{"id":11413,"date":"2014-12-03T23:51:02","date_gmt":"2014-12-04T04:51:02","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.southsidecentral.com\/wordpress\/?p=11413"},"modified":"2014-12-04T00:11:08","modified_gmt":"2014-12-04T05:11:08","slug":"time-machine-from-south-boston-to-tazewell-and-bust","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.southsidecentral.com\/wordpress\/2014\/12\/03\/time-machine-from-south-boston-to-tazewell-and-bust\/","title":{"rendered":"Time Machine: From South Boston to Tazewell… and Bust!"},"content":{"rendered":"

Let’s hop in the SouthsideCentral Time Machine and go back to July 16, 2001. It will end up in Tazewell County, but our visit starts in South Boston.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

You may remember South Boston’s “The Software Factory” (or you may not… like most people wouldn’t). Two people from northern Virginia (Jerry Hill & Beverly Lucas) got some investors and decided to train people from South Boston to fix the Year 2000 problem. I was one of those people. They taught us a crash course in how to make the computer code fixes and we went to work.<\/p>\n

Except there wasn’t any work. Oops. The owners were assured that they’d have Burlington Industries as our first customer because they had millions of lines of computer program code that needed fixing. Computer code errors were the least of Burlington’s problems because they went out of business like all other textile mills. The Software Factory became a cold-call phone bank trying to solicit any kind of business. The company got up to 50 employees at one time but quickly cut the staff down to 40<\/del> 30<\/del> 25<\/del> 20<\/del> 15.<\/p>\n

The company found a niche market by hiring people to completely inventory industrial plants’ machinery to make sure that the internal components wouldn’t stop working on 1\/1\/2000. That worked for a while, and we all know that the Year 2000 panic turned out to be horsecrap. The company cut the staff down to 12<\/del> 10<\/del> 9<\/del> 7<\/del> 5<\/del> 2. i was one of the last 2, along with the bookkeeper. The owners were always doing quite well despite the company having very little revenue. Yeah, exactly.<\/p>\n

In the last year of the company’s life, the owners decided to say “Screw you, South Boston!” and try other bad-off localities to try and pull the same tricks. They finally landed in Tazewell County and impressed former Congressman Rick Boucher. Boucher always brought home the bacon to Southwest Virginia and he helped broker this deal…<\/p>\n

Verisign To Locate A Major Call Center In Tazewell County<\/a><\/h4>\n

It never happened. Job Bust. What did happen was Jerry & Beverly sitting in a shell building at the Tazewell County Industrial Park and nothing moving forward on this project. Tazewell County asked them to start paying rent on the building and Hill not-so-politely reminded them that he was trying to revitalize their crappy economy. How’d THAT work out? A Tazewell County deputy showed up with an eviction notice.<\/p>\n

That was the last I ever heard out of them. They never came back to South Boston. My last two paychecks bounced. I’m sure theirs didn’t.<\/p>\n

That’s a trip in the SouthsideCentral Time Machine!<\/p>\n

\"sclogo\"<\/a><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Let’s hop in the SouthsideCentral Time Machine and go back to July 16, 2001. It will end up in Tazewell County, but our visit starts in South Boston.<\/p>\n

[…]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[44],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-11413","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-time-machine","odd"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pwqFk-2Y5","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":false,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":11744,"url":"https:\/\/www.southsidecentral.com\/wordpress\/2015\/01\/10\/time-machine-south-boston-ymca-hilarity\/","url_meta":{"origin":11413,"position":0},"title":"Time Machine: South Boston YMCA Hilarity","author":"SouthsideCentral","date":"January 10, 2015","format":false,"excerpt":"We're only going back three months in the SouthsideCentral time machine trip. Hey, Marcus Hargrave? Let's go back to September 25, 2014... Why the YMCA? This letter was published on Thursday, September 25th so it had to been written earlier than that. Thursday, September 25th is also\u00a0 conveniently when the\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Time Machine"","block_context":{"text":"Time Machine","link":"https:\/\/www.southsidecentral.com\/wordpress\/category\/featurescentral\/time-machine\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/i.imgur.com\/dV5BBjB.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":4558,"url":"https:\/\/www.southsidecentral.com\/wordpress\/2009\/07\/07\/south-boston-planning-commission-to-draft-skeet-range-ordinance\/","url_meta":{"origin":11413,"position":1},"title":"South Boston Planning commission to draft skeet range ordinance","author":"SouthsideCentral","date":"July 7, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"Berry Hill Inn Founders College Estate Resort & Conference Center, Come On Down! South Boston's got a new ordinance chosen especially just for you! Wednesday, July 8th, the South Boston Planning Commission will start the process of adding a new ordinance to the Town code that will permit firing ranges\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "NewsCentral"","block_context":{"text":"NewsCentral","link":"https:\/\/www.southsidecentral.com\/wordpress\/category\/newscentral\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":5093,"url":"https:\/\/www.southsidecentral.com\/wordpress\/2009\/08\/22\/south-boston-town-council-agenda-for-824\/","url_meta":{"origin":11413,"position":2},"title":"South Boston Town Council Agenda for 8\/24","author":"SouthsideCentral","date":"August 22, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"What's on tap for the South Boston Town Council's work session on Monday evening? The meeting starts at 5:45 PM. I. COUNCIL PUBLIC HEARING on AMENDMENT TO TOWN CODE - FLOOD HAZARD OVERLAY DISTRICT Adjourn II. CURRENT ISSUES COMMITTEE [Bryant, Chairman, Thompson and Morris] 1. JOYCE ENGINEERING REPORT ON LANDFILL\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "PoliticsCentral"","block_context":{"text":"PoliticsCentral","link":"https:\/\/www.southsidecentral.com\/wordpress\/category\/politicscentral\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":6410,"url":"https:\/\/www.southsidecentral.com\/wordpress\/2010\/02\/14\/danville-police-help-out-halifax-county-sheriffs-office\/","url_meta":{"origin":11413,"position":3},"title":"UPDATED: Danville police help out Halifax County Sheriff’s Office","author":"SouthsideCentral","date":"February 14, 2010","format":false,"excerpt":"Teamwork gets a bunch of idiot kids off the road and into jail. UPDATE: We've got the information from the Halifax County Sheriff's Office about how this incident started. From our friends at the Danville Police Department... Danville Police responded to a request for assistance reference a shots fired call\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Danville"","block_context":{"text":"Danville","link":"https:\/\/www.southsidecentral.com\/wordpress\/category\/locations\/danville\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":5982,"url":"https:\/\/www.southsidecentral.com\/wordpress\/2009\/12\/14\/barry-tucks-speech-to-the-south-boston-town-council\/","url_meta":{"origin":11413,"position":4},"title":"Barry Tuck’s speech to the South Boston Town Council","author":"SouthsideCentral","date":"December 14, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"Tonight, the Town of South Boston held their own public comment section about the proposed 2030 Comprehensive Plan. Barry Tuck made a speech and he wants to share it with our readers. Dear members of the Town Council, Town Manager Ted Daniels and Respective Mayor, Carroll Thackston As the 2030\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "NewsCentral"","block_context":{"text":"NewsCentral","link":"https:\/\/www.southsidecentral.com\/wordpress\/category\/newscentral\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":5080,"url":"https:\/\/www.southsidecentral.com\/wordpress\/2009\/08\/20\/halifax-county-crime-roundup\/","url_meta":{"origin":11413,"position":5},"title":"Halifax County crime roundup","author":"SouthsideCentral","date":"August 20, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"It's been a quiet week for the boys in brown... Off-duty South Boston police officer Clinton Mann spotted a 2003 Dodge Intrepid on Dudley Rd. and called it in to the HCSO. The car had been reported stolen out of Prince George County in Maryland. Seth Bowen recovered the car,\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Halifax County"","block_context":{"text":"Halifax County","link":"https:\/\/www.southsidecentral.com\/wordpress\/category\/locations\/halifax-county\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.southsidecentral.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11413","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.southsidecentral.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.southsidecentral.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.southsidecentral.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.southsidecentral.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11413"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.southsidecentral.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11413\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11421,"href":"https:\/\/www.southsidecentral.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11413\/revisions\/11421"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.southsidecentral.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11413"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.southsidecentral.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11413"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.southsidecentral.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11413"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}