A Pronounced Identity By Ian Shapira Washington Post Staff Writer Thursday, April 22, 2004; Page LZ03 The first thing you need to know about Fauquier County is how to pronounce it. The county was named after Francis Fauquier, Virginia's acting royal governor from 1758 to 1768, but saying it incorrectly can have some distinctly unregal consequences. Old-timers say it with a hardened, southern accent: Fawkeer. Never employ the patois of a backwater town by saying Fohkear. And no French accent, either. You must achieve the right balance between sounding too twangy and too haughty. Therein lies Fauquier's predicament. The county of 60,000 people, assorted cattle farms and technology companies is not exactly part of metropolitan Washington, but it is not exactly in the hinterlands, either. It lies on the edge of Northern Virginia, about 40 miles from the District. For people who want a quiet and comparatively inexpensive place to live and do not mind an hour-long commute to jobs in Fairfax County or Washington, Fauquier is the perfect habitat. It is a place where you can drink beer at a British pub owned by a former high-tech power player. Or you can head to Great Meadow in The Plains on summer Friday nights, tailgate with a candelabra and bottle of locally produced wine and watch rousing "twilight polo" matches. Fauquier is a place where animals are taken seriously and support people's livelihoods. In a region where farming has become largely unaffordable, Fauquier is an agricultural stronghold, and weather is monitored as closely for signs of when to start harvesting the hay or corn as for school closings. Silos stand tall in the southern end of the county, near Remington and Bealeton, where dairy farmers still make a living feeding chopped corn to Holstein cows that produce milk for grocery stores. Cattlemen remain aplenty, raising Angus beef that lands on dinner plates in upscale restaurants in New York. Every Tuesday, cowhands duke it out at the Fauquier Livestock Exchange in Marshall for cheap prices on steers or heifers. Horses are also a lucrative business in Fauquier, with the second-highest number of horses in Virginia behind neighboring Loudoun County. This was the home of the late philanthropist Paul Mellon, whose Sea Hero won the 1993 Kentucky Derby. Breeders continue to thrive here and ship their mares each spring to stallions in Kentucky to produce foals that race at tracks near Charles Town, W.Va., Baltimore and Richmond. Northern Fauquier also boasts a mother lode of horse farms, many enclosed by mortarless stone walls and weathered fences. Near the town of Middleburg in Loudoun, many Fauquier residents enter horses in weekend steeplechase races or fox-hunt in one another's backyards. It is no surprise then that such an expensive industry has lured celebrities and the wealthy to retreat or start a new career in the area. Actor Robert Duvall lives in The Plains, used to own the popular Rail Stop Restaurant there and auctions tango lessons for local charities. Linda Tripp, who helped bring about Bill Clinton's impeachment, opened a Christmas store in Middleburg. Sheila C. Johnson, co-founder of Black Entertainment Television, is building an upscale inn near Middleburg that has provoked some of the biggest controversy here since Walt Disney Co. proposed an amusement park nearby in Prince William County in the 1990s. Fauquier residents vigilantly guard two closely intertwined elements: low taxes and land conservation. People here expect Fauquier to grow, but at a glacial pace. The property tax rate is 99 cents per $100 of assessed value, and most of the county's 420,000 acres are under some form of permanent or temporary protection from commercial or residential development. The county has only three incorporated towns -- Remington in the south, Warrenton, the county seat, in the center, and The Plains in the north -- all of which contain a Main Street that seems to projects a world from old black-and-white television shows. (Check out the Remington Community Variety Building, where you can still get your Beta videocassette player repaired.) Worried about a huge subdivision going up next to your home? The zoning laws in rural parts of Fauquier are some of the toughest in the state: Developers can build about one home per 35 acres on average. Fauquier residents are eyeing the vinyl siding of Loudoun with wariness -- and glee. They worry that rampant growth there could lead to a hot real estate market in their county. At the same time, county officials think that developers could leave Fauquier alone, now that Loudoun's new Republican-majority Board of Supervisors is loosening the county's building regulations. The one thing both sides of the growth debate in Fauquier and Loudoun agree on? Grapes. Wineries and vineyards are booming in these parts, particularly because the tourism revenue makes them a viable form of using the land. And, they do not add new people and require new schools or higher taxes. Just be careful about finding your way around the Oasis Winery in Hume. Locals pulling their gooseneck trailers often fuss about navigating the twisty roads in these parts because of a most unusual occurrence: the winery's stretch limousines carrying tourists. © 2004 The Washington Post Company