Peninsula In Passage

Point locomotive shop. But he devotes much of his free time to the Pughsville-Suffolk Civic League and has served as the president for the last 15 years or so. “Years ago everybody knew everybody and we try to keep that old time feeling of looking out for your neighbor,” he says. He talks about one resident who, about 10 years ago, bought a dilapidated shell of a house and started fixing it up as he had the time and the money. But then he fell seriously ill, required dialysis three times a week and couldn’t work so he had no money to spend on the project. And his current home was falling into disrepair. So the neighbors took over, led by White. They pooled their resources, talents and time. They worked through the summer and fall to finish the house so that their ailing neighbor, his wife and daughter could move in before Christmas. “Everybody donated their time and money for the project,” White said. “The younger generation doesn’t have that care for each other and tend to look out for themselves.” Respass Beach

Perched high above the confluence of the James and Nansemond Rivers the quiet, hidden community of Respass Beach was once farmland and peach orchards where peacocks flocked and the Matthews family kept a summer place for fish fries and other family gatherings. In the early 1900s, a few homes began to pop up on the waterfront and a block or two back, all reachable primarily by water or Respass Beach Road. The secret has slipped out in more recent years and people from Churchland, Portsmouth, Chesapeake and elsewhere have discovered the peace and quiet tucked away on the very northern tip of the peninsula. Some have bought one of the small ranches or bungalows and expanded to suit their needs. Others have simply torn down a small aging house and built a new, custom home that might have seemed to be a palace to the earliest residents.

Kevin Culpepper, a Portsmouth native and a car inspector for Norfolk-Southern railroad with 38 years of service, had hoped to find a home on the water. When he and his wife, Debra, saw one of those newer houses on the market they knew they had found their waterfront dream home but it came with repair and handyman projects. Over the last year they’ve made enough progress on their 10-year-old brick home to take time to enjoy the water and the neighbors including the eagles and ospreys. “Everybody is really friendly, welcoming,” he says as he looks out over the water. To the left is the Monitor-Merrimac Memorial Bridge-Tunnel and to the right are the busy piers of the Portsmouth waterfront, a constantly changing panorama. Kevin Culpepper

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