November 14, 2014 Coats Museum News
In the summer of 1950, groundwork was being done on a gymnasium and primary classrooms on the Coats High School campus. Did other high schools in the county already have gymnasiums? Can you name the other high schools in the county in 1950? Even easier, can you name those today and is the number the same?
On the eastern border of Harnett County at Oakdale, the Home Demonstration Club was celebrating its fourth anniversary. The club had been the 20th club in Harnett County in June 1946. The club proudly shared to the paper its activities of the past four years. They had given a play, “This They Called Love” and had made $56.00. They had given gifts and flowers to sick neighbors and new babies in the community. The circulating basket with literature on baby health care and baby care was passed from one expectant mother to another in the community. The members had selected an empty classroom at Oakdale School. They cleaned, renovated, purchased drapes, painted old tables and furnished playpens for the babies. The club had green versus gold teams to increase membership. They brought in 13 new members increasing the membership to 28. Mr. Dallas Norris loaned the club a piece of land beside their pond for a picnic grounds. The area was leveled and planted in grass and flowers. When completed, the entire community was invited to a fish fry. Are you impressed with that community love?
Mrs. Inez Scarbourgh lost her husband, William Bernice Scarbourgh, 51, at Rex Hospital. Burial was in Dublin, Georgia. He was a member of the Coats Baptist Church (Dunn Dispatch July 14, 1950).
Pope’s in Coats had a July Clearance Sale. Folks could purchase dungarees for $1.98, blouses or sandals for $. 97, men’s t-shirts for $.59 or a man’s suit for $15.95 (Dunn Dispatch July 17, 1950). Do you think the store was cleared with those prices?
Things were popping around Coats. Miss Edna Beasley of Annapolis, Maryland, was spending some time with Mr. and Mrs. T.O. Beasley. Mr. Bob Warren, who had been residing in Coats for several months as an assistant to M.O. Phillips, had accepted a position at Anderson Creek and had moved there. Question-how many of our Benson readers recognize that name? Was he not principal of Benson High School and later the state senator from that district? Can we conclude that he did a great job? Does a portion of NC Hwy 40 display his name?
Mrs. H.C. Stewart, leader of the YWA girls at Coats Baptist, chaperoned a group who spent a weekend at Fort Caswell. Sue Turlington, Marilyn Yarley, Evangeline Stewart, Glenda Parrish, and Cecil Fuquay made the trip. The Ruth Eller Class had met at the home of M.O. Phillips. Members of that class were Mrs. Johnnie Barnes, Mrs. Banks Pollard, Mrs. Keith Wayne Stewart, Mrs. Raymond Ennis, Mrs. Donald Moore, Mrs. Verle Flowers and Mrs. McRay Stewart.
While those folks were going here and there for various reasons, the death angel came to Coats with one goal in mind and that was to visit the home of Mrs. Mattie Hodges Coats, 79. G.R., J.C., C.F., McKinnley, Draughon, and Joe Coats survived her. She had one daughter, Mrs. Hodges Cobb, and several stepchildren-Willie Tew, Sis Boone, Mattie Lee, and Sarah Lou Sanders. Mrs. Flonnie Tart and Mrs. Laura Jones were siblings. Mrs. Coats had been a resident of Coats for about 28 years and had been a member of the Gift PB Church (Dunn Dispatch July 19, 1950).
Peggy Joyce Weaver, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Clyde Weaver, represented the Coats 4-H Club at State College on July 24-29. However, the Harnett County Commissioners were likely more concerned of there being talk that an increase in the county tax rate was needed. The rate was currently $1.30 but it was not providing enough funds to meet the needs of the county (Dunn Dispatch July 21, 1950).
It did happen. The Harnett County Board of Commissioners had met and set the new tax rate at $1.34. The chairman was absent and tempers flared. Out of the budget, 68 cents of the $1.34 went for schools. Grove taxpayers paid an additional 19 cents for the Road Referendum Bonds.
Five families had gathered at William L. Taylor’s farm at Coats on a Saturday in a community effort to get ripening tobacco into curing barns and ready for the warehouse opening on August 18th (Dunn Dispatch July 24, 1950). How many of you remember the time that neighbors did help each other barn tobacco and a few weeks later socialize as the entire family would go to a neighbor’s grading house and help tie the cured leaves.
Coats Theater was showing “Knock on Any Door” with Humphrey Bogart (Dunn Dispatch July 26, 1950). This was the time frame when the open drive-in theaters were beginning to be popular. Wonder how it affected Mr. Yarley’s Coats Theater.
I do know that farmers from Grove competed in the Corn Production Contest. The farmers were Hassell Lewis, Carson Gregory, J.W. Sorrell, Jr., J.B. Jernigan, Owen Odum, and Sherrill Stephenson. Could there have been some controversy brewing over the tax increase? The paper was posting the salaries of some of the county employees. Sheriff Bill Salmon’s salary was $423.39 per month; County Tax Collector Duncan Ray carried home a check for $345.90; the County Tax supervisor was paid a few dollars more at $367.35.
Do you wonder what the county commissioners were paid in 1950? The chairman made $50.00 and board members received $25.00 per month. That doesn’t sound like a great deal of money but recall that a man’s suit only cost $15.95 in 1950 (Dunn Dispatch July 28, 1950).
Life at the museum is a new experience each day. How many of you remember a former student at Coats High School named Marilyn Yarley whose father operated the Coats Theater? Recently we received several calls from Jim Womble from Virginia Beach, Virginia inquiring about Marilyn’s family that was living in Coats when Marilyn and he were students at Campbell College. He was trying to reconnect with the family. JoAnn Turlington graduated from Coats High School with Marilyn and she gave us her last known address of Marilyn. We could not get a match on Marilyn.
That is not the rest of the story. In about 2003, the museum volunteers were trying to get pictures and information of all the licensed pilots who grew up in Coats for an Aviation Collection Exhibit. It was at this time that we were spending every day at the Daily Record library researching for material for our Coats heritage book that we read an article about a Dr. Dewey Yarley who was a U.S. Navy pilot. I called a Dr. Dewey Yarley whose Durham number I had found on white pages. A phone call to him disclosed that his family had come to Coats after he had graduated from high school but he was very familiar with the town and even remembered that he had Edison Johnson (Herbert, Mary Jo and Doris’s brother) as a patient in Durham. Dr. Yarley sent us pictures of the inside and outside of his dad’s Coats Theater along with aviation pictures.
Now for the rest of the story- Patsy and Stacy Avery and Becky Adams were volunteering at the museum on Sunday and a call came in from Virginia Beach. Yes, it was Jim Womble who excitedly shared that he had talked with Dr. Yarley for 20 minutes even though neither knew each other. Jim did learn that Marilyn, his college friend, has MS and Alzheimer’s. We also learned that JIm remembered our beloved Norfleet Gardner who was also at Campbell playing on the baseball and basketball teams at that time.
Stories such as this is why we value our Coats Museum.
In the summer of 1950, groundwork was being done on a gymnasium and primary classrooms on the Coats High School campus. Did other high schools in the county already have gymnasiums? Can you name the other high schools in the county in 1950? Even easier, can you name those today and is the number the same?
On the eastern border of Harnett County at Oakdale, the Home Demonstration Club was celebrating its fourth anniversary. The club had been the 20th club in Harnett County in June 1946. The club proudly shared to the paper its activities of the past four years. They had given a play, “This They Called Love” and had made $56.00. They had given gifts and flowers to sick neighbors and new babies in the community. The circulating basket with literature on baby health care and baby care was passed from one expectant mother to another in the community. The members had selected an empty classroom at Oakdale School. They cleaned, renovated, purchased drapes, painted old tables and furnished playpens for the babies. The club had green versus gold teams to increase membership. They brought in 13 new members increasing the membership to 28. Mr. Dallas Norris loaned the club a piece of land beside their pond for a picnic grounds. The area was leveled and planted in grass and flowers. When completed, the entire community was invited to a fish fry. Are you impressed with that community love?
Mrs. Inez Scarbourgh lost her husband, William Bernice Scarbourgh, 51, at Rex Hospital. Burial was in Dublin, Georgia. He was a member of the Coats Baptist Church (Dunn Dispatch July 14, 1950).
Pope’s in Coats had a July Clearance Sale. Folks could purchase dungarees for $1.98, blouses or sandals for $. 97, men’s t-shirts for $.59 or a man’s suit for $15.95 (Dunn Dispatch July 17, 1950). Do you think the store was cleared with those prices?
Things were popping around Coats. Miss Edna Beasley of Annapolis, Maryland, was spending some time with Mr. and Mrs. T.O. Beasley. Mr. Bob Warren, who had been residing in Coats for several months as an assistant to M.O. Phillips, had accepted a position at Anderson Creek and had moved there. Question-how many of our Benson readers recognize that name? Was he not principal of Benson High School and later the state senator from that district? Can we conclude that he did a great job? Does a portion of NC Hwy 40 display his name?
Mrs. H.C. Stewart, leader of the YWA girls at Coats Baptist, chaperoned a group who spent a weekend at Fort Caswell. Sue Turlington, Marilyn Yarley, Evangeline Stewart, Glenda Parrish, and Cecil Fuquay made the trip. The Ruth Eller Class had met at the home of M.O. Phillips. Members of that class were Mrs. Johnnie Barnes, Mrs. Banks Pollard, Mrs. Keith Wayne Stewart, Mrs. Raymond Ennis, Mrs. Donald Moore, Mrs. Verle Flowers and Mrs. McRay Stewart.
While those folks were going here and there for various reasons, the death angel came to Coats with one goal in mind and that was to visit the home of Mrs. Mattie Hodges Coats, 79. G.R., J.C., C.F., McKinnley, Draughon, and Joe Coats survived her. She had one daughter, Mrs. Hodges Cobb, and several stepchildren-Willie Tew, Sis Boone, Mattie Lee, and Sarah Lou Sanders. Mrs. Flonnie Tart and Mrs. Laura Jones were siblings. Mrs. Coats had been a resident of Coats for about 28 years and had been a member of the Gift PB Church (Dunn Dispatch July 19, 1950).
Peggy Joyce Weaver, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Clyde Weaver, represented the Coats 4-H Club at State College on July 24-29. However, the Harnett County Commissioners were likely more concerned of there being talk that an increase in the county tax rate was needed. The rate was currently $1.30 but it was not providing enough funds to meet the needs of the county (Dunn Dispatch July 21, 1950).
It did happen. The Harnett County Board of Commissioners had met and set the new tax rate at $1.34. The chairman was absent and tempers flared. Out of the budget, 68 cents of the $1.34 went for schools. Grove taxpayers paid an additional 19 cents for the Road Referendum Bonds.
Five families had gathered at William L. Taylor’s farm at Coats on a Saturday in a community effort to get ripening tobacco into curing barns and ready for the warehouse opening on August 18th (Dunn Dispatch July 24, 1950). How many of you remember the time that neighbors did help each other barn tobacco and a few weeks later socialize as the entire family would go to a neighbor’s grading house and help tie the cured leaves.
Coats Theater was showing “Knock on Any Door” with Humphrey Bogart (Dunn Dispatch July 26, 1950). This was the time frame when the open drive-in theaters were beginning to be popular. Wonder how it affected Mr. Yarley’s Coats Theater.
I do know that farmers from Grove competed in the Corn Production Contest. The farmers were Hassell Lewis, Carson Gregory, J.W. Sorrell, Jr., J.B. Jernigan, Owen Odum, and Sherrill Stephenson. Could there have been some controversy brewing over the tax increase? The paper was posting the salaries of some of the county employees. Sheriff Bill Salmon’s salary was $423.39 per month; County Tax Collector Duncan Ray carried home a check for $345.90; the County Tax supervisor was paid a few dollars more at $367.35.
Do you wonder what the county commissioners were paid in 1950? The chairman made $50.00 and board members received $25.00 per month. That doesn’t sound like a great deal of money but recall that a man’s suit only cost $15.95 in 1950 (Dunn Dispatch July 28, 1950).
Life at the museum is a new experience each day. How many of you remember a former student at Coats High School named Marilyn Yarley whose father operated the Coats Theater? Recently we received several calls from Jim Womble from Virginia Beach, Virginia inquiring about Marilyn’s family that was living in Coats when Marilyn and he were students at Campbell College. He was trying to reconnect with the family. JoAnn Turlington graduated from Coats High School with Marilyn and she gave us her last known address of Marilyn. We could not get a match on Marilyn.
That is not the rest of the story. In about 2003, the museum volunteers were trying to get pictures and information of all the licensed pilots who grew up in Coats for an Aviation Collection Exhibit. It was at this time that we were spending every day at the Daily Record library researching for material for our Coats heritage book that we read an article about a Dr. Dewey Yarley who was a U.S. Navy pilot. I called a Dr. Dewey Yarley whose Durham number I had found on white pages. A phone call to him disclosed that his family had come to Coats after he had graduated from high school but he was very familiar with the town and even remembered that he had Edison Johnson (Herbert, Mary Jo and Doris’s brother) as a patient in Durham. Dr. Yarley sent us pictures of the inside and outside of his dad’s Coats Theater along with aviation pictures.
Now for the rest of the story- Patsy and Stacy Avery and Becky Adams were volunteering at the museum on Sunday and a call came in from Virginia Beach. Yes, it was Jim Womble who excitedly shared that he had talked with Dr. Yarley for 20 minutes even though neither knew each other. Jim did learn that Marilyn, his college friend, has MS and Alzheimer’s. We also learned that JIm remembered our beloved Norfleet Gardner who was also at Campbell playing on the baseball and basketball teams at that time.
Stories such as this is why we value our Coats Museum.