Lahore is a small town in Orange County

Orange County, Virginia

As of the census of 2000, there were 25,881 people, 10,150 households, and 7,470 families residing in the county. The population density was 76 people per square mile . There were 11,354 housing units at an average density of 33 per square mile...

, Virginia

Virginia

The Commonwealth of Virginia , is a U.S. state on the Atlantic Coast of the Southern United States. Virginia is nicknamed the "Old Dominion" and sometimes the "Mother of Presidents" after the eight U.S. presidents born there...

 in the United States of America, which was named after the ancient city of Lahore

Lahore

Lahore is the capital of the Pakistani province of Punjab and the second largest city in the country. With a rich and fabulous history dating back to over a thousand years ago, Lahore is no doubt Pakistan's cultural capital. One of the most densely populated cities in the world, Lahore remains a...

, Punjab, Pakistan

Pakistan

Pakistan , officially the Islamic Republic of Pakistan is a sovereign state in South Asia. It has a coastline along the Arabian Sea and the Gulf of Oman in the south and is bordered by Afghanistan and Iran in the west, India in the east and China in the far northeast. In the north, Tajikistan...

 in the 1850s. The latitude of Lahore is 38.198N. The longitude is -77.969W.
It is in the Eastern Standard time zone

Time zone

A time zone is a region on Earth that has a uniform standard time for legal, commercial, and social purposes. In order for the same clock time to always correspond to the same portion of the day as the Earth rotates , different places on the Earth need to have different clock times...

. Elevation is 364 feet (110.9 m).

History of name

The village, it was told, was established by an American couple in 1860s who chose its name through random reading of a book on (the then) British India, which was quite in news those days because of War of Independence

Indian Rebellion of 1857

The Indian Rebellion of 1857 began as a mutiny of sepoys of the British East India Company's army on 10 May 1857, in the town of Meerut, and soon escalated into other mutinies and civilian rebellions largely in the upper Gangetic plain and central India, with the major hostilities confined to...

 fought by the natives against the English in 1857.

Pakistan's Response

The story got Pakistani media’s attention in mid seventies when a Pakistani American journalist, Mr. Akmal Aleemi wrote a column in a popular Urdu Daily, Imroz. The column informed about the existence of Lahore in Virginia, which Mr. Aleemi discovered accidentally, when he lost his way in Orange County

Orange County, Virginia

As of the census of 2000, there were 25,881 people, 10,150 households, and 7,470 families residing in the county. The population density was 76 people per square mile . There were 11,354 housing units at an average density of 33 per square mile...

. The story although, got lost in people’s memories and life went on. Khalid Hasan, another journalist, broke the story once again in early 2007, with a pleasant news of a Lahori soul (Noor Naghmi) who was trying to buy the village of Lahore in Virginia.

Purchase of lands

Noor Naghmi, son of very well known broadcaster Abul Hasan Naghmi brought the American Lahore to the news once again in 2007. The junior Naghmi, Noor, is a dealer in mortgage and rental properties in Washington’s Fairfax County. After a years long negotiations with Nancy Wallace, a farmer and tough negotiator who owned the 235 acre (0.9510121 km²) of American Lahore including the center of the town, Naghmi was able to strike a deal for USD 3 million. It was not, however, an easy venture with an owner who believed she had no plans to sell, although “everything I have is for sale, for the right price,” she said.

Naghmi now, has a dream. The centre of the 1,500-resident farming town about 75 miles (120.7 km) south of Washington is a strip of whitewashed buildings on a quiet stretch of road. An old water pump sits idle. A faded Esso sign creaks in the breeze. “The venture is an expensive gamble for Naghmi,” a Washington based newspaper says, but quotes Naghmi as saying, “I have this feeling I was born to do this. People might think I’m crazy for saying so, but that is what I believe.” He says he thinks that his successful ventures will help make his Lahore dream possible.

Naghmi's Plans

Naghmi told the Washington Post’s Indian-American reporter Sandhya Somashekhar in 2007 that his $3 M deal will turn Lahore, Virginia into a regional tourist attraction for South Asians and others. His plans include a banquet hall fashioned after his hometown’s famous Shalimar Gardens. He envisions a library and a museum dedicated to the histories of both Lahores. He wants to open a bed-and-breakfast place to serve chickpea curry

Curry

Curry is a generic description used throughout Western culture to describe a variety of dishes from Indian, Pakistani, Bangladeshi, Sri Lankan, Thai or other Southeast Asian cuisines...

 alongside eggs and toast. He wants to organize Basant with all its fan fare and pomp in the American Lahore.

According to reports, he has begun negotiating with a film studio in Hyderabad, India, to create the facades for his buildings. He recently put up a sign — written in English, Urdu, Hindi and Punjabi, advertising the coming of the Lahore Museum.