November 21, 2014 Coats Museum News
The July 21, 1950 Dunn Dispatch recorded that the Harnett County Schools buses had traveled 459,266.6 miles without a serious accident. Also it was printed that 11,060 cars had been registered in Harnett County for the first half of 1950. The county had ranked 26th in the state. The August 2, 1950 edition of the same paper wrote that the school system had added 15 new buses to the 83 that were currently being used to transport students to the public schools.
Does 35 years sound like a short or long time? I do know that 35 years ago from 1950 that the Boy Scouts of America was 4 years old, that Grove # 3 Coats students went to school only 160 days a year and the American flag had 48 stars. Some Coats students were learning in the “Goat House”, a two-room school that supplemented the five room school on the school campus in 1915. It became the Coats Museum 80 years later in 1995. The three-story brick school building was 5 years from being built in 1915 and 30 years old in 1950.
In 1915, the telephone linked New York to San Francisco. The story goes that the patrons at Grove District #4 Turlington School saw a need to send their scholars to a school that was not overcrowded and offered the advantages of piano lessons, library, and better qualified teachers according to the late Brookie Stewart of Turlington Crossroads. Her father, G.M. (Gus) Stewart, was an innovative gent who devised the county’s first public school transportation system.
Gus Stewart built a frame over his two-horse wagon and covered it with black cloth for protection against the elements. A door graced the rear for entering and exiting the wagon by the students. A long bench on both sides accommodated 18 to 20 children to ride in the “Jitney.” As Mr. Stewart traveled the dirt paths, he would ring a large gong as he approached a rider’s house to announce his arrival. “Maude” and “Nell,” the two large mules, began their trip at 7:30 each morning and arrived at school in time for their riders to meet 8:30 tardy call. Forty dollars was paid to Gus Stewart each month for his transportation system. The system lasted for one year and is accredited, in part, for the enlarging of Turlington School into a five-room school according to the late Brookie Stewart.
Let’s hop back onto our paper canoe and rejoin the trip into July of 1950 when we learn that Brock Chevrolet, Co. opened in Lillington. Surely Mrs. Haywood Roberts attended the event to show her support for her brother, Clifton Brock, the owner.
This I do know. Miss Addie Pope had returned from Myrtle Beach where she had spent several days. July was pretty hot in Harnett County and possibly that is why Mrs. W.E. Nichols took her grandson, Nickie Tyner, to White Lake for several days. Is Nick Tyner alive today? The paper did report that Mrs. Grover Upchurch spent time in Coats visiting her sister Mrs. Eva Nichols. Mrs. Bob Byrd and daughter were also visiting family. She was the former Christine Odum and daughter of Owen and Anna Odum (Dunn Dispatch July 28, 1950).
How many of you remember your first trip to White Lake or to the beach? Can you recall seeing all Spanish moss hanging from the trees or blowing in the wind as it dangled from a car’s radio antenna or side mirror? Did you have a choice of beaches to visit and did one beach have a little more “up town” crowd than the other? At my daddy’s farm, the beach was a ten acre pond with a diving board for swimming and boat for fishing.
I bet Stacy Byrd, seaman, USN, son of Fred Byrd, could have shared some ocean stories. He had visited the ancient city of Athens, Greece when his ship, the aircraft carrier USS Leyte, anchored there after extensive maneuvers with the Sixth Fleet of which it was a unit.
A farmer outside of Coats would likely have loved to have had some of this water that you are reading about when a fire destroyed 2 of his twenty-foot tobacco barns, one of which was filled with tobacco. After working day and night during the latter part of the week, Mr. Alonzo L. Johnson had completed another barn to take care of the rest of his tobacco crop. Mr. Johnson had not expect to make much profit that year because about half the crop was expected to be marketed (Dunn Dispatch July 31, 1950).
How sad it was for the Johnson family as they realized that many of their hours of hard labor went up in flames as likely did some of the wants of the children in the family. Across the woods, another Johnson family had better news. Jonah C. and Alice Johnson were waiting for their daughter to arrive with her husband, William Jennings Bryan Dorn, who had been elected to U.S. Congress.
Another politician, Harnett County Representative Carson Gregory, wrote to Governor Kerr Scott that he favored a proposal to add one cent to the gasoline tax to be used to care for city street maintenance. Wonder how that turned out. I do know that there were 1528 births and 349 deaths reported in Harnett County in 1949 (Dunn Dispatch August 2, 1950).
Garner Bryant from Coats was the driver of a Ford belonging to Junior Walden that wrecked near Roger’s Service Station between Lillington and Buies Creek. James C. Liles and Eugene Liles were seriously hurt. With the sun continuing to bring typical hot weather to the Coats area, more folks headed for Carolina Beach. Mr. and Mrs. Keith Wayne Stewart, Miss Alice Stewart, and Dunbar Stewart spent a Sunday at Carolina Beach. Dr. and Mrs. Donald Moore and Billy were guests of Mrs. Exie Smith and Cecil Fuquay at their cottage at the beach. At home in Coats, Mr. Russ Carlson and little daughter Janet and Russ’s parents had spent last week with Mrs. Russ Carlson and Mrs. Mattie Highfill. Was Mrs. Russ Carlson ill at this time? I do know that Hayes Beasley and Braxton Pollard had left for San Diego, California where they entered the U.S. Navy (Dunn Dispatch August 7, 1950).
The museum volunteers enjoyed a short visit from Mary Stewart who came to give the museum several items belonging to her late husband Eugene Stewart.. So many pilots can recall that it was Eugene who instructed them in their flight lessons. This writer simply recalls that he was such a charming southern gentleman.
The Coats High Class of 1959 met at the Coats Community Building to eat and share an evening together recently. The Coats Museum volunteers were delighted to show off the museums by giving them a tour of many new exhibits. We were also excited to show them the trophies and autographed basketball that the Coats team had won as the 1959 Harnett County Boys Basketball Championship and the Carolina 1-A West Conference Basketball Championship. The team also won the Sportsmanship Award which did not happen often according to Phillip Nordon who attended the reunion. A big thank you goes to Josephine Rains, Linda Godwin, Linda Cobb and Billie Pope who worked with the museum staff to set up the tours and to the many other students in the class who donated enough money to place a plaque on the donor wall to honor the Class of 1959. A brick to honor the class was also added to the walk by Billie Pope. If you are on the Heritage Square, look at the new addition of bricks on the Walk of Ages and see the names of some more folks who have a made a tremendous contribution to Coats and surrounding areas.
The July 21, 1950 Dunn Dispatch recorded that the Harnett County Schools buses had traveled 459,266.6 miles without a serious accident. Also it was printed that 11,060 cars had been registered in Harnett County for the first half of 1950. The county had ranked 26th in the state. The August 2, 1950 edition of the same paper wrote that the school system had added 15 new buses to the 83 that were currently being used to transport students to the public schools.
Does 35 years sound like a short or long time? I do know that 35 years ago from 1950 that the Boy Scouts of America was 4 years old, that Grove # 3 Coats students went to school only 160 days a year and the American flag had 48 stars. Some Coats students were learning in the “Goat House”, a two-room school that supplemented the five room school on the school campus in 1915. It became the Coats Museum 80 years later in 1995. The three-story brick school building was 5 years from being built in 1915 and 30 years old in 1950.
In 1915, the telephone linked New York to San Francisco. The story goes that the patrons at Grove District #4 Turlington School saw a need to send their scholars to a school that was not overcrowded and offered the advantages of piano lessons, library, and better qualified teachers according to the late Brookie Stewart of Turlington Crossroads. Her father, G.M. (Gus) Stewart, was an innovative gent who devised the county’s first public school transportation system.
Gus Stewart built a frame over his two-horse wagon and covered it with black cloth for protection against the elements. A door graced the rear for entering and exiting the wagon by the students. A long bench on both sides accommodated 18 to 20 children to ride in the “Jitney.” As Mr. Stewart traveled the dirt paths, he would ring a large gong as he approached a rider’s house to announce his arrival. “Maude” and “Nell,” the two large mules, began their trip at 7:30 each morning and arrived at school in time for their riders to meet 8:30 tardy call. Forty dollars was paid to Gus Stewart each month for his transportation system. The system lasted for one year and is accredited, in part, for the enlarging of Turlington School into a five-room school according to the late Brookie Stewart.
Let’s hop back onto our paper canoe and rejoin the trip into July of 1950 when we learn that Brock Chevrolet, Co. opened in Lillington. Surely Mrs. Haywood Roberts attended the event to show her support for her brother, Clifton Brock, the owner.
This I do know. Miss Addie Pope had returned from Myrtle Beach where she had spent several days. July was pretty hot in Harnett County and possibly that is why Mrs. W.E. Nichols took her grandson, Nickie Tyner, to White Lake for several days. Is Nick Tyner alive today? The paper did report that Mrs. Grover Upchurch spent time in Coats visiting her sister Mrs. Eva Nichols. Mrs. Bob Byrd and daughter were also visiting family. She was the former Christine Odum and daughter of Owen and Anna Odum (Dunn Dispatch July 28, 1950).
How many of you remember your first trip to White Lake or to the beach? Can you recall seeing all Spanish moss hanging from the trees or blowing in the wind as it dangled from a car’s radio antenna or side mirror? Did you have a choice of beaches to visit and did one beach have a little more “up town” crowd than the other? At my daddy’s farm, the beach was a ten acre pond with a diving board for swimming and boat for fishing.
I bet Stacy Byrd, seaman, USN, son of Fred Byrd, could have shared some ocean stories. He had visited the ancient city of Athens, Greece when his ship, the aircraft carrier USS Leyte, anchored there after extensive maneuvers with the Sixth Fleet of which it was a unit.
A farmer outside of Coats would likely have loved to have had some of this water that you are reading about when a fire destroyed 2 of his twenty-foot tobacco barns, one of which was filled with tobacco. After working day and night during the latter part of the week, Mr. Alonzo L. Johnson had completed another barn to take care of the rest of his tobacco crop. Mr. Johnson had not expect to make much profit that year because about half the crop was expected to be marketed (Dunn Dispatch July 31, 1950).
How sad it was for the Johnson family as they realized that many of their hours of hard labor went up in flames as likely did some of the wants of the children in the family. Across the woods, another Johnson family had better news. Jonah C. and Alice Johnson were waiting for their daughter to arrive with her husband, William Jennings Bryan Dorn, who had been elected to U.S. Congress.
Another politician, Harnett County Representative Carson Gregory, wrote to Governor Kerr Scott that he favored a proposal to add one cent to the gasoline tax to be used to care for city street maintenance. Wonder how that turned out. I do know that there were 1528 births and 349 deaths reported in Harnett County in 1949 (Dunn Dispatch August 2, 1950).
Garner Bryant from Coats was the driver of a Ford belonging to Junior Walden that wrecked near Roger’s Service Station between Lillington and Buies Creek. James C. Liles and Eugene Liles were seriously hurt. With the sun continuing to bring typical hot weather to the Coats area, more folks headed for Carolina Beach. Mr. and Mrs. Keith Wayne Stewart, Miss Alice Stewart, and Dunbar Stewart spent a Sunday at Carolina Beach. Dr. and Mrs. Donald Moore and Billy were guests of Mrs. Exie Smith and Cecil Fuquay at their cottage at the beach. At home in Coats, Mr. Russ Carlson and little daughter Janet and Russ’s parents had spent last week with Mrs. Russ Carlson and Mrs. Mattie Highfill. Was Mrs. Russ Carlson ill at this time? I do know that Hayes Beasley and Braxton Pollard had left for San Diego, California where they entered the U.S. Navy (Dunn Dispatch August 7, 1950).
The museum volunteers enjoyed a short visit from Mary Stewart who came to give the museum several items belonging to her late husband Eugene Stewart.. So many pilots can recall that it was Eugene who instructed them in their flight lessons. This writer simply recalls that he was such a charming southern gentleman.
The Coats High Class of 1959 met at the Coats Community Building to eat and share an evening together recently. The Coats Museum volunteers were delighted to show off the museums by giving them a tour of many new exhibits. We were also excited to show them the trophies and autographed basketball that the Coats team had won as the 1959 Harnett County Boys Basketball Championship and the Carolina 1-A West Conference Basketball Championship. The team also won the Sportsmanship Award which did not happen often according to Phillip Nordon who attended the reunion. A big thank you goes to Josephine Rains, Linda Godwin, Linda Cobb and Billie Pope who worked with the museum staff to set up the tours and to the many other students in the class who donated enough money to place a plaque on the donor wall to honor the Class of 1959. A brick to honor the class was also added to the walk by Billie Pope. If you are on the Heritage Square, look at the new addition of bricks on the Walk of Ages and see the names of some more folks who have a made a tremendous contribution to Coats and surrounding areas.