Collection (1848-2002) of Pace family papers, including documents; photograph and postcard albums; scrapbooks; loose photographs, deeds, legal documents, and newspaper clippings; printed yearbooks, catalogs, textbooks, and newspapers; genealogical charts, postcards, brochures, World War I Army Medical Corps documents, and ephemera relating to physician Dr. Karl Busbee Pace, Sr. and his sons, Dr. Karl B. Pace, Jr., Charles Taylor Pace, and J. T. W."Tommy" Pace and their families in Robeson, Chatham and Pitt counties, NC.
Dr. Karl Busbee Pace, Sr., was born in Maxton, Robeson County, North Carolina, on March 7, 1888, to Thomas Benton Pace and Florence Burnett(e) Pace. His siblings included James B., John Lucian, Walter, Nettie, Thomas and Julia. He graduated from Maxton High school in 1906, worked for a few years then pursued an education in medicine from UNC Chapel Hill and the Jefferson Medical College in Philadelphia in 1914. He was also licensed to practice medicine in NC in 1914. He then served as an intern in New York until 1916 when he came back to work with Dr. Charles Laughinghouse in Greenville, North Carolina. He enlisted in the Army Medical Corp of the AEF in 1917, served on Hospital Trains 27, 61, and 63, and was given a commission as a first lieutenant and commanding officer of Hospital Train 63. He served in France during World War I and was discharged in 1919 with the rank of captain. After the war, he returned to Greenville and continued to practice medicine. In 1922 he married Lida Harrison Taylor and their family grew to include three sons Karl Busbee Jr., Charles Taylor, and John Thomas Walter Pace. He was an active member of the community and was well-liked as a physician and community leader. He was instrumental in the creation of the Pitt County General hospital, Pitt County Medical Society, and the first venereal disease clinic in the state. He was named General Practitioner of the year for North Carolina in 1954. Dr. Karl Busbee Pace Sr. died on August 20, 1968.
Dr. Karl Busbee Pace, Jr., was born in Pitt County on April 9, 1923. He enlisted in the US Navy during World War II. He was trained as a dermatologist and worked as a stockbroker on Wall Street. He was very involved in wildlife conservation and created the Wysocking Wildlife Sanctuary Inc. He was married to Nancy Frazier Derrickson. Karl Busbee Pace Jr. passed away June 28, 2013.
John T. W. Pace was born on June 8, 1932, in Greenville, served in the Air Force as a 2nd Lieutenant, and was the owner/operator of Cape Securities Inc., in Jacksonville, NC. He married Barbara R. Pace and had three children: John Jr., Christopher, and Karl. He died on February 22, 2013.
Dr. Charles T. Pace was born April 18, 1926, in Pitt County NC. He is an Ophthalmologist in Greenville, NC. He received his education at Sidney Kimmel Medical College at Thomas Jefferson University in Philadelphia, PA. Along with his medical career, he has published two books, Lincoln as He Really Was (2018) and Southern Independence. Why War?: The War to Prevent Southern Independence (2015).
The personal correspondence in this collection contains documents dating from 1872 to 1977. These letters are mostly written to or between Karl Busbee Pace, Sr., and his siblings and they discuss family matters, personal relationships, local news in Maxton NC, religious meetings, family health updates (a 1922 letter also includes a diet plan) and contain calling cards, invitations to social events, telegrams, distribution notices of an estate, postcards from different cities, and in memoriam notices. One letter includes the 1903 program for the 10th Annual Oratorical Contest held by The Leazar Literary Society of the North Carolina College of Agriculture and Mechanic Arts (later North Carolina State University). A September 1918 letter on Red Cross stationary written by Dr. Karl B. Pace, Sr., while he was serving as a doctor with an AEF hospital train during World War I, describes the living conditions in a French country village including the prices paid for vegetables. Other correspondence includes a letter (1968) to Dr. Karl B. Pace, Sr., about naming a dispensary after him at the Union Carbide plant in Greenville, N.C., letters from the Pace Society of America, holiday greeting cards, and birthday cards. Judge Tom P. Pace and his wife Loretta of Oklahoma wrote letters covering the years 1943 to 1977 describing life in Purcell and Norman, Oklahoma.
The military records pertain mostly to Karl B. Pace Sr. who served in the Medical Corps of the American Expeditionary Forces from 1917-1919. During World War I, Dr. Pace was a First Lieutenant and commander of a Hospital Train. He mainly served in the Chateau Thierry and Argonne Forest Sector. He was honorably discharged in 1919 as a Captain. The military documents include registration card, commissioning papers, leave passes, inventory reports, officer record book for his service on all three Hospital Trains (September 1, 1917 to August 8, 1919), certificates of clearance, war risk insurance, and discharge papers from Camp Lee, Virginia. Other military documents include the discharge papers for Karl B. Pace Jr., as Apprentice Seaman V-12 USNR on November 5, 1945.
The land records in Box 2 and in oversize folder 2 contain documents between the years 1856-1960. Included are deeds, contracts, receipts of payment, mortgage contracts and payments, probate court orders, letters about estate properties relating to the Pace family and their holdings. An 1888 advertisement for the sale of a farm in the central part of the state on the Haw River is particularly explicit listing the house and tenement buildings as well as a saw mill, cotton gin, blacksmith and woodworking shop, untapped water power, and more. Also included (in the oversize folder) is a North Carolina state grant to Julia O. Harriss in 1877 for ½ acre in Robeson County near Shoe Heel Depot on the Carolina Central Railway and it is witnessed and signed by Governor Zebulon B. Vance in 1878. All documents relate to the areas of Robeson, Richmond, Chatham, New Hanover, and Pitt counties, North Carolina, and mainly concern the Pace and Harriss families. The genealogical records delve into the Pace family tree to the 1870's. These records include a pedigree chart of Charles T. Pace, genealogical notes and correspondence related to an application for the Colonial Dames of America sent in by Lida Harrison Taylor Pace, genealogy of the William Taylor family, the last will and testament of Nettie Pace Peoples of Chatham Co., NC, and then numerous newspaper clippings that relate to different members of the Pace family from 1928-1976.
The miscellaneous documents in this collection include invitations (1910-1914) to graduations (especially Trinity College which is now Duke University) and weddings, programs, announcements, calling cards, recipes, poems, a diploma, certificates, a coroner's inquest report (1920s), a paper on rabies written by Karl B. Pace, Sr., and read before the UNC Medical Society in April 1912, and ephemera. Several of the programs relate to recitals (1905-1918) at Greensboro Female College (now Greensboro College), literary events at N.C. State Normal and Industrial College (now UNC-Greensboro), and Junior/Senior and graduation events at Greenville High School (1942-1943). Also included are an announcement of the 1960 birth of Charles Downing Taylor Pace (son of Charles T. Pace) and the funeral program for the death of Tom P. Pace. Certificates document Dr. Karl Pace's 1916 Physician's and Surgeon's Registration, and pertain to Charles T. Pace's years at Greenville High School. The diploma is for Karl B. Pace Jr.'s graduation from McCallie School at Missionary Ridge in Chattanooga, Tennessee. Ephemera includes among other items a car registration, an 1894 promissory note, lab notes, religious notes, a 1923 receipt for two railroad tickets, and a caricature of a woman that criticizes her for wearing long dresses that sweep the street.
The images in this collection depict different members of the Pace family, several towns and vacation sites, and also include school and wedding photographs. Formats include postcards, original photographs, photocopies, negatives and an image on a copper block for printing. Photographs of particular interest are of Karl or Thomas Pace in France during World War I, World War I photographs of Medical Officers Training Camp (MOTC) at Fort Oglethorpe in Georgia, and a photograph of Karl Pace Jr. during World War II; and African American women and children picking beans at the Pace farm near Maxton in 1892, and an African American family (ca. 1940s) identified as the children and grandchildren of "Uncle" Sam Burnett who are identified as employees at the same Pace farm. Also of interest are the James Pace House (ca. 1890) and Thomas B. Pace's houses in Maxton; images of Karl B. Pace, Jr.'s graduation from McCallie School, as a mascot for the dedication of the Tar River Bridge in Greenville, at Camp Sequoyah near Asheville, and as a mascot for the graduating class at East Carolina Teachers College (no view on campus); the Pavilion at Ocean Beach in Beaufort, N.C.; Dr. Sellers Mark Crisp (Dr. Karl B. Pace, Sr.'s business partner for thirty years); and the covered bridge (ca. 1890s) over the Haw River at Bynum in Chatham County.
There are several photograph albums and scrapbooks in this collection. A postcard album dating from ca. 1907 contains greeting and humorous postcards, Buster Brown postcards, and postcards with images of towns mainly in North Carolina and Virginia and of lakes in Scotland, and the Jamestown 1907 Exposition. A photograph album belonging to Julia Pace contains many pictures of unidentified young people, a shot of Julia and several other girls posing on steps with a 1915 Pennant for Carolina, and pictures of the home of Dr. Karl B. Pace, Sr. in Greenville, N.C., and the Pace home in Maxton. Another photograph album contains some loose photographs, a few postcards, and World War I photographs of the Medical Officers Training Camp (MOTC) Camp Greenleaf at Fort Oglethorpe in Georgia including images of barracks and horses pulling covered wagons. Karl B. Pace, Sr.'s World War I photograph album contains images of patients and staff at a hospital and Dr. Pace holding babies, and hospital trains in Europe with nurses and soldiers.
Scrapbooks include Lida Taylor (Pace) ECTTS (East Carolina Teachers Training School, later East Carolina University) Scrapbook (1915-1916) containing images of college life including senior play Midsummer Night's Dream, Junior-Senior Reception superlatives, Drama Club items, letters, 1st grade students at the Model School on campus, and other ephemera.; and a child's scrapbook (1939-1942, 1951) of souvenirs from the 1939 World's Fair and images cut out of magazines related to World War II. A Pace family scrapbook (1924-1952) contains 1924 doctor visits bills, clippings, photographs, letters, postcards, an Atheneum Book Club program (1943-1944); items related to Karl B. Pace, Jr., and Charles T. Pace as children such as report cards and attendance awards related to the Training School on the campus of East Carolina Teachers College (East Carolina University) and reports and letters related to Camp Seqouyah in the foothills of the Blue Ridge Mountains near Asheville, N.C.; and items concerning life in Greenville, N.C. A letter from Charles Pace in 1952 while he was serving with the 55 Medical Group at Ramey Air Force Base in Puerto Rico describes Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands. A final scrapbook (1935-1954) titled Karl Busbee Pace 1888-1954 "Country Doctor" Scrapbook contains photographs, congratulatory notes, clippings, recommendations, awards, and articles related to Dr. Karl B. Pace, Sr., being nominated for and winning the General Practitioner of the Year for North Carolina award in 1954.
Other items include an 1888 account book kept by Thomas B. Pace of Maxton; a general merchandise cash book for 1890-1891 listing customers, their purchases and prices paid; prospectuses (catalogs) for Oak Ridge Institute (prep school for boys in Guilford County, N.C.) for 1897-1898 and 1903-1904; a booklet (1912) titled "Ye May Day Fete at Ye State Normal College" (now University of North Carolina at Greensboro); 1923 Tecoan (yearbook for ECTTS, now East Carolina University); a booklet titled "Welcome to Crossnore School" (in the Blue Ridge Mountains of N.C.); and a 1941 McCallie School commencement program. Other publications are the 1914 "Illustrated City of Greenville, Pitt County, North Carolina"; an instructional book on prayer; a handbook for "Maxton N.C. Area Centennial March 29-April 16, 1974"; a pamphlet titled "History and Origins of Pitt County's First Hospital" written by Karl B. Pace, Sr.; and a copy of Charles T. Pace's, The First Principle of Government Demonstrated by the Confederate States of America and the War to Prevent Southern Independence.
Oversize materials include land records (1848-1899), a panoramic photograph of the Southern Club at Jefferson Medical College (1913), National Society of the Colonial Dames of America Lineage Paper for Lida Harrison Taylor Pace (1958), handwritten family tree of Lida Harrison Taylor Pace, the Raleigh Christian Advocate (4/15/1915), Greensboro College Alumni News (April 1974), Certificate of Residency from Pennsylvania Hospital for Karl B. Pace, Jr. (1949), Joseph Hackney family tree, Cradle Roll certificates at Jarvis Memorial Methodist Church (Greenville, NC) for Karl B. Pace, Jr., and Charles T. Pace, and a caricature cartoon of "Biddy the Freak."
Gift of Williams, Luther G
Gift of Charles T. Pace
Encoded by Apex Data Services
Inventory by Cheryl Funderburk 3/25/2008
Processing completed March 2020 by Ryan Miranda and revised July 2020 by Martha Elmore.
Literary rights to specific documents are retained by the authors or their descendants in accordance with U.S. copyright law.