Eddie and Others: In the old court records of Washington county, "marks" or brands are recorded for peoples hogs. In those days the chestnut trees grew to great size and produced large chestnuts which fell to the ground in the fall and people would turn the hogs into the forest to fatten on those chestnuts..When they got fat, they were round-up and and sorted by the "marks". My father told me that many hogs were fattened in the Clinch Mountain on chestnuts up until about the turn of the century.. Also, the lands northwest of the Blue Ridge Mountain were much better than the land to the south..due to the limestone base..A creek or river bottom would sustain cultivation for several years and if sown in hay for two or three years could be farmed again with good results..A lot of clover was used for hay in the early days and it built land up rather than wear it out..Corn was the first crop planted on "newground" because it would grow and could be harvested among the stumps, after that, tobacco could be planted and harvested. The stumps rotted or were burned out and then wheat could be grown.. When the land became weak it was turned into pasture land and more land cleared. G. Lee Hearl Abingdon, Va.