At this location Dixie Pickling Co. built a pickle factory in the creek. It was later owned by Borshay Pickling company, On January 31, 1916, the Urbanna Board of Trade pledged $92 to encourage the firm to locate in Urbanna. Captain D. M. Nelson and Messrs. Green & Bristow agreed to give 1000 bushels of oyster shells toward the foundation of the pickle house building. The company came to Urbanna and built out in the water on the shoreline at this site. Next to the pickle house, Columbus (Captain Lum) Simon Burton, born in 1845 had a pier with a building on the end near the pickle house. He ran a seasonal business making shaft tongs for oystermen who came to Urbanna during the annual Rappahannock River wintertime oyster tong season. Capt. Lum's 1898 logbook showed that he sold 105 tong shafts that he made out of ash, fir, and pine wood. He grossed $344.25 from August to December. In the summer he would purchase, and repair old sail powered log canoes to sell to boost his yearly income. According to his 1897 logbook, he sold a rebuilt log canoe for $75. In the warm weather months, Capt. Lum's daughters used his pier to “chicken neck” for hard-shell crabs which were steamed and served for dinner at the Burton House. Capt. Lum and his wife, Lucy Hackney Burton ran a boarding house up on the hill where many return customers came annually just to get another taste of Lucy's local cuisine.

Photo: Dixie Pickling Co., owned by Borshay and Sons Co. of Baltimore, can be seen in the far-right corner of this photo. It was a large building built out on oyster shells in Urbanna creek. The Borshays closed this waterfront factory in 1935 and opened another plant about a mile and a half outside of Urbanna on Old Virginia Street Road. That plant closed in the late 1950s. (Courtesy of Pat Marshall.)