Setting The Table

Sarah Harmeyer Found A Way To Connect With Her Neighbors—Now She Wants To Share It.

- Sara Austin

ABOUT 30 MILES inland from the salt-water taffy stands of Virginia Beach, rows of tidy clapboard homes line the streets of Culpepper Landing. Nearly a century ago, this land was a 488-acre farm, abundant with corn, wheat, and soybeans. Nine years ago, it was a small housing development of only about 40 homes within the city of Chesapeake, Virginia. Most everyone knew one another; longtime resident Tim Gudge (everyone just called him “the mayor” back then) remembers throwing a party at which one roasted pig was enough to feed the entire neighborhood.

As the economy improved, Culpepper Landing boomed, and it now has some 700 homes of various sizes, many of them housing young military families tied to Naval Station Norfolk and other nearby bases. “What I like about the neighborhood is that we get all socioeconomic groups, all living together and being neighborly together, and isn’t that what we are supposed to do? We are supposed to love each other and get to know each other,” says resident Linda Rice, who works at the Hampton Roads Community Foundation. Still, says Rice, rapid growth has also made the area fee more anonymous; it’s harder to meet new people these days. 

Which brings us to the table.