Peninsula In Passage

Bill & Joyce Wooldridge When Bill and Joyce Wooldridge left Norfolk’s West Ghent for North Suffolk in the mid-1990s they knew they would be living in the country for a while. “We could barely find our way out here,” Bill Wooldridge says. “ Route17 was entirely rural.” But when they first walked into their waterfront home in Bennett’s Creek Landing they knew they were home. “We opened front door and could see through the house to the river and across to Newport News – what a view!” he remembers. They were confident that the area would develop and appreciate. The land’s history was a draw as well for Bill, a retired Vice President for Law with Norfolk Southern, and Joyce, an educator and counselor. The walls of the Wooldridge library carry the well-known John Smith quote – “Heaven & earth never agreed better to frame a place for man’s habitation.” “I had collected stamps as a boy, I was fascinated by the small engravings, and then moved up to maps, I’ve been collecting them for years,” he says. He’s compiled a number of those maps into a 300-page book, “Maps of Virginia,” and continues to explore local history, especially Richard Bennett’s story. “It’s a shame the developers knocked down the Civil War era earthworks here,” he says. The years the family has spent vacationing on the Outer Banks inspired Joyce Wooldridge to create a cookbook of her favorite recipes. She follows the North Suffolk tradition of hospitality, introducing her book with “I so love having everyone gather around the table – the dining room table or a big porch table – talking into the night, heading down to the beach or the sound for a walk after dinner.” She shares one of her favorite recipes and says “A whole lot of butter makes it better.”

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