June 19, 2020 Coats Museum News
Do you wonder what toys were popular in 1984? An examination of letters to Santa Claus gives us some clues. A young four year-old Coats boy, Jonathan Tart, wanted a Battle Cat, a He-Man, Dragon Walker, Sekletor Cat and a Castle Grayskull (Daily Record Dec. 13, 1984). Remember any of these toys?
Tonya Kay Stancil, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. James Sherrill Stancil, celebrated her 7th birthday. She was a first grade student at Coats School (Daily Record Dec.14, 1984).
Mr. N. Earl Jones, Jr., attorney at law, received the Business Focus of the Week by the CACC. Mr. Jones had opened his law office in 1979 and was very active in civic clubs and his church. Elsewhere, Mark Pleasant, son of J.L. and Della Pleasant, had written Santa for a tractor with a backhoe and a front-end loader. Skates would also be nice as he wrote his letter (Daily Record Dec. 19, 1984).
Christmas festivities were marred for the Henry Edward Loyd family. Mr. Loyd, 69, had died on Tuesday. He was buried in the Bethel PB Church Cemetery. His survivors were his wife-Mary Etta Clayton Loyd, and five children-Edward, Kenneth, Garland, Joan Baker and Nancy Lucas.
Around the world people greeted a new year-1985. It was the year in which there seemed to be too many spies, terrorists and mergers. Ronald Reagan was inaugurated for his second term as a severe cold wave killed forty people and the inaugural parade was cancelled. A federal study targeted obesity as a major killer in the same category as smoking and high blood pressure. Mikhail Gorbachev was the new leader of the Soviet Union. Compact discs and disc players were an immediate hit with music lovers. There was much merchandise created to welcome the return of Halley’s Comet. Live Aid and Farm Aid concerts favorably displayed the consciences of pop musicians. It was the year of “Rambo” and “Rambo: First Blood-Part II.” Pete Rose eclipsed Ty Cobb’s record for the most career hits. Manly stubble came on as male weekday fashion. Mel Gibson, Harrison Ford, Bruce Springsteen and Don Johnson pioneered the five o’clock shadow. A song, “We are the World” was sung by an all-star group and netted more than $30 million for African famine relief. Four –wheel-drive vehicles asserted themselves. Coca Cola Company announced that the company was abandoning the old formula for a new Coke. Twenty-four mergers or takeovers involved than a billion dollars. Officially and for the first time since WWI, the US became a debtor nation. Random House acquired the rights to Reagan’s autobiography for $3 million. The cost to mail a first –class stamp rose to 22 cents. A 17.2-cubic GE refrigerator cost the same as in 1965-$635. Simultaneous airport terrorist attacks in Rome and Vienna killed 18 and wounded 110. Congress passed the Gramm-Rudman Budget Reduction Bill which required Congress to eliminate the federal deficit by 1991 (Dickson, Paul. From Elvis to E-Mail. Massachusetts: Federal Street Press, 1999, pp. 277-282).
The January 1, 1985 edition of the Daily Record shared news about Sandy Langdon, son of Mr. and Mrs. J.A. Langdon, Jr. of Route 3, Dunn and Tammy Lynn Johnson, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Bobby Johnson of Four Oaks. Tammy and Sandy announced their engagement and wedding plans for February 10, 1985. Elsewhere, Wendy Dawn Whitman, daughter of Teresa Whitman of Route, Coats, had celebrated her first birthday with her sister Lori and brother Jody. The children had celebrated three days earlier on Christmas day.
A Coats business that has made Coats proud for decades is the one operated by Stacy and Judy Williams. The extremely high quality of workmanship from the Stacy Williams Upholstery Company can be found in Liberty Hall Museum in Kenansville, the Governor’s Mansion, Capital City Club, Coats Mueum and all the way into Virginia Beach at the General Booth Veterinary Hospital. This couple is such a giving pair. They always support the Chamber in Coats and for years have been so generous to the Coats Museum. Thank you once again, Judy and Stacy Williams. Thank you goes to the CHS Class of 1960 for remembering their classmate Cecil Gregory with a memorial to the Coats Museum.
Read next week about the robbery of the Coats High School safe.
Do you wonder what toys were popular in 1984? An examination of letters to Santa Claus gives us some clues. A young four year-old Coats boy, Jonathan Tart, wanted a Battle Cat, a He-Man, Dragon Walker, Sekletor Cat and a Castle Grayskull (Daily Record Dec. 13, 1984). Remember any of these toys?
Tonya Kay Stancil, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. James Sherrill Stancil, celebrated her 7th birthday. She was a first grade student at Coats School (Daily Record Dec.14, 1984).
Mr. N. Earl Jones, Jr., attorney at law, received the Business Focus of the Week by the CACC. Mr. Jones had opened his law office in 1979 and was very active in civic clubs and his church. Elsewhere, Mark Pleasant, son of J.L. and Della Pleasant, had written Santa for a tractor with a backhoe and a front-end loader. Skates would also be nice as he wrote his letter (Daily Record Dec. 19, 1984).
Christmas festivities were marred for the Henry Edward Loyd family. Mr. Loyd, 69, had died on Tuesday. He was buried in the Bethel PB Church Cemetery. His survivors were his wife-Mary Etta Clayton Loyd, and five children-Edward, Kenneth, Garland, Joan Baker and Nancy Lucas.
Around the world people greeted a new year-1985. It was the year in which there seemed to be too many spies, terrorists and mergers. Ronald Reagan was inaugurated for his second term as a severe cold wave killed forty people and the inaugural parade was cancelled. A federal study targeted obesity as a major killer in the same category as smoking and high blood pressure. Mikhail Gorbachev was the new leader of the Soviet Union. Compact discs and disc players were an immediate hit with music lovers. There was much merchandise created to welcome the return of Halley’s Comet. Live Aid and Farm Aid concerts favorably displayed the consciences of pop musicians. It was the year of “Rambo” and “Rambo: First Blood-Part II.” Pete Rose eclipsed Ty Cobb’s record for the most career hits. Manly stubble came on as male weekday fashion. Mel Gibson, Harrison Ford, Bruce Springsteen and Don Johnson pioneered the five o’clock shadow. A song, “We are the World” was sung by an all-star group and netted more than $30 million for African famine relief. Four –wheel-drive vehicles asserted themselves. Coca Cola Company announced that the company was abandoning the old formula for a new Coke. Twenty-four mergers or takeovers involved than a billion dollars. Officially and for the first time since WWI, the US became a debtor nation. Random House acquired the rights to Reagan’s autobiography for $3 million. The cost to mail a first –class stamp rose to 22 cents. A 17.2-cubic GE refrigerator cost the same as in 1965-$635. Simultaneous airport terrorist attacks in Rome and Vienna killed 18 and wounded 110. Congress passed the Gramm-Rudman Budget Reduction Bill which required Congress to eliminate the federal deficit by 1991 (Dickson, Paul. From Elvis to E-Mail. Massachusetts: Federal Street Press, 1999, pp. 277-282).
The January 1, 1985 edition of the Daily Record shared news about Sandy Langdon, son of Mr. and Mrs. J.A. Langdon, Jr. of Route 3, Dunn and Tammy Lynn Johnson, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Bobby Johnson of Four Oaks. Tammy and Sandy announced their engagement and wedding plans for February 10, 1985. Elsewhere, Wendy Dawn Whitman, daughter of Teresa Whitman of Route, Coats, had celebrated her first birthday with her sister Lori and brother Jody. The children had celebrated three days earlier on Christmas day.
A Coats business that has made Coats proud for decades is the one operated by Stacy and Judy Williams. The extremely high quality of workmanship from the Stacy Williams Upholstery Company can be found in Liberty Hall Museum in Kenansville, the Governor’s Mansion, Capital City Club, Coats Mueum and all the way into Virginia Beach at the General Booth Veterinary Hospital. This couple is such a giving pair. They always support the Chamber in Coats and for years have been so generous to the Coats Museum. Thank you once again, Judy and Stacy Williams. Thank you goes to the CHS Class of 1960 for remembering their classmate Cecil Gregory with a memorial to the Coats Museum.
Read next week about the robbery of the Coats High School safe.