By Jamie McEachin

Chaz Haywood has been many things: a military man, a consultant in Washington D.C., a James Madison University student and a cobbler to make ends meet. Now, he’s the Clerk of the Circuit Court in Rockingham County. Above all else, he’s a history buff. 

Haywood sits in his office in the historic Court Square Courthouse, surrounded by artifacts of his own history. Genealogy charts spread across the walls, and black-and-white photos of his family are displayed proudly in a cabinet—his grandfather Charles’ photo front and center. 

“I always thought I was going to be a history and sociology teacher like my grandfather,” Haywood said. “It didn’t work out that way.”

Haywood was elected clerk in 2008, and has since led the transformation of the Rockingham County historical archives. In the process, Haywood and his archival team have discovered a trove of original historical documents going back to 1778, the year Rockingham County was created. 

Under Haywood’s leadership, the Court Square Courthouse found itself as the steward of Rockingham County’s history. Beyond just holding the physical archives, Haywood’s courthouse has become a center for historical storytelling. 

“It’s telling the stories of these case files,” Haywood said. “And that’s what we want to keep doing. So it’s not just keeping the record, but it’s saying, ‘Here it is,’ giving it to you. ‘Here’s a great story. This should be of interest.’”

Haywood’s love for history and genealogy came from his grandfather Charles, who shared family histories with him as a child in Montana as a method of teaching his grandchild life lessons. He regrets not paying close enough attention to remember them now, decades later.

“I listened, because that’s what we do with our grandparents,” Haywood said. “But gosh darn it. Shame on me for not hearing more. And I get that now that I have grandkids.”

Haywood remembers how his grandfather would say, “Let me give you a little story,” before launching into a historical tale. Now, Haywood cultivates that same enthusiasm for sharing the stories his courthouse has discovered deep within the archives. 

“Everybody loves a good story,” Haywood said. “And if you can connect with just a story, it’s going to have more impact and last longer. So that’s what I’m trying to do here with these stories. These cases and stuff that maybe people forgot about—let’s tell the story.”

Before voters first elected Haywood as clerk in 2008, boxes of records were stacked perilously to the ceiling in storage rooms, collecting coal dust from the old boiler room in the basement. Miraculously, the dry coal-smoke conditions were good for preservation of the old, delicate paper. Haywood is grateful that his courthouse has the resources to preserve and properly archive these historical case files.

“The treasures are out there,” Haywood said. “It’s just, who’s going to find them first? Or are you going to find them before they disintegrate?”

Last year, he hired a full-time historical archivist, Megan Schoeman. She works at preserving and digitizing the historical record in Rockingham County. Schoeman’s fascination with local history comes from being raised in China as the child of a U.S. diplomat, searching for a connection with her home country through her interest in American history. 

“I think public historians, archivists, they need to be good storytellers,” Schoeman said. “Otherwise they’re just custodians. And so, what do you do with this information that you’re looking after and storing? You want people to be able to enjoy it too.”

Haywood describes finding records written on vellum—a historic material made out of thin sheets of animal hide–including land grants from King George II and King George II. That’s when Haywood and the archivists knew they had found a collection worth sharing. 

“What I wanted to do is not just start keeping the record, but saving the record,” Haywood said. “Because as we started to go through room after room here, drawer after drawer, cabinet after cabinet. I mean, rooms were filled to the brink and then closed the door, throw a few more things on top, and that’s how it was.”

Some of Haywood’s favorite histories discovered in Rockingham County’s case files include a thwarted assassination plot on George Washington, the antics of secret moonshine distilleries in the mountains during Prohibition and the devastation that the construction of Skyline Drive wreaked on the local community. The courthouse features these stories and more in its column “Clerk’s Corner” in partnership with the Daily-News Record. 

Any cases over 100 years old are being digitized with the goal of publishing for public view. Haywood and Schoeman are proud of the work they’ve accomplished so far, but the sheer size of the record collection means there’s still a lot of preservation waiting to be done.

“Last year we hit 10.2 million images…” Haywood said, grinning. “Not too bad for a little circuit court clerk’s office.”

Haywood and Schoeman are happy to see that their collections in the archives are helping families learn their histories. Local histories in collections like “Histories Along the Blue Ridge” humanize the people who lived in the past, and allow previously forgotten stories to be rediscovered.

Haywood discovered his own family connections to Virginia through archival records—a seventh-great grandmother’s name was discovered on a marriage record in Rockingham County. Now, despite growing up in Montana, Haywood feels this historical revelation makes him a true Virginian. He’s excited that the courthouse can provide those tools of historical discovery to other people searching for their family histories in Rockingham County. 

Haywood isn’t technically a historian, but somehow he finds himself immersed in the small details of history.

“I don’t know that much,” Haywood said. “I know a little bit about a lot of things, not a lot about a little things.”

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