January 24, 2012 Coats Museum News
The month of July 1926 was posted on the calendars in the homes and businesses throughout the Grove area. In that same time frame, a warrant was sworn out by J.F. Collier naming A.J. Godwin, deputy sheriff of Coats, as the party who side swiped Collier’s truck loaded with young people. Mr. Collier charged that the deputy “assaulted” the son of J.F. Collier with a deadly weapon. Fifteen young people were joy riding when the accident occurred. The deputy denied the charges and the hearing would be the following Tuesday according to the Harnett County News July 1, 1926 edition. Are you wondering what kind of truck could carry fifteen young people? Have too many years passed for those riders to be alive today, and wonder if any of their children were told of the accident and remember the outcome? The people at the Coats Baptist Church heard the Rev. Charles H. Stevens and J.A. Campbell. Does the name Campbell sound familiar? Is this the same Campbell who started the subscription school with sixteen students that would eventually become the Campbell Academy and expand into Campbell University?
I do know that death claimed another fine citizen of the Grove Township. Mr. Allison Byrd died at the home of his daughters. He was 67 years old and his health had forced him to give up his job as mail carrier between Lillington, Coats, and Buies Creek before he moved to Greensboro to live with his daughters Clara and Flossie Byrd. He was brother of ex-sheriff John McKay Byrd of Coats. He was buried at Pleasant Plains Church as recorded by the Harnett County News July 1, 1926 edition. Was there ever a time when mail was delivered twice a day into the rural areas?
As if the local farmers did not have enough to worry them, they were warned to be on the lookout for boll weevils, which were already damaging the blooms on cotton in Harnett County? Possibly the farm families were walking the rows of cotton and examining the cotton plants and removing by hand any signs of boll weevils. Did they burn what they picked from the stalks and ground? Did some farmers lose their mortgaged farms if boll weevils were impossible to bring under control?
Farmers were not flying high, but Alton Stewart of Coats was as he piloted Ben Dixon McNeill to Morehead Bluffs. They had made the trip in one hour and forty minute from Raleigh. That was some faster than they could have made on a Ford (Harnett County News July 1, 1926).
The Coats Town Board met on July 2, 1926 and Mayor P.F. Pope presided. J.H. McLamb was hired for a period of two months to serve as policeman and work on the streets. He was allowed extra compensation if he used his horse and wagon (Coats Town Board Meeting Minutes July2, 1926).
How old is the Spivey’s Corner Hollering Contest event? In August of 1926, the North Carolina Farmers and Women’s Convention had met in Raleigh and 1700 people attended. Thirty-eight people from Harnett were there. Among the Coats people were Ethel Ennis, I.E. Ennis, G. I. Smith, J. F. Parrish, Mr. and Mrs. R.D. Ennis and son Preston. The feature of the convention was a hog-calling contest. Sixty-seven farmers entered the contest and J.C. Nichols of Durham won the musical call. All who attended enjoyed a delicious 25-cent meal according to the Harnett County News August 5, 1926 edition of the paper.
My question is was W.E. Nichols of Coats a relative of J.C. Nichols?
I do know that the August 5, 1926 headlines of the Harnett County News read that “Talley, Mabry, Currin, and Others-Ultra Progressive Farmers of That Section- Growing Man-Size Crops”. The article was written about the Black River and Grove farmers. Fine crops, did you say? Yes, the tobacco, cotton and corn crops over against the Johnston County line were super sized and especially the tobacco that was over in the section where Black River and Grove Township lines joined and hooked to Johnston County in front of Mr. Cicero Talley’s beautiful home. The article stated that the soil was unlike the balance of the county. Talley and Ed Mabry, a pair of farmers, grew leaves on their tobacco that when “waving in a breeze looked like palms of the tropics” according to that edition of the news.
What was the secret other than the native soil? According to the article there was a magic formula for which Talley gave Mabry credit. He was the mixer of the additives that went into the soil as fertilizer. Mabry brought his materials by the carload and mixed the ingredients. He mixed 700 tons for farmers in the Coats area. All were mixed by hand with a shovel. How many pounds did he mix , where did he mix it, and was it placed into bags? Did some farmers simply buy the additives and mix their own in their barnyards? I do know that the editor of the paper predicted money was to be made that year by the Mabry, Talley, Currin, and Williams families in Barclaysville (Harnett County News August 5, 1926).
If that was the case, this writer does not know, but she does know that next week you will read about more school buses being added to the county fleet, information about some colored schools being built, and the Turlington Clan’s Fourth Annual Reunion at Bethsaida Primitive Baptist Church.
Becky Adams and Joyce Turner were volunteers at the museum last Sunday. Among their visitors were Peggy Holliday Robinson and Thomas Brown. Thomas has moved back to his native Erwin from California. Peggy and Thomas are helping the Coats Museum folks plan some special events during February to honor the black community and collect their stories and family history.
A special thank you goes to Hilda Pope for her donations to the Coats Museum Building Fund to honor the memories of Holley Hudson and Laura F. Pope Lassiter and to Robie and Lynda Butler who have given memorials to the same fund to honor Laura F. Pope Lassiter, Shirley M. McLeod, Thelma Stephenson, and Edward Oliphant. In the near future those dollars given to the Coats Museum Building Fund will be put to use to build the new addition to the Heritage Museum.
Please be mindful that this article appeared in the Daily Record in January 24, 2012.
The month of July 1926 was posted on the calendars in the homes and businesses throughout the Grove area. In that same time frame, a warrant was sworn out by J.F. Collier naming A.J. Godwin, deputy sheriff of Coats, as the party who side swiped Collier’s truck loaded with young people. Mr. Collier charged that the deputy “assaulted” the son of J.F. Collier with a deadly weapon. Fifteen young people were joy riding when the accident occurred. The deputy denied the charges and the hearing would be the following Tuesday according to the Harnett County News July 1, 1926 edition. Are you wondering what kind of truck could carry fifteen young people? Have too many years passed for those riders to be alive today, and wonder if any of their children were told of the accident and remember the outcome? The people at the Coats Baptist Church heard the Rev. Charles H. Stevens and J.A. Campbell. Does the name Campbell sound familiar? Is this the same Campbell who started the subscription school with sixteen students that would eventually become the Campbell Academy and expand into Campbell University?
I do know that death claimed another fine citizen of the Grove Township. Mr. Allison Byrd died at the home of his daughters. He was 67 years old and his health had forced him to give up his job as mail carrier between Lillington, Coats, and Buies Creek before he moved to Greensboro to live with his daughters Clara and Flossie Byrd. He was brother of ex-sheriff John McKay Byrd of Coats. He was buried at Pleasant Plains Church as recorded by the Harnett County News July 1, 1926 edition. Was there ever a time when mail was delivered twice a day into the rural areas?
As if the local farmers did not have enough to worry them, they were warned to be on the lookout for boll weevils, which were already damaging the blooms on cotton in Harnett County? Possibly the farm families were walking the rows of cotton and examining the cotton plants and removing by hand any signs of boll weevils. Did they burn what they picked from the stalks and ground? Did some farmers lose their mortgaged farms if boll weevils were impossible to bring under control?
Farmers were not flying high, but Alton Stewart of Coats was as he piloted Ben Dixon McNeill to Morehead Bluffs. They had made the trip in one hour and forty minute from Raleigh. That was some faster than they could have made on a Ford (Harnett County News July 1, 1926).
The Coats Town Board met on July 2, 1926 and Mayor P.F. Pope presided. J.H. McLamb was hired for a period of two months to serve as policeman and work on the streets. He was allowed extra compensation if he used his horse and wagon (Coats Town Board Meeting Minutes July2, 1926).
How old is the Spivey’s Corner Hollering Contest event? In August of 1926, the North Carolina Farmers and Women’s Convention had met in Raleigh and 1700 people attended. Thirty-eight people from Harnett were there. Among the Coats people were Ethel Ennis, I.E. Ennis, G. I. Smith, J. F. Parrish, Mr. and Mrs. R.D. Ennis and son Preston. The feature of the convention was a hog-calling contest. Sixty-seven farmers entered the contest and J.C. Nichols of Durham won the musical call. All who attended enjoyed a delicious 25-cent meal according to the Harnett County News August 5, 1926 edition of the paper.
My question is was W.E. Nichols of Coats a relative of J.C. Nichols?
I do know that the August 5, 1926 headlines of the Harnett County News read that “Talley, Mabry, Currin, and Others-Ultra Progressive Farmers of That Section- Growing Man-Size Crops”. The article was written about the Black River and Grove farmers. Fine crops, did you say? Yes, the tobacco, cotton and corn crops over against the Johnston County line were super sized and especially the tobacco that was over in the section where Black River and Grove Township lines joined and hooked to Johnston County in front of Mr. Cicero Talley’s beautiful home. The article stated that the soil was unlike the balance of the county. Talley and Ed Mabry, a pair of farmers, grew leaves on their tobacco that when “waving in a breeze looked like palms of the tropics” according to that edition of the news.
What was the secret other than the native soil? According to the article there was a magic formula for which Talley gave Mabry credit. He was the mixer of the additives that went into the soil as fertilizer. Mabry brought his materials by the carload and mixed the ingredients. He mixed 700 tons for farmers in the Coats area. All were mixed by hand with a shovel. How many pounds did he mix , where did he mix it, and was it placed into bags? Did some farmers simply buy the additives and mix their own in their barnyards? I do know that the editor of the paper predicted money was to be made that year by the Mabry, Talley, Currin, and Williams families in Barclaysville (Harnett County News August 5, 1926).
If that was the case, this writer does not know, but she does know that next week you will read about more school buses being added to the county fleet, information about some colored schools being built, and the Turlington Clan’s Fourth Annual Reunion at Bethsaida Primitive Baptist Church.
Becky Adams and Joyce Turner were volunteers at the museum last Sunday. Among their visitors were Peggy Holliday Robinson and Thomas Brown. Thomas has moved back to his native Erwin from California. Peggy and Thomas are helping the Coats Museum folks plan some special events during February to honor the black community and collect their stories and family history.
A special thank you goes to Hilda Pope for her donations to the Coats Museum Building Fund to honor the memories of Holley Hudson and Laura F. Pope Lassiter and to Robie and Lynda Butler who have given memorials to the same fund to honor Laura F. Pope Lassiter, Shirley M. McLeod, Thelma Stephenson, and Edward Oliphant. In the near future those dollars given to the Coats Museum Building Fund will be put to use to build the new addition to the Heritage Museum.
Please be mindful that this article appeared in the Daily Record in January 24, 2012.