July 5, 2024 Coats Museum News
Time is such a robber-gobbling up our seconds, our minutes, our hours, our days, our weeks, our years and finally our lives. Fifteen years ago, H.L. and I would have just returned from Spring Hope, N.C. where we would have gone to the old Barbee Plantation for one of the biggest annual Fourth of July Barbeque feasts around. Hundreds of folks from east, west, north and south traveled to come to that event of food, fun and catching up.
Being from Coats, you might wonder how H.L. and I happened to go to this distant event every year. My older sister Joyce Johnson graduated from Coats High School (1957) as an outstanding scholar and athlete who upon graduating from college went to work on Capitol Hill as an administrative assistant for US Congressman Harold Cooley of Nashville, NC. Congressman Cooley was the true voice for the farmer. When Congress was out of session, Joyce returned with her boss back to his congressional farm district which included Spring Hope. It was there that she met Walter Milton Farmer, whose mother was a Barbee. After their marriage, Joyce and Milt would later buy the Barbee Plantation with its once beautiful old plantation house that backed up to the Tar River and through the years they would open the grounds for all kinds of cooking gatherings.
This is the same Barbee family that would donate tremendous acreage for the University of NC and the same Barbee family who would marry into the Barclay Family of Barclaysville, NC. Christopher C. Barbee married Kesia (K.S) Barclay, daughter of John and Mildred Eastwood Barclay (operators of the Barclay’s Inn). C.C. Barbee would own over 20,000 acres of land, was a postmaster and operated a turpentine distillery. Christopher C. Barbee’s two brothers-Clement S. and George Barbee- would operate a stagecoach business together according to the January 4, 1860 issue of the Weekly Standard Raleigh, NC. (pages 13-14 of the Heritage of Coats, NC Vol. 1)
Time would usher us to 1906 when F.A. Arendell and Edgar B. Barbee of Wakefield, who was the son of Christopher C. and Kesia Barclay Barbee, would spur the town of Zebulon’s creation when they formed the Zebulon Company. The pair purchased the 49 acres for $ 1,470 and divided the land into lots, blocks, streets and avenues. Little did they know that this community that sprouted from a railroad depot at the turn of the century would become the home of the Glaxo-Wellcome and the Carolina Mudcats (Guide to Zebulon- p.1 and Heritage of Coats, NC Vol. 1- p.14).
It is a very small world and time and death visits regardless of where one lives. A few months ago, death from cancer, took my amazing young neighbor, Annis Barbee. Annis had grown up in Garner but would die at her home which is just a few miles from where her original ancestors were part of the Mildred Barclay’s Inn and Christopher Barbee families.
Death had visited and taken Jean Danenburg’s sister Jewel James from Graham. Others in the area were hospital patients- Dorothy Pope, Willa Mae Parrish, Vic McLeod, James Grimes, Garner Rose Ennis, Lisa Shearin, Wade Stephenson, Wilma Byrd Johnson and Margie Daniel. Charlotte Ennis Park had suffered an aneurysm and was in rehab in Richmond, VA (Daily Record Aug. 18, 1994).
Travis and Kara Spivey Reardon would announce the birth of a daughter, Tessa Danielle Reardon, who was born at BJMH. Maternal grandparents were Sandra and Mark Rigsbee and the late Rickey Reardon. Great-grandparents were Edna Stewart and Mr. and Mrs. Troy Stewart and Paul and Judene Spivey (Daily Record Aug. 23, 1994).
Alice P. Faircloth, 76, of Coats had died on Tuesday. Her services were held at the Coats Church of God by the Revs. Jimmy Tripp, Agnes Baker and John Stephenson. Barbara, Susan and Alice were daughters and Bruce and Roger were her sons (Daily Record Aug. 24, 1994).
“Notes from Coats” by Belle Williams shared that the CACC had sold 75 pork shoulders. Charles Byrd was planning a volleyball tournament. Alton and Mattie Wood had celebrated their 57th wedding anniversary. Mr. Wood would likely recall that one because he was a hospital patient that year with a gall bladder operation down at BJMH. Lela Powell had also spent time in the Wake Medical Center. Virginia Pollard was saddened by the death of her 39 year-old nephew, Gregory Goodwin, who had died from cancer.
Thank you goes to the Coats High Class of 1962 who memorialized their classmate Aldine Williams. Thank you, Cheryl Dorman Whittington for your class memorial and for always sharing tiny bits of history during your delivery of a donation. Also thank you - Linda Cobb for your memorial for Sandra Coats Byrd to the Coats Museum Endowment with the North Carolina Community Foundation.
Time is such a robber-gobbling up our seconds, our minutes, our hours, our days, our weeks, our years and finally our lives. Fifteen years ago, H.L. and I would have just returned from Spring Hope, N.C. where we would have gone to the old Barbee Plantation for one of the biggest annual Fourth of July Barbeque feasts around. Hundreds of folks from east, west, north and south traveled to come to that event of food, fun and catching up.
Being from Coats, you might wonder how H.L. and I happened to go to this distant event every year. My older sister Joyce Johnson graduated from Coats High School (1957) as an outstanding scholar and athlete who upon graduating from college went to work on Capitol Hill as an administrative assistant for US Congressman Harold Cooley of Nashville, NC. Congressman Cooley was the true voice for the farmer. When Congress was out of session, Joyce returned with her boss back to his congressional farm district which included Spring Hope. It was there that she met Walter Milton Farmer, whose mother was a Barbee. After their marriage, Joyce and Milt would later buy the Barbee Plantation with its once beautiful old plantation house that backed up to the Tar River and through the years they would open the grounds for all kinds of cooking gatherings.
This is the same Barbee family that would donate tremendous acreage for the University of NC and the same Barbee family who would marry into the Barclay Family of Barclaysville, NC. Christopher C. Barbee married Kesia (K.S) Barclay, daughter of John and Mildred Eastwood Barclay (operators of the Barclay’s Inn). C.C. Barbee would own over 20,000 acres of land, was a postmaster and operated a turpentine distillery. Christopher C. Barbee’s two brothers-Clement S. and George Barbee- would operate a stagecoach business together according to the January 4, 1860 issue of the Weekly Standard Raleigh, NC. (pages 13-14 of the Heritage of Coats, NC Vol. 1)
Time would usher us to 1906 when F.A. Arendell and Edgar B. Barbee of Wakefield, who was the son of Christopher C. and Kesia Barclay Barbee, would spur the town of Zebulon’s creation when they formed the Zebulon Company. The pair purchased the 49 acres for $ 1,470 and divided the land into lots, blocks, streets and avenues. Little did they know that this community that sprouted from a railroad depot at the turn of the century would become the home of the Glaxo-Wellcome and the Carolina Mudcats (Guide to Zebulon- p.1 and Heritage of Coats, NC Vol. 1- p.14).
It is a very small world and time and death visits regardless of where one lives. A few months ago, death from cancer, took my amazing young neighbor, Annis Barbee. Annis had grown up in Garner but would die at her home which is just a few miles from where her original ancestors were part of the Mildred Barclay’s Inn and Christopher Barbee families.
Death had visited and taken Jean Danenburg’s sister Jewel James from Graham. Others in the area were hospital patients- Dorothy Pope, Willa Mae Parrish, Vic McLeod, James Grimes, Garner Rose Ennis, Lisa Shearin, Wade Stephenson, Wilma Byrd Johnson and Margie Daniel. Charlotte Ennis Park had suffered an aneurysm and was in rehab in Richmond, VA (Daily Record Aug. 18, 1994).
Travis and Kara Spivey Reardon would announce the birth of a daughter, Tessa Danielle Reardon, who was born at BJMH. Maternal grandparents were Sandra and Mark Rigsbee and the late Rickey Reardon. Great-grandparents were Edna Stewart and Mr. and Mrs. Troy Stewart and Paul and Judene Spivey (Daily Record Aug. 23, 1994).
Alice P. Faircloth, 76, of Coats had died on Tuesday. Her services were held at the Coats Church of God by the Revs. Jimmy Tripp, Agnes Baker and John Stephenson. Barbara, Susan and Alice were daughters and Bruce and Roger were her sons (Daily Record Aug. 24, 1994).
“Notes from Coats” by Belle Williams shared that the CACC had sold 75 pork shoulders. Charles Byrd was planning a volleyball tournament. Alton and Mattie Wood had celebrated their 57th wedding anniversary. Mr. Wood would likely recall that one because he was a hospital patient that year with a gall bladder operation down at BJMH. Lela Powell had also spent time in the Wake Medical Center. Virginia Pollard was saddened by the death of her 39 year-old nephew, Gregory Goodwin, who had died from cancer.
Thank you goes to the Coats High Class of 1962 who memorialized their classmate Aldine Williams. Thank you, Cheryl Dorman Whittington for your class memorial and for always sharing tiny bits of history during your delivery of a donation. Also thank you - Linda Cobb for your memorial for Sandra Coats Byrd to the Coats Museum Endowment with the North Carolina Community Foundation.