Whenever I come back to my hometown of Roanoke, Va., it is always tempting to look up at Mill Mountain to see the famed Mill Mountain Star, which was built in 1949, unless I am in the middle of rush hour traffic.
According to Wikipedia, the star was built in 1949 to gain enthuisiasm for the Christmas shopping season that year. It was the largest man-made star in the world until the El Paso Star in El Paso, Tex., was completed.
Roy C. Kinsey built the neon tubes along with his sons Roy Jr., Bob and Warren.
Roanoke is nicknamed the Star City of the South because of the Mill Mountain Star.
The current mayor of Roanoke is David Bowers, who had previously been major of the city in the 1990s.
The star sits near downtown Roanoke, The Mill Mountain Zoo and Roanoke Memorial Hospital where I was born in 1970.
Due to the Sept. 11th attacks, the color of the star was changed to red, white and blue and it remained that way until April of last year when another tragedy, the Virginia Tech Massacre, made city officials decide to have the star become all white.
Other roadside attractions in Roanoke, include Mini-Graceland and a Muffler Man statue which sits in a garage on Williamson Road. The Muffler Man has been the subject of a "Zippy the Pinhead" comic strip within recent years.
Useful Links:
http://www.roadsideamerica.com
http://www.zippythepinhead.com
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