January 4, 2013 Coats Museum News
In 1936, cotton was a big cash crop not only in Harnett County but also in much of the South. How many bolls of cotton would it take to make a pound of seeded cotton? Picking those fluffy bolls could be a profitable task if one chose to make it so. It had been estimated in 1936 that it could take between 50 and 80 bolls to make a pound. Wonder how much a person could pick a day? The Harnett County News, November 26, 1936 edition, reported that Willie James Grimsley, age 17, had picked 625 pounds in one day. His brother Harvey, age 16, had picked 492 pounds in one day. Their older brother Jack, age 18, had picked 497 pounds out of those cotton bolls. Did you say “Are you kidding us?” It is told that one of our local ladies, Mrs. Clara Cobb Barbour, could easily pick 300 pounds per day when growing up in the Coats area. Does anyone know someone who is remembered for being able to pick large poundage of cotton per day?
I do know that some Coats gents had received notices that they would have to do their civic duty as jurors at the Harnett Superior Court in January. T.C. Bayles, Harvey Partin, John R. Cobb, Purdie Barnes, and J. Henry Parrish were those named. You still notice that there are never any women names on the jurors’ lists. Why? Before many people will eat at a restaurant today, they check out the sanitation grade posted in the facility. Inspector K.W. Ballentine had graded the food establishments in the Coats area in 1936 and had posted the 87.5(B) at the Beasley Café and Smith’s Quick Lunch 78 (C). The County Board of Commissioners had named Carlos Stewart as registrar of vital statistics for Grove Township. Surely, Paul Turlington was not a “happy camper” when he discovered that his new 1936 V-8 Ford Coach had been stolen in Erwin on Saturday night and was abandoned by the thieves after they had set it on fire about 2 miles from Coats (Harnett County News December 11, 1936).
Today some folks often joke that they always read first the obituaries when they receive their newspaper to make sure that their name in not listed. Wonder if that was the case of earlier days and if so, they would have read that Mrs. B.F. (Barty) Parrish, 65, had died early Saturday morning .Services were at the Coats Primitive Baptist Church. She had married Mr. Parrish five years earlier and prior to that she was Talitha Stephenson. The same edition reported that nine-year –old Clayburn Stewart, son of Henry Stewart, had been killed instantly when he ran into the path of a car while he was riding his new bicycle that he had received for Christmas. Yet another accident was reported to have killed two young men who were walking on a road near Erwin on Christmas night. The accident was one of the most tragic in several years according to the paper. It happened on Highway 55 about one mile north of Erwin where 55 and 421 separate. A young man from Barclaysville was held under $5,000 bond pending action by the January Grand Jury (Harnett County News December 21, 1936).
Mrs. Verle Flowers shared last week that her brother-in-law Edgar Faircloth worked for the WPA and he had helped construct the 1936 Coats School Building. The cornerstone of that building was opened in 1986 and contained a paper sharing who was on the Building Committee for the construction of that building. The names recorded were Dr. J.R. Butler (Chairman), W. E. Nichols, H.A. Turlington, Willie T. Sorrell, Dr. C.G. Fuquay, W. M. Keene, John L. Sorrell, C.G. Stewart, R.O. Stewart, Fred Byrd, B.T. Barnes, and Joe H. Penny. Mr. J.T. Jerome was principal.
Families continued to move in and out of the Coats area. One family who moved into the community was the Seth Lee family from Johnston County. Seth Lee was born in Johnston County on May 26, 1878. He was the son of Monroe and Mary Blackman Lee. Monroe Lee had shaken hands with General Grant at Appomattox, Virginia. Following the Civil War, he had walked every step with bleeding tired feet to reach his home in Johnston County where he discovered that he had lost three brothers in that War Between the States. In the 1920’s, Seth built a huge house on what is the current site of the Meadow Village Restaurant. Seth had been educated at Wentworth Academy, Turlington Institute, and Massey’s Business College in Richmond where he had received a license to be a surveyor. In Meadow he was a farmer, merchant, and teacher. Seth moved to Harnett County in 1927 where he bought several farms to form a 325-acre farm. He was proud that he was instrumental in getting the first school bus on the Coats Bethel Road to go to the Coats School. Seth Lee and Lenora Johnson Lee’s daughter Maida Leonora married Johnnie Daniel Dixon. Seth Lee, Jr. was the husband of Naomi Opal Dixon and Georgia Ellen Lee married Emery Engen. Monroe Primrose, “M.P.”, married Annie Laura Grimes. Mary Eliza Lee became the wife of Carsie Denning, Sr.
The Lee children grew up on what is today called the Abattoir Road near Little Flock Primitive Baptist Church. A trip on that road will show evidence of a dairy. The Lee Dairy was started in 1936. Electricity had just come to the 325-acre farm. There were 55 acres of pastureland and plenty of land to grow corn, soybeans, and hay for the dairy and three tenant families who lived on the farm to grow crops needed to feed the milk cows. Seth Lee, Jr. and his two helpers, Buddy and Herman Sills, operated the dairy that became well known. Milk was delivered to customers in the towns of Coats, Erwin and Dunn. The cows were milked twice a day. The milk was put into a sterilizing room at a temperature of 143 degrees for 34 minutes before it was pasteurized and then cooled. Grade “A” sweet milk, buttermilk, and chocolate milk were bottled into half pints, pints and quart bottles. To keep the milk from having a bitter taste, the bitterweed ( a yellow flower weed) had to be picked by hand from the pastureland every spring. The Lee Dairy had operated until 1942 (Carsie K. Denning, Sr. notes-2004).
Thanks goes to the J.B. Smith Family of Fuquay –Varina for their Christmas gift to the Coats Museum and to Pauline and Dorsey Daniel for remembering their family with a Christmas gift to the museum.
Please be mindful that this article was written and published in 2013.
In 1936, cotton was a big cash crop not only in Harnett County but also in much of the South. How many bolls of cotton would it take to make a pound of seeded cotton? Picking those fluffy bolls could be a profitable task if one chose to make it so. It had been estimated in 1936 that it could take between 50 and 80 bolls to make a pound. Wonder how much a person could pick a day? The Harnett County News, November 26, 1936 edition, reported that Willie James Grimsley, age 17, had picked 625 pounds in one day. His brother Harvey, age 16, had picked 492 pounds in one day. Their older brother Jack, age 18, had picked 497 pounds out of those cotton bolls. Did you say “Are you kidding us?” It is told that one of our local ladies, Mrs. Clara Cobb Barbour, could easily pick 300 pounds per day when growing up in the Coats area. Does anyone know someone who is remembered for being able to pick large poundage of cotton per day?
I do know that some Coats gents had received notices that they would have to do their civic duty as jurors at the Harnett Superior Court in January. T.C. Bayles, Harvey Partin, John R. Cobb, Purdie Barnes, and J. Henry Parrish were those named. You still notice that there are never any women names on the jurors’ lists. Why? Before many people will eat at a restaurant today, they check out the sanitation grade posted in the facility. Inspector K.W. Ballentine had graded the food establishments in the Coats area in 1936 and had posted the 87.5(B) at the Beasley Café and Smith’s Quick Lunch 78 (C). The County Board of Commissioners had named Carlos Stewart as registrar of vital statistics for Grove Township. Surely, Paul Turlington was not a “happy camper” when he discovered that his new 1936 V-8 Ford Coach had been stolen in Erwin on Saturday night and was abandoned by the thieves after they had set it on fire about 2 miles from Coats (Harnett County News December 11, 1936).
Today some folks often joke that they always read first the obituaries when they receive their newspaper to make sure that their name in not listed. Wonder if that was the case of earlier days and if so, they would have read that Mrs. B.F. (Barty) Parrish, 65, had died early Saturday morning .Services were at the Coats Primitive Baptist Church. She had married Mr. Parrish five years earlier and prior to that she was Talitha Stephenson. The same edition reported that nine-year –old Clayburn Stewart, son of Henry Stewart, had been killed instantly when he ran into the path of a car while he was riding his new bicycle that he had received for Christmas. Yet another accident was reported to have killed two young men who were walking on a road near Erwin on Christmas night. The accident was one of the most tragic in several years according to the paper. It happened on Highway 55 about one mile north of Erwin where 55 and 421 separate. A young man from Barclaysville was held under $5,000 bond pending action by the January Grand Jury (Harnett County News December 21, 1936).
Mrs. Verle Flowers shared last week that her brother-in-law Edgar Faircloth worked for the WPA and he had helped construct the 1936 Coats School Building. The cornerstone of that building was opened in 1986 and contained a paper sharing who was on the Building Committee for the construction of that building. The names recorded were Dr. J.R. Butler (Chairman), W. E. Nichols, H.A. Turlington, Willie T. Sorrell, Dr. C.G. Fuquay, W. M. Keene, John L. Sorrell, C.G. Stewart, R.O. Stewart, Fred Byrd, B.T. Barnes, and Joe H. Penny. Mr. J.T. Jerome was principal.
Families continued to move in and out of the Coats area. One family who moved into the community was the Seth Lee family from Johnston County. Seth Lee was born in Johnston County on May 26, 1878. He was the son of Monroe and Mary Blackman Lee. Monroe Lee had shaken hands with General Grant at Appomattox, Virginia. Following the Civil War, he had walked every step with bleeding tired feet to reach his home in Johnston County where he discovered that he had lost three brothers in that War Between the States. In the 1920’s, Seth built a huge house on what is the current site of the Meadow Village Restaurant. Seth had been educated at Wentworth Academy, Turlington Institute, and Massey’s Business College in Richmond where he had received a license to be a surveyor. In Meadow he was a farmer, merchant, and teacher. Seth moved to Harnett County in 1927 where he bought several farms to form a 325-acre farm. He was proud that he was instrumental in getting the first school bus on the Coats Bethel Road to go to the Coats School. Seth Lee and Lenora Johnson Lee’s daughter Maida Leonora married Johnnie Daniel Dixon. Seth Lee, Jr. was the husband of Naomi Opal Dixon and Georgia Ellen Lee married Emery Engen. Monroe Primrose, “M.P.”, married Annie Laura Grimes. Mary Eliza Lee became the wife of Carsie Denning, Sr.
The Lee children grew up on what is today called the Abattoir Road near Little Flock Primitive Baptist Church. A trip on that road will show evidence of a dairy. The Lee Dairy was started in 1936. Electricity had just come to the 325-acre farm. There were 55 acres of pastureland and plenty of land to grow corn, soybeans, and hay for the dairy and three tenant families who lived on the farm to grow crops needed to feed the milk cows. Seth Lee, Jr. and his two helpers, Buddy and Herman Sills, operated the dairy that became well known. Milk was delivered to customers in the towns of Coats, Erwin and Dunn. The cows were milked twice a day. The milk was put into a sterilizing room at a temperature of 143 degrees for 34 minutes before it was pasteurized and then cooled. Grade “A” sweet milk, buttermilk, and chocolate milk were bottled into half pints, pints and quart bottles. To keep the milk from having a bitter taste, the bitterweed ( a yellow flower weed) had to be picked by hand from the pastureland every spring. The Lee Dairy had operated until 1942 (Carsie K. Denning, Sr. notes-2004).
Thanks goes to the J.B. Smith Family of Fuquay –Varina for their Christmas gift to the Coats Museum and to Pauline and Dorsey Daniel for remembering their family with a Christmas gift to the museum.
Please be mindful that this article was written and published in 2013.