The Doves Back in Tryon's Plaza Fountain Sit on a Corner the Lanes Rebuilt

For most of this summer, the carved stone rail and two mourning doves were missing from the fountain at the corner of North Trade and Maple. The sculpture had been partly pried off its base, and town employees took it to sculptor Dale Weiler's studio in July. After about six weeks of repairs, town crews helped him set it back in October.

Plenty of people pass "Tails to Rails" every day without knowing what it marks. The sculpture is a memorial to Bob and Jackie Lane. The plaza it sits in is one of three Lane projects that Tryon's economic development director, Crys Armbrust, credited with renewing downtown revitalization at a crucial time. The restored doves are the one marker on Trade Street that tells you who rebuilt this corner.

What came back to the fountain

According to the Tryon Daily Bulletin's account of the restoration, the sculpture had deep scratches, gouges and fractures after someone forced it loose from its mounting. Weiler believes someone tried to pry it from its base, though how the damage happened has not been confirmed. "There were some tough marks," he told the paper. "There were a lot of tough marks."

The railroad tie under the sculpture held up. The tie plate joining the carved rail to the base cracked in several places, and pieces were missing. The Bulletin describes the repair in this order:

1. Town employee Chuck Sherbert removed the rail before it could fall into the fountain and drove it to Weiler's studio.
2. Weiler took off the rail and birds and ground the stonework back to its bare surface to work out the blemishes.
3. The breaks in the tie plate were clean, so he reused the original pieces and did not have to carve a new plate.
4. He reassembled the parts, resealed the stone, and fixed the sculpture to its base with a stronger epoxy than before.
5. Town employees helped him return it to the fountain.

"They have been invaluable," Weiler said of the town's help.

The materials help explain why the piece could be saved. It is carved from steatite, a soapstone from Virginia that has fewer soft minerals than other soapstones. Weiler uses it for much of his outdoor work because it resists acid rain and wears more slowly than many other stones. The original mounting used industrial epoxy and no drilled fasteners, because holes in the stone could create weak points. That is why the new epoxy, and not new hardware, holds the sculpture in place now.

Why a rail, and why two doves

The Bulletin reports that Weiler and Bob Lane worked out the concept together before Lane died in 2015. The carved rail stands for Tryon's railroad history and the stonework for its artistic community. The doves are for Bob and Jackie.

The piece was dedicated on Wednesday, November 22, 2017. As the Bulletin reported at the time, about 50 residents, town leaders and members of the Lane family gathered at the fountain. Mayor Alan Peoples spoke, and Weiler unveiled the sculpture. Weiler said the doves represented the Lanes' love for the town and for each other. Next month marks nine years since the dedication.

The corner itself was a Lane project

The building at North Trade and Maple had been a service station, a realty office, a clothier and a thrift store over its life, most recently the St. Luke's Thrift Store. In April 2013 the town accepted an easement to keep the plaza in front of it as a public gathering place, and Lane agreed to lease that easement to Tryon for $1. The Lanes bought and redeveloped it after a downtown revitalization meeting, meaning for it to be the centerpiece of town. In Bulletin coverage the space goes by both St. Luke's Plaza and Tryon Plaza.

Lane explained what he wanted in his own words, quoted in the Bulletin's 2015 tribute:

"I hope like Sunnydale it will be a gathering place that will draw people to the center of Tryon and then they will go up and down the street shopping and eating in Tryon. I want them to enjoy being with other people."

He wanted St. Luke's Plaza to connect with Depot Plaza and pull foot traffic between the two. That is why the sculpture uses a rail. The memorial sits in the plaza Lane built to link up with the depot.

Three buildings, one pattern

The Lanes came from Charleston, South Carolina, and were part-time Tryon residents for about 20 years. In Charleston, Bob had built Bob Lane Realty into a major brokerage, sold it in 1981, and moved into commercial and investment real estate through Lane Properties. According to the Bulletin, he loved restoring old things, from three Model A Fords and a garage full of British sports cars to buildings. One of those was a King Street building in Charleston that later held three restaurants, a salon and shops.

In Tryon, the Bulletin's coverage links the couple to three properties.

Sunnydale was the first. Lane kept driving past the building and watching it decline until he told Jackie he had to save it. During the gut work, he told the Bulletin, passersby would stop to say, "Thanks for saving Sunnydale."

When Lane died in 2015, Tryon Mayor Jim Wright summed up the record for the Bulletin: "Bob and his wife Jackie were brave investors in Tryon at a time when others were unwilling to take those risks."

The Lanes picked buildings that had fallen out of use and returned them to the street in a public form: a theater's home, a commercial building, a plaza with a fountain. Any old storefront on Trade Street would fit the same treatment. The rail and doves are the only thing downtown that names who did this work.

A short walk from the fountain

If you start at the doves, a handful of downtown landmarks are a short walk away, and each has its own history.

1. Tails to Rails, North Trade and Maple. Look at the tie plate where the rail meets the base. That is where the cracks were, and where Weiler fit the original pieces back together.
2. Rotary Clock Tower Plaza and John Cowan Memorial Garden, 85 North Trade Street. The Town of Tryon lists it as a hillside park overlooking downtown.
3. Tryon Depot, 22 Depot Street. This is the depot end of the plaza connection Lane hoped for. On Thursday, October 29 at 7:30 p.m., Shakespeare & Friends will hold a $20 staged reading of Kimberly Akimbo there, as the Bulletin announced.
4. Morris the Horse, Trade and Pacolet. The giant parade horse goes back to 1928, and the fiberglass Morris you see now was made in 1983, according to the Tryon Toy Makers' history. In August 2025 the town announced a September 27 fundraiser to pay for a fresh coat of paint.
5. Nina Simone Plaza, 54 South Trade Street. Zenos Frudakis made the larger-than-life bronze, dedicated February 21, 2010, across from the Tryon Theatre, according to UNC's Commemorative Landscapes record.

Two of these stops are memorials to people, and two mark the town's history. Tails to Rails is the one that honors the people who rebuilt the corner it stands on, and it now has a stronger bond to its base than it had before this summer.

If you've ever looked at a tired building downtown and wondered what it could become, I'd enjoy that conversation. Sunnydale and St. Luke's Plaza are good local examples of what careful restoration can return to a street, and that kind of craftsmanship is something I look for in every property. Sandra Thomas is always glad to talk about Tryon's older buildings and what makes them worth keeping. Let's Connect.