This book traces the rich history of one of this country's famous rivers and its valley.

"The Shenandoah is also a legend, and it deserves to be. . . . the Valley is loved not only for its history, but for the earth itself. The fields roll from the Alleghenies on the West to the Blue Ridge Mountains on the east. Blue is the color of the Valley--hazy blue mountains, blue sky, cornflowers as blue as the sky itself.

"The Valley is the old brick houses, set among their tall trees. It is the smell of boxwood in the gardens, or of honeysuckle in the summer night. It is a sense of permanence and peace. The morning sun shines there through groves of oaks which were old when white men first saw them. . . . Time moves slowly in the Valley, as summer changes to fall, as winter changes to spring. Some people live on land where seven generations of their family have lived before them. The earth still feeds its children, for they have taken care of it.

"In the Valley the oak leaves and the doves have time to set up their music in the heart of a child. The Valley is home."