New in the collection: Dixie Fire Insurance blotter

Dixie Fire Insurance, chartered in 1906, is long lost into a series of industry mergers, but its handsome headquarters — at five stories, once Guilford County’s tallest skyscraper — remains as the nominally truncated Dixie Building.

Now that Winston-Salem has renamed the Dixie Classic Fair the Carolina Classic Fair and Winn-Dixie has beaten a retreat from the state, the Dixie Building may be the Triad’s most prominent bearer of the increasingly-contentious name.

Also from Dixie Fire Insurance’s store of desk accessories: this eye-catching mirror/paperweight from World War I.

One Englishman’s Goldsboro, 1957

“There were no interstates in 1957, only the old numbered federal highways that wandered the stagecoach routes between city and city. US 1 was the route we chose southward out of Washington on an itinerary only partly planned, and it took us to Richmond, then — Americans still laugh when I tell them — we headed over to Goldsboro, North Carolina, thence to Charleston, and so to Atlanta.

“Gentle memories of Goldsboro, hick town though Americans may think it, remain with me still. I liked it because in the middle of unfettered space, its citizens had chosen to build what then passed for a skyscraper in the South, a touching symbol of civic pride. I liked it because it was the first town in which I stayed in a motel, that brilliantly creative American contribution to the conveniences of travel, the American caravanserai, without vermin, camel smells, importunate hangers-on, or unspeakable sanitation. I liked it because in the growing cool of a Southern evening, I could sit outside above the dust of an unpaved sidewalk and watch the beautiful legs of girls otherwise unseen in the dying twilight walking—where? I longed to know. I longed to follow. The English girls with whom I had grown up wore skirts below their knees. Southern girls, even in 1957, wore abbreviated shorts above golden, athletic thighs….”

— From “One Englishman’s America” by John Keegan in American Heritage (February-March 1996)

New in the collection: FCX pinback

Pinback with words "FCX Farm and Garden, 50th Anniversary, 1934-1984"

“FCX Inc., then known as Farmers Cooperative Exchange, opened its first outlet in Burlington in 1934. Seven more stores quickly followed… during the Great Depression.

“In the 50 years since then FCX has grown into an operation with 95 centers and gross sales of about $500 million a year. In 1984, it ranks as the No. 1 farm supplier in North and South Carolina.”

— From “FCX Marks 50 Years of Self-Help Success” by Eugene S. Knight in Carolina Country (March 1984)

Alas, by this time the declining farm economy had already pushed FCX to the brink of bankruptcy, and in 1986 it accepted a buyout offer from Richmond-based Southern States Cooperative.

‘A bastard born in sin and secession’

“Before Reconstruction, most Southern state legislatures had the sole power to appoint judges. But at North Carolina’s 1868 Constitutional convention, the state gave voters the power to directly elect judges. One of the delegates who voted in favor was Abraham Galloway, a former fugitive slave, who explained why this issue was so important for black voters.

” ‘[Galloway] said…that the Judiciary in New Hanover [County] was a bastard born in sin and secession,’ reported the convention notes. ‘In their eyes, it was a crime to be a black or loyal man. He said that the Judge of the Criminal Court had already sent men to the work-house merely to prevent their voting upon the ratification of the Constitution.’ ”

— From “How Power Grabs in the South Erased Reforms After Reconstruction” by Becky Little at History.com (Dec. 20, 2018)

New in the collection: Charlotte Speedway pinback

Blue pinback with words "World 600. I'll be there!"

A 600-mile stock-car race? How come? Because Bruton Smith and Curtis Turner, owners of the brand-new Charlotte Motor Speedway, wanted to one-up the famed Indianapolis 500 on Memorial Day 1960.

Undercutting their ploy, construction problems delayed the track’s opening by three weeks –and even then the rough, uncured surface caused a memorable mess. Six drivers – Richard Petty, Lee Petty and Junior Johnson among them — were disqualified for cutting through the grass for pit stops to replace blown tires.

By 1981 Charlotte Motor Speedway had put its ragged debut behind it, and World 600 drivers could confidently promise, “I’ll Be There!”

How lamps lit up the naval stores industry

“In the 1840s North Carolina planters transformed a marginal backwoods industry worked by small, poor, mostly white producers into a booming, slave-based engine of light.

“Not particularity profitable in colonial America, the ‘naval stores’ industry, which consisted mainly of tar, pitch,  turpentine and other products made from the wood of resinous pines — products sold mostly to the British navy — had centered early on in the piney woods of North Carolina, where the sandy and swampy soil supported little agriculture….

“It was the discovery in the 1830s that spirits of turpentine could be mixed with alcohol to produce a bright, cheap illuminant that catapulted naval stores to prominence….”

— From “American Lucifers: The Dark History of Artificial Light, 1750–1865” by Jeremy Zallen (2019)

New in the collection: campaign emery boards

Two emery boards. One has sentence "Keep Mizell Your Congressman." The other has wording that reads "W. Kerr Scott will work for you as your U.S. Senator" and includes a small icon for a union.

I had called these humble political giveaways fingernail files, but more specifically — according to an expert — they are emery boards.

That distinction likely made scant difference to candidates such as W. Kerr Scott and Wilmer “Vinegar Bend” Mizell.

Mizell’s emery board would be from one or more of his 1970, 1972 or 1974 reelection campaigns. Scott’s, from his successful 1954 campaign for U.S. Senate, is notable for its union bug, given the state’s often chilly attitudes toward organized labor.

Federal Writers’ Project sagged in South

“In January 1936 Katharine Kellock, field representative for the Federal Writers’ Project, set out from Washington to survey the project’s offices in the Southeastern states….

“Kellock was dismayed by what she found. She discovered incompetent editors and incorrect filing systems and improper spending. Some workers were turning in useless copy. Others weren’t entirely sure what the FWP was supposed to be doing. The national staff had anticipated that the Southeastern office would be thin on expertise and experience; the density of writers in, say, Georgia, didn’t compare with that in New York or Illinois.

“But now Kellock could see how this disadvantage looked in practice. A federal writer on the North Carolina project described her colleagues this way: ‘A skilled city editor, victim of retrenchment — and a newsroom hanger-on to be described as only a moderate drunk. A man who had been good at his craft, in his day, but was simply too old to adapt. And housewives, some college women, some widows with only high school, or less. There were former teachers set adrift by cuts in staff. We had a few boys and girls who had really had no jobs at all.’ ”

— From “Republic of Detours: How the New Deal Paid Broke Writers to Rediscover America” by Scott Borchert (2021)

New in the collection: socklet garter ad

Package for socklet garter featuring image of young girl holding doll.

I’ll admit it — I was startled to see that the Gem-Dandy Garter Co. advertised on this 2- by 4-inch card is still operating, though with a modernized name and product line.

Here’s how Gem-Dandy Accessories, headquartered in the Rockingham County town of Madison, traces its path into the 20th century:

“The Penn Family started Gem-Dandy in 1921 as a successor to the Penn Suspender Co.  Green Penn, the first company president, invented and patented the GEMCO Adjustable Garter — the world’s first fully adjustable garter for men, women and children….

“Gem-Dandy entered the belt business during World War II. The Danbury name was registered as a brand name in the 1970s and sales expanded across the country into thousands of men’s specialty shops.

“Today, Gem-Dandy distributes a wide variety of belts, wallets, suspenders and other accessories in dress, casual, work wear and western styles. We are the proud licensor of several popular brands such as Greg Norman®, Pebble Beach® , John Deere®, Berne Workwear®, Roper®, REALTREE® and Colours by Alexander Julian®. We also have our own proprietary brands including Danbury Golf, Danbury Workwear, Lady Danbury, G-Bar-D Western Outfitters and Cowgirls Rock. Our products can be found in major department stores as well as smaller venues.”

Alcohol vs. abstinence: The mule ruled

“The heyday of alcohol drinking began in the 1790s and lasted until the first prohibition efforts in Asheville in the 1830s — an effort backed by women and ministers alarmed by alcohol’s effect on work habits, church attendance and marriage.

“In the 1790s, Methodist Bishop Francis Asbury had just come to North Carolina to start the Great Awakening. He noted how liquor consumption led to excess and distracted from a different kind of spirit; but he could only be cautionary in this regard.

“Whiskey was not only considered a social amenity and a health-giving potion, but also an economic necessity in the mountains.

” ‘A mule could carry about four bushels of corn on the long journey to market,’ Bruce Stewart writes in his book, ‘Moonshiners and Prohibitionists.’ ‘After it was distilled into whiskey, however, a mule could haul the equivalent of twenty-four bushels of corn.’ “

— From “Eavesdropping on an Asheville committee in 1792” by Rob Neufeld in the Asheville Citizen-Times (April 1, 2013)