September 22, 2023 Coats Museum News
Last Thursday, the Coats Museum volunteers enjoyed a short visit from Pastor David Smithey from the Ebenezer Presbyterian Church where Becky Adams and I are members. Pastor David is from western North Carolina, so he doesn’t know much about what it was like in the “good ole days” here in Harnett County.
I questioned if there was such a thing as “good ole days” that people often say that they wished things were like today. Since we volunteers are farm-reared, we began to share with him what it was like to get up at three or four o’clock in the morning to get sticks of dried (cured) tobacco leaves out of the barns so green ones could be put in that day.
We failed to mention to him that even after the tobacco barning was finished for that day, the work of the farm family was not over. The day was wrapped up with a trip back into the tobacco field to pull suckers from the tobacco stalks or a trip to the garden to pick vegetables for the next day’s meals or for freezing or canning if extras were ready to harvest.
On our farm, we most times had to take out two barns of tobacco and store them in a pack house. My mom would always help with the first barn but would return to the house and prepare a breakfast of either country ham or sausage, grits, fried apples and homemade biscuits all the while preparing food for the noon meal which could consist of a meat, a couple of veggies. Peaches from the orchard were often picked and my sisters and I would peel them at lunch and make homemade whipped topping from real milk cream for our dessert. There were no prepared meals or food from outside our house except when there was a fundraiser of barbeque chicken or pork at the various churches.
Pastor David mentioned that another church member, Tommy Ennis, shared with him about something that was black and sticky would get on the hands from handling the tobacco. Most surely Pastor David has much to learn about the good ole days’ on a Harnett County farm. Yes, we informed we knew all about tobacco gum and back then we even had a store purchased soap that would help remove it before we had our noon meal. Lynda Butler recalled it was lava soap and I reminded him that some folks actually used homemade lye soap to remove the tobacco gum from the arms and hands. We’ll tell him all about lye soap on another visit.
I’m not sure I would want to relive those days in the corn, cotton and tobacco fields which were long, extremely sweaty, and exhausting. I will admit one bright spot was that soft drink and choice of cookie, candy or some other unhealthy snack that all enjoyed during morning or afternoon break while barning tobacco.
What are some other things from the “good ole days”? Do you realize that we have a very few folks who are still with us who might have had to walk to school if they lived a mile and half from their school and in 1933 that was to be increased to a two mile walk? Yes, parents did protest the law. It was interesting that these same parents were the ones who had boasted of having to walk five miles for their “schoolin”.
Days were not too good for teachers in the” good ole days”. Ninety years ago in 1933, teachers were paid $543 a year or $45 per month for 12 months. Coats had 5 high school teachers and 22 elementary in that year; whereas, the state had 23,000. Were farmers any better off? Tobacco was selling for 3 to 25 cents per pound in Georgia.
Just as we have fears of viruses in 2023, in the “good ole days’ they did likewise. In fact in 1933, the county board of commissioners appropriated $2,000 for a campaign of vaccination against typhoid fever and diphtheria in Harnett County. Eight cases had been reported in Harnett. Did you say “Same stage, just different actors?”
Did you know that license plates in N.C. were not always the same color or size in the good ole days? Eventually they were standard sized but in 1933, the color was blue and white and then in 1934 they changed to black and yellow. In the” good ole days” some folks could not afford a license plate or gas for their vehicle so they parked their car and returned to their mule and wagon to travel those good ole dusty, bumpy dirt roads.
In the “good ole days” an individual could buy an old school. The county board approved the sale of the Gregory School to Mr. D.S. Langdon of Angier, Route 2, for the sum of $400. That was almost as much as a teacher made in a 1933 year so obviously Mr. Langdon was not a teacher. However, things could get worse in those days. It was reported that N.C. teachers were among the lowest paid in the nation. It was reported that a teacher averaged $498 a year-$550 for white teacher and $365 for Colored. Good ole days? These numbers vary slightly from those above is it because of that word “average”?
Wonder if Massachusetts continues to pay the highest salary for teachers in 2023? They paid $1,838 per year in 1934.
This I do know. Sixty years later in 1993, the CACC recognized the J and M Heating and Air Conditioning Inc. The company was headed by Hoover Johnson and was located on Turlington Road. The customers come from as far west as Interstate 77, all the way to the coast of NC, north to VA state line and south to the SC state line. The business had 12 full-time employees including Hoover and his wife- Betty Moore Johnson, Tommy Bennett, Kent Johnson, Mark Ederette, Cliff Dilts, Jody Byrd, John Bailey, Andy Watkins, Jay Honeycutt, Jerry Pleasant, and Danny Gregory. They served 28 construction companies in their service area (Daily Record July 28, 1993.
Wouldn’t you like to know how the schools and homes were cooled and heated in the good ole days?
Saturday was a big day at the museum. The Coats Museum Board of Directors and officers met. The new board members are David Barnes, Mayor Chris Coats, Wallace Pollard, Brenda Rhiner and former Mayor Walter Weeks. The new members will join Linda Cobb, Ralph Denning, Hilda Pope, Gayle Sorrell, Myrtle Bridges, Peggy Robinson and Randy Stephenson. Andy Cole is chair and Lenny Parker is his vice chair of the board while Becky Adams serves as secretary and Robie Butler as treasurer.
Last Thursday, the Coats Museum volunteers enjoyed a short visit from Pastor David Smithey from the Ebenezer Presbyterian Church where Becky Adams and I are members. Pastor David is from western North Carolina, so he doesn’t know much about what it was like in the “good ole days” here in Harnett County.
I questioned if there was such a thing as “good ole days” that people often say that they wished things were like today. Since we volunteers are farm-reared, we began to share with him what it was like to get up at three or four o’clock in the morning to get sticks of dried (cured) tobacco leaves out of the barns so green ones could be put in that day.
We failed to mention to him that even after the tobacco barning was finished for that day, the work of the farm family was not over. The day was wrapped up with a trip back into the tobacco field to pull suckers from the tobacco stalks or a trip to the garden to pick vegetables for the next day’s meals or for freezing or canning if extras were ready to harvest.
On our farm, we most times had to take out two barns of tobacco and store them in a pack house. My mom would always help with the first barn but would return to the house and prepare a breakfast of either country ham or sausage, grits, fried apples and homemade biscuits all the while preparing food for the noon meal which could consist of a meat, a couple of veggies. Peaches from the orchard were often picked and my sisters and I would peel them at lunch and make homemade whipped topping from real milk cream for our dessert. There were no prepared meals or food from outside our house except when there was a fundraiser of barbeque chicken or pork at the various churches.
Pastor David mentioned that another church member, Tommy Ennis, shared with him about something that was black and sticky would get on the hands from handling the tobacco. Most surely Pastor David has much to learn about the good ole days’ on a Harnett County farm. Yes, we informed we knew all about tobacco gum and back then we even had a store purchased soap that would help remove it before we had our noon meal. Lynda Butler recalled it was lava soap and I reminded him that some folks actually used homemade lye soap to remove the tobacco gum from the arms and hands. We’ll tell him all about lye soap on another visit.
I’m not sure I would want to relive those days in the corn, cotton and tobacco fields which were long, extremely sweaty, and exhausting. I will admit one bright spot was that soft drink and choice of cookie, candy or some other unhealthy snack that all enjoyed during morning or afternoon break while barning tobacco.
What are some other things from the “good ole days”? Do you realize that we have a very few folks who are still with us who might have had to walk to school if they lived a mile and half from their school and in 1933 that was to be increased to a two mile walk? Yes, parents did protest the law. It was interesting that these same parents were the ones who had boasted of having to walk five miles for their “schoolin”.
Days were not too good for teachers in the” good ole days”. Ninety years ago in 1933, teachers were paid $543 a year or $45 per month for 12 months. Coats had 5 high school teachers and 22 elementary in that year; whereas, the state had 23,000. Were farmers any better off? Tobacco was selling for 3 to 25 cents per pound in Georgia.
Just as we have fears of viruses in 2023, in the “good ole days’ they did likewise. In fact in 1933, the county board of commissioners appropriated $2,000 for a campaign of vaccination against typhoid fever and diphtheria in Harnett County. Eight cases had been reported in Harnett. Did you say “Same stage, just different actors?”
Did you know that license plates in N.C. were not always the same color or size in the good ole days? Eventually they were standard sized but in 1933, the color was blue and white and then in 1934 they changed to black and yellow. In the” good ole days” some folks could not afford a license plate or gas for their vehicle so they parked their car and returned to their mule and wagon to travel those good ole dusty, bumpy dirt roads.
In the “good ole days” an individual could buy an old school. The county board approved the sale of the Gregory School to Mr. D.S. Langdon of Angier, Route 2, for the sum of $400. That was almost as much as a teacher made in a 1933 year so obviously Mr. Langdon was not a teacher. However, things could get worse in those days. It was reported that N.C. teachers were among the lowest paid in the nation. It was reported that a teacher averaged $498 a year-$550 for white teacher and $365 for Colored. Good ole days? These numbers vary slightly from those above is it because of that word “average”?
Wonder if Massachusetts continues to pay the highest salary for teachers in 2023? They paid $1,838 per year in 1934.
This I do know. Sixty years later in 1993, the CACC recognized the J and M Heating and Air Conditioning Inc. The company was headed by Hoover Johnson and was located on Turlington Road. The customers come from as far west as Interstate 77, all the way to the coast of NC, north to VA state line and south to the SC state line. The business had 12 full-time employees including Hoover and his wife- Betty Moore Johnson, Tommy Bennett, Kent Johnson, Mark Ederette, Cliff Dilts, Jody Byrd, John Bailey, Andy Watkins, Jay Honeycutt, Jerry Pleasant, and Danny Gregory. They served 28 construction companies in their service area (Daily Record July 28, 1993.
Wouldn’t you like to know how the schools and homes were cooled and heated in the good ole days?
Saturday was a big day at the museum. The Coats Museum Board of Directors and officers met. The new board members are David Barnes, Mayor Chris Coats, Wallace Pollard, Brenda Rhiner and former Mayor Walter Weeks. The new members will join Linda Cobb, Ralph Denning, Hilda Pope, Gayle Sorrell, Myrtle Bridges, Peggy Robinson and Randy Stephenson. Andy Cole is chair and Lenny Parker is his vice chair of the board while Becky Adams serves as secretary and Robie Butler as treasurer.