Articles in regional publications that pertain to a wide range of North Carolina-related topics.
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8561
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Meteorologist Marvin Hunter presents an argument that supposes the Lost Colony was eradicated by a hurricane-induced storm surge and not by Indians. When he returned to the colony in 1588, Governor John White assumed the colonists had moved to Croatan because of the infamous tree carving. However, bad weather prevented Governor White and his crew from going to Croatoan. Because White was so detailed in all of his descriptions, Hunter argues that White does not mention house remnants because they simply were not there. Further evidence of a hurricane is the inclement weather met by White and his crew.
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8562
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The town of Carthage has a rich history. George Washington was related to people living in Carthage and so they call him “Cousin George.†Andrew Johnson, who became the 7th President of the United States, was once a tailor in Carthage. Carthage may be the only tiny town in the world to receive a gift from another country. The republic of France gave a monument to Carthage resident James Rogers McConnell of “Flying for France†Fame. W.C. Dowd, founder of the Charlotte Observer, was born and raised in Carthage. In addition to professors, lawyers, and bankers, there are townspeople who are related to the Queen of England.
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8563
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As early as 1499, Vespucci said he found natives chewing tobacco when he visited the Americas. Tobacco was a cash crop for early American settlers and the chaw, that pooch in a person's cheek while chewing, became a common sight. Sir Walter Raleigh and Ralph Lane helped open a market for tobacco in England and even though King James I tried to ban it, people still smoked it. Thomas Jefferson denounced tobacco as “infinite wretchedness†and wanted wheat to be the primary crop of the colonies. But tobacco was in high demand and too profitable to be second best. Chewing tobacco became popular in the working class as men could not work and smoke. The plug, a compressed rectangle of tobacco, was the main American tobacco product for years starting in the early1800s. Chewing tobacco lost sales after the Depression when smoking became synonymous with civilized lifestyle and chewing tobacco with farming. Chewing tobacco has seen better sales since the Depression and more than a third of the annual national tobacco crop in 1982 went into making it.
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8564
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The North Carolina Navy began on May 27, 1861, when several Albemarle Sound steamers were organized as gunboats and army transports to protect the North Carolina shoreline. The navy had existed for only two months when the ships were bought by the Confederacy and used to challenge Federal ships. The Beaufort, for example, engaged the Federal ship the Albatross on July 22, 1861, and although neither ship suffered any major damage, the message was sent to the Federal army that passage through the Outer Banks would not go uncontested. That same day, all the North Carolina navy boats were bought by the Confederate army. The Beaufort engaged in several more battles and finally burned in Richmond on April 4, 1865.
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8565
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Riddles Knob is supposedly haunted by Captain William Riddle, a Tory hanged in 1781 by Colonel Ben Cleveland at Tory Tree in Wilkesboro. During the American Revolution, North Carolinians were divided in their loyalties. In western North Carolina, neighbor fought against neighbor until the Tories were defeated and taken prisoner by the Patriots. Acting under a North Carolina law, Colonel Cleveland summoned a jury to try the accused men and all were quickly found guilty and sentenced to death by hanging. Colonel Cleveland then took his volunteer militia through the New River valley hanging more Tory leaders including Captain William Riddle.
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8566
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The John C. Campbell Folk School in Brasstown is known primarily for its instruction in handcrafts, particularly wood-carving. Campbell went to college in Massachusetts and worked as a teacher in Alabama and Tennessee, and later served as president of Piedmont College in North Georgia. His work in rural Southern communities convinced him that schools were not preparing students to remain in their communities. While traveling through western North Carolina with his wife, Campbell heard about folk schools in Denmark and came to believe an adaptation of these schools would work well in the Southern mountains. Campbell died suddenly in 1919 but his wife continued his work, visiting the schools in Denmark and other European countries and locating a site on which to build his school. Brasstown was chosen and a merchant there, Fred O. Scroggs, gave ninety acres of land including a farmhouse which is still in use today.
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8567
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In 1770, Captain John Collet's map of North Carolina showed a string of ordinaries from the Chowan River to the Yadkin River. An ordinary was a commercial building serving to satiate travelers during colonial times. By 1800, the term “ordinary†was replaced by “tavern,†to mean a place catering to social drinking, and later by “inn†as taverns began to provide overnight accommodations. Many businesses that were run by farmers, however, remained taverns due to a lack of space for lodging. Taverns sprang up every few miles in the towns of the colonial period and thrived until the train became the popular means of transportation. The Halifax ordinary, “Sign of the Thistle,†is where both the Halifax Resolves and the North Carolina Constitution were written over tankards of ale. Minstrels visiting the area came to entertain clientele. The building was remodeled and later called Eagle Hotel. The Marquis de Lafayette spent the night there on February 27, 1825. Both Andrew Jackson and James K. Polk visited another tavern, the York Tavern, in Rockford, North Carolina. By the end of the 1800s, the railroad had laid tracks in North Carolina and most of the taverns fell into disuse.
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8568
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Standing in the mountains of Highland, North Carolina, are what appear to be the ruins of an old Grecian temple –- four stone Doric columns. The stone columns were molded in Chicago in 1902 with the same method used by the Romans in 200 B.C. and sent by railway to Gainesville in 1908. They were intended as a gift for the entrance of the First Baptist Church of Gainesville, GA, being built at that time. The church was destroyed by fire in 1960 but only one of the columns was damaged. The columns switched hands a few times and were finally bought by Brevard Williams, an artistic designer with a Highland shop, who had them moved to his estate in 1960 and built the four column monument seen today. At the time of erection, he poured a concrete tablet and inscribed on it in Greek letters “To The Glory of God.†Brevard Williams is buried at the foot of his monument.
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8572
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Furnifold McLendel Simmons, known as “The Senator,†was born in New Bern in 1854. Although he did not attend law school, he passed both of his law examinations and practiced law in Jones County, New Bern, and Goldsboro. The seventeen-year period following Reconstruction was controlled by the Democratic Party, an era called the Bourbon Democracy. When people's cries for tax reform went unheeded, a new political party called the Populist Party was formed to run against both Democrats and Republicans in 1892. During this period of upheaval, Simmons accepted the position of chairman of the state Democratic party and helped to put Elias Carr in the governor's office, also in 1892. These activities were the beginning of what would be known as “the Simmons Machine.†In 1898, Simmons was again appointed chairman of the Democratic Party, which used the platform “Black Supremacy or White Supremacy in North Carolina?†and employed red-shirted horsemen to keep African Americans from voting. Democrats regained control of the General Assembly, and in 1899 Simmons proposed a suffrage amendment and grandfather clause to discourage African American voters. Simmons helped elect Charles Brantley Aycock, the Democratic nominee, to the governor's office in 1900, and from 1901-1931 Simmons served as a United States Senator.\r\n
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8573
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Jefferson Davis, the first and only president of the Confederate States of America, died on December 6, 1889, in New Orleans. Memorial services were held throughout the South as his body lay in state in the New Orleans City Hall. Although almost 100,000 people came to pay their respects, many more could not attend because of the expense and distance involved. But in 1893, when Davis's body was being moved to Richmond, the eight-car funeral train included Raleigh as one of its stops. The train arrived in Raleigh on May 30, 1893, at 1:10 p.m. to a crowd of thousands. Confederate veterans served as pallbearers. The casket was taken into the rotunda of the Capitol building and a service was held. Just after 3 p.m., the casket was taken back to the train station and arrived in Richmond at 3 a.m. on May 31. Jefferson Davis was finally laid to rest at Hollywood Cemetery in Richmond on the afternoon of May 31, 1893.\r\n
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8574
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Disasters have struck those who live around Core Sound several times when severe winter weather brought icy conditions. For example, on January 11, 1886, a three-mast schooner, CHRISSIE WRIGHT, bound for her home port of New York, was overtaken by an extremely cold gale off of Cape Lookout. The cook and four crew members huddled down on the deck under a sail, but only the cook was still alive when a whaler was finally able to reach the ice-covered ship. In 1898, when the sound froze over, the fishing village of Davis, accessible only by boat, suffered near-famine conditions. Many people became ill, and several died. Close by, a ship, the PONTIAC, had shipwrecked. Survivors made a fire which produced a black column of smoke visible to the townspeople in Davis. Three rescuers set out and found the survivors and their ship full of molasses and grain. When the sound froze again in 1917, Davis's food supply again dwindled, but no one died.
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8575
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The very first Atlantic Coast Conference basketball tournament was played in 1954 in Raleigh's Reynolds Coliseum. North Carolina State University won all three of the first ACC's. The tournament in 1954 sold out only on semifinals. Ticket prices began at $9 and $6 for season books, all four sessions and did not go up in price until 1958. Other ACC coaches requested that the tournament be moved out of Raleigh to a more neutral setting. In 1967, it was played in Greensboro and in 1968, in Charlotte. The tournament was partially televised for the first time in 1967 and by 1974, when NC State won the NCAA championship in Greensboro, NBC began to carry full coverage of the tournament. The ACC tournament then stayed in Charlotte for three years, while Greensboro underwent renovations. Non-state teams began protesting and finally the ACC tournament was moved out of North Carolina.
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8576
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Christmas tree-growing is a several-million-dollar-a-year business in Western North Carolina. Sixty percent of the trees grown are Fraser first, which grown in twenty-five North Carolina counties. In Avery county, growers begin cutting trees around November 1st and sell them to brokers or retailers. Seeds to plan the trees are obtained from tree cones on Roan Mountain and Mount Mitchell.
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8577
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Both the success and criticism of the “Simmons Machine,†headed by Furnifold McLendel Simmons, stemmed largely from the fact that it announced its gubernatorial candidates over four or eight years in advance of the election. This created a momentum and continuity against which opponents had little recourse. Another reason for the machine's success was that it could offer well-qualified candidates for governor from within its own ranks. It also engaged in red-shirting, a practice where horsemen in red shirts prevented African-Americans from voting, and falsifying absentee ballots. It wasn't until 1930, when Simmons lost re-election for a sixth US Senate term, that the machine stopped being a political threat.
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8578
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In Brunswick County, people recycle their Christmas trees by placing them on the beach and allowing the ocean to repair the dunes. The trees catch and hold the sand which the ocean pushes over them and, as they disintegrate over the course of the first year, plants root in the newly formed dunes. Old dunes can be ruined by such things as dune buggies or storms, and the Christmas trees help to reform the dunes each year.
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