This is a story about a rock, a plaque, two neighborhoods, and a veterans organization. The plaque is attached to the rock and commemorates "the boys of Cherrydale, Virginia, who gave their lives in the World War."

The war in question is the first one and the plaque carries the names of five men from Cherrydale who were killed in the war.

The war dead are Lt. John Lyon, Lt. Irving T.C. Newman, Frederick Wallis Schutt, Archibald Walters Williams and Pvt. Harry E. Vermillion.

Since being erected by a now defunct chapter of the Daughters of the American Revolution (DAR) in 1925, the rock sat in front of the old Cherrydale elementary school at Lee Highway and Oakland Street.

Now it’s gone and some people want it back. Albert Thompson, assistant manager of the Cherrydale Hardware Store, said he would like to see it in Cherrydale because it is part of the community’s heritage.

It was presented to the community in commemoration of the boys from Cherrydale, Virginia," Thompson said. He indicated people coming into the store remember the stone and rhetorically ask what happened to it.

It was moved, probably before the school was torn down, to make room for the Camelot Nursing Home at 3170 Lee Highway. County records show the school was torn down in October 1973. The rock, rectangular and about five feet long and three wide, was moved with county equipment about a mile to Lyon Park by the Veterans of Foreign Wars post that bears that name.

Lyon, son of a large landowner in Arlington, was killed in World War I and his name happens to be the first on the list. His name also appears on a larger war memorial previously located at Clarendon Circle now at the courthouse.

Manny Vieira, a county planning commission and VFW member, said that the post took charge of the stone before the school was torn down in fear the rock and plaque could have been destroyed.

Vieira, a retired Marine colonel said the stone was moved at the VFW expense with volunteer labor and loan of Arlington County vehicles to carry the heavy rock. The post went into negotiations with Lyon Park, which sits on the land donated by the Lyon family, and decided to plant it there. They even placed a flagpole behind it for use in Memorial Day and Armistice Day programs.

"Nobody even looked at the stone," when it was at the school Vieira said. "It was hidden away, obscure. Even the DAR forgot about it. It’s amazing that someone wakes up now and wants it back."

However, Vieira’s fears of the rock being destroyed seem somewhat untenable. The rock is considered a monument by some people in Cherrydale. It is also part of the historical background done on Cherrydale by Eleanor Lee Templeman in her book, "Arlington Heritage."

Further a spokesman for the Franlin & Waldron general contracting company, the firm that built the Camelot Nursing Home, said original plans for the site included area for the rock. Then a citizens group wanting to preserve trees stepped in and had planners move a sidewalk – right into the area left for the rock. "The trees won and the rock lost," Dave Rowland, project coordinator, said.

Anthony Pezzella, who now works with Thompson at the hardware store after working on the nursing home construction, said he believes the rock was meant to stay on the site after the nursing home was completed.

Paul Salditt, architect for the nursing home, said there is sufficient room on the nursing home site to have it returned. He said returning it to where it was taken from would be a "phenomenal idea."

Salditt, of the firm Salditt, Lipp & Helbing, said he would assist in any way to get the rock back. "They might as well stick it in Prince William County," he said of the rationale behind moving the historic piece to another site.

"This is funny. If we hadn’t saved it, it wouldn’t be in existence," Vieira said. He added the post, while painting the plaque black and the lettering gold, are custodians for it until someone claims the rock. The rock is now embedded in the ground near the Lyon Park Community Center at Pershing and Fillmore streets.

The Cherrydale Citizens Association has not yet been involved in the matter. Howard Bregman, past president of the group, said, "I didn’t even know about it." He said the consensus of the body’s executive committee is to show an interest in Cherrydale’s heritage and it "would be most interested in the preservation of artifacts and memories."

He said if the stone were illegally taken, the association would want it back. But, if it was taken with the community’s permission, then it would be allowed to remain where it was as long as it was safe.

Should the stone be returned, county manager W. Vernon Ford said public property is available at the Cherrydale library grounds or along a nature strip behind a 7-11 store. The county, while it owns the Camelot site, no longer has control of it. The property is leased to the nursing home owners.

"My family has lived here for years and years and we have people coming in all of the time to see the stone. A lot of people consider it part of the community heritage." Thompson said.

Location: The monument was eventually relocated (for a second time) to the Cherrydale Nursing Home/HealthCare Center at 3710 Lee Highway.