped with the names and dates served of past sheriffs. A webpage blog about the jail states, “There have been 30 sheriffs in Madison County, and we’re interested in all of them. The first sheriff was appointed in 1851 when the county was formed from pieces of Mitchell and Yancey counties, but the current building opened in 1905.”
More from the webpage: “Once upon a time in Madison County, there was a family named Ponder. Their origins stretch way back before the Civil War. I’m not sure how far back, but for our purposes here, we’re looking at Emma and Zadie Ponder and their descendants. Emma bore thirteen children, twelve of whom were boys, and many of whom went on to run the county. E.Y. Ponder was the sheriff for 32 years, based out of the jail, and he’s our touchstone. His brothers and nephews and other family members played key roles in local politics, education, economic development and more — particularly Zeno, who presided over the Democratic party, held various roles through the Board of Elections, and unsuccessfully ran for state senate in 1964.”
Zadie, E.Y. Ponder’s father’s name is the name of the specialty grocery delivery business that Josh’s wife Emily (who, like Josh, also has an entrepreneurial spirit) in response to the pandemic’s economic downturn and changing needs. It’s also the name of the deli restaurant going in the Old Marshall Jail. See you there soon!
_______Read about a 2017 community brick stamping event HERE.