Kyle Green | The Roanoke Times

Deedie Kagey lives in a house built in 1836. It's one of the oldest remaining residences in Roanoke County, and the Bonsack resident is afraid she will lose her house to development. Already, she and her husband, Monty Williams, can see a Lowe's and Applebee's from their sunroom.

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When Deedie Kagey bought her home in Bonsack 32 years ago, she understood that the bucolic, historic community on U.S. 11/460 was changing.

"I knew when I moved out here that eventually there would be development, but I was not planning on it gobbling up my land."

So far, her 4.5 acres are still zoned residential, and her home -- built in 1836 and one of the oldest remaining residences in Roanoke County -- is still secure.

But right next door, a Georgia company has purchased a 7.5-acre tract where it wants to put a pharmacy, a fast-food restaurant and a small shopping center. The center's entranceway would share the stoplight with the Wal-Mart and Lowe's that are on the other side of the road.

That prospect was a major factor in the Roanoke Valley Preservation Foundation's decision to place the village of Bonsack on its 2007 listing of "endangered sites."

It's the 11th year that the preservation group has created such a list, designed to call attention to what it considers threatened historical, cultural and ecological resources.

This year's list also includes the Buena Vista and Villa Heights recreation centers, the Patrick Henry Hotel, and Elmwood Park in Roanoke, as well as the entire valley's tree canopy.

As is true for much of the Roanoke Valley, settlement of the Bonsack area began in the mid-18th century, and its history has been a special interest of Kagey's for years. She is the author of "A History of Roanoke County, Va.," as well as a separate history of Bonsack.

Kagey, principal of Bonsack Elementary School, said last week that the early settlers included a who's who of familiar names besides Bonsack -- Stoner, Moomaw, Crumpacker, Cook. Most were originally German Baptists who later became members of the Church of the Brethren and farmed huge tracts that supplied not only their large families but the region.

There was also a huge woolen mill in the community, and it was the home of James Albert Bonsack who in 1880 at age 22 designed the first practical cigarette rolling machine. It made him a fortune when it was adopted by the Duke tobacco processing operations in North Carolina.

In recent years, commercial and residential development has spread from the Roanoke city limits eastward down U.S. 11/460, and the area bordering the highway is now considered "transition" in Roanoke County's community plan.

Tim Beard, the county planner working with the developer on the plan for the site beside Kagey's, noted that just because an area may be ripe for transition from residential to commercial uses that doesn't mean anything goes.

The community plan notes that: "Intense retail and highway oriented commercial uses are discouraged in transition areas, which are more suitable for office, institutional and small-scale, coordinated retail uses."

The proposal for the pharmacy, restaurant and shopping center has been sent back to the developer for additional engineering on its impact on nearby watersheds and on building designs.

Buildings in such areas "need to have extremely good design, good environmental consideration, and some compatibility" with the surrounding neighborhood, Beard said. "My major consideration is that it be a good fit compared with what is on that south side of 460."

The historian in Kagey sees it all as part of a pattern. "It seems like they obliterated Southern Hills, Pinkard Court. Those were two black communities [on the south side of the county] that had some history. I just feel like it's happening over again."

And for the preservation foundation, Kagey's place is a key in preserving an identity for Bonsack, said board member Alison Blanton.

"I think if we were to lose Deedie's house, basically that will impact the whole village."