John Blythe – Page 17 – NC Miscellany

Hot Time in the Old Town…This Weekend

Bradham's Drug Store, New Bern, circa 1913. — Bradham's Drug Store, New Bern, circa 1913, by Bayard Wootten.

New Bern residents this weekend are continuing celebrations of the 300th anniversary of the founding of their city. And some of my colleagues from the North Carolina Collection are playing a part.

The celebrations include the re-dedication of the U.S. Federal Courthouse at 10:30 this morning. The building’s lobby has undergone a few changes, including the addition of a small exhibit space. And that’s where you’ll find 22 prints by New Bern native Bayard Wootten hanging. Those prints are produced from glass negatives in the North Carolina Collection Photographic Archives.

The prints were produced between 1910 and 1916, the period coinciding with the bicentennial of New Bern’s founding. The exhibit includes photographs of city buildings(both interior and exterior shots), as well as images of the city waterfront and railyard.

The photo above depicts the inside of Bradham’s Drug Store about 1913. Here’s what the exhibit panel says about the photo:
Located on the ground floor of the Stanly Building, completed in 1913, on Middle Street at the corner of Broad Street was the “Broad Street Store” of the Bradham Drug Company. Caleb D. Bradham, inventor of Pepsi-Cola, used the store, which featured a decorative soda fountain, for retail sales.

Our friends at the New Bern-Craven County Public Library asked us to mention another fascinating exhibit that they’ve mounted in the Kellenberger Room. They’ve put on display documents, pamphlets and books illustrating the early history of New Bern and Craven County. Items include an original 1720 land patent for land along the Neuse River signed by Gov. Charles Eden and Thomas Pollock; the 1753 Custis Family Bible of New Bern; Abstract of the Army Accounts of the North-Carolina Line, 1794; the 1812 New Testament of the North Carolina branch of the DeGraffenried Family; and the sheet music for William Gaston’s The Old North State. They’ve sent us a link to more information on the library’s website. But they’re experiencing some web problems so the link may not work.

It’s not often you get to attend a 300th birthday celebration. Make sure you’re a part of this one.

On Franklin Street Stuck on Repeat

The Beatles put “Penny Lane” in your ears. Gerry Rafferty took you winding down “Baker Street.” Bruce Springsteen hit you with a “10th Avenue Freeze Out.” And Simon and Garfunkel got you to slow down and feel groovy with their “59th Street Bridge Song.”

Now add J. Robert Wagoner to those hoping to move you with their music (Mind you, I’m steering clear of predicting how you’ll be moved).

A CD of his song “On Franklin Street” recently arrived at the North Carolina Collection. We don’t know a lot about Wagoner. He appears to have earned a master’s degree from the Department of Radio, Television and Motion Pictures here in Chapel Hill in 1974. And J. Robert Wagoner is credited as director and writer of the film Disco Godfather, which came out in 1979. “On Franklin Street” was released in 1998.

Wagoner’s ode to Chapel Hill’s main drag includes some of the names you would expect — Thomas Wolfe, Mia Hamm and Michael Jordan. But there’s also mention of Kathrine Everett, one of the first female graduates of the UNC Law School and the first woman to argue and win a case before the North Carolina Supreme Court.

Kwame Nkrumah, the first president of Ghana and, apparently, a UNC student at one point, also gets a shout out. Wagoner mentions another African leader. I can’t make out his or her name. Can you?

Do you know any additional details on Wagoner? Are there other songs about North Carolina streets? Let us know.

Sneads Ferry Struggles

Shrimp have long been a part of life in the Onslow County town of Sneads Ferry. Since 1971 the town has celebrated its ties to the crustacean with the Sneads Ferry Shrimping Festival, held the second weekend of August. But, as in coastal communities throughout the U.S., fishing is hardly the economic backbone it once was. Residents who once depended on the sea for their living now must commute to other towns for work. And those who still haul in catches find themselves competing at the market with farm-raised seafood. Homes held by families for generations are being sold as developers move in to capitalize on a demand for beach homes.

Husband and wife team Matt and Cornelia Barr spent seven years documenting the changes brought to Sneads Ferry. Their film Wild Caught: The Life and Struggles of an American Fishing Town airs tonight at 10 on UNC-TV. The documentary has been updated since its original release in 2006.

Monkey in the Middle

It’s the first day of classes for children in North Carolina public schools. And, as students return to the books, some will find themselves discussing the origins of humans. The word evolution will eventually make its way into the dialogue. No doubt some parent or child from Murphy to Manteo will find the topic doesn’t agree with their beliefs. And the long simmering debate over the teaching of evolution will continue. Tar Heels have argued the subject for more than 75 years. In 1927, legislators tried to ban the teaching of “Darwinism or any other evolutionary hypotheses that links man in blood relationship with any lower form of life.” Check out The Evolution Controversy in North Carolina in the 1920s.

Recalling James Baldwin

NPR’s Morning Edition today featured North Carolina author and UNC-Chapel Hill professor Randall Kenan discussing James Baldwin. Kenan is the editor of a soon-to-be published volume of Baldwin’s uncollected writing. The book is Kenan’s second work on the writer. He published a young adult biography of Baldwin in 1994.

Listening to the interview with Kenan, I recalled a moment 26 years ago that he and I shared with Baldwin. Kenan and I were undergrads in an African-American literature class taught by J. Lee Greene at UNC-Chapel Hill. Kenan was a star pupil, full of insightful comments. I, on the other hand, was a diligent note taker, hoping the brilliance of Kenan and a few other students would help me better understand such classics as Baldwin’s Go Tell it On the Mountain and Ralph Ellison’s Invisible Man.

As I recall, on this particular morning Professor Greene was slow in arriving for class. And, when he finally walked in, he was accompanied by a diminutive and elegantly-dressed African-American man. That man was, of course, James Baldwin.

Sadly, I don’t remember much of what Baldwin said. I do recall being impressed by the preciseness of his speech, the mellifluousness of his voice, the angles of his face and his large eyes. Heck, he might have even lit a cigarette as he stood at the front of the class addressing our questions (the campuswide prohibition on smoking wasn’t in place then). I suspect that Randall Kenan asked a question or two. And I’m sure his memories of that day are a little more vivid than mine.

Baldwin was apparently on campus as the keynote speaker for the university’s Human Rights Week. The Daily Tar Heel reports that the writer spoke to a crowd of 1,500 at Memorial Hall on November 12. According to the paper’s account of the speech, Baldwin addressed head-on the nation’s troubled history of race relations. Here are a few quotes from that speech:

“Who is Sambo? Who is a nigger? Who is Uncle Tom? The question must come up, who is Scarlett O’Hara? What I’m suggesting is that History with a capital H is a creation of the people who think of themselves as white.”

“The people who conquered the North American wilderness were not white before they came here, not before they found me. They were Russian, Turk, Greek and French. But they were not white. They became white out of the bitter necessity to justify their crime.”

“It was not true that I was waiting to be discovered, it was not true that my discovery was by Christians who wanted to save my soul. It’s not true that I came here in chains, the happy darkie; it’s not true that I picked cotton for free out of love.”

“According to me the Civil Rights Movement was one of the last slave insurrections.”

A literary great in my presence and I failed to soak it all in. Thanks to Randall Kenan, then and now, for helping me know Baldwin a little better.

A Final Farewell

I’ve just returned from my family’s annual pilgrimage to Sunset Beach, a trip that we’ve been making since 1969. And the thought just occurred to me that I may have crossed for the last time the floating drawbridge that connects the barrier island to the mainland.

The bridge is an iconic structure – one that has graced the fronts of postcards for decades (strangely we don’t seem to have a copy in our postcard collections). It’s even been featured on the cover of a novel.

A floating bridge has linked Sunset Beach to the mainland since at least the mid-1950s. The current one-way bridge was put in place in 1961 and it’s said to be the last floating drawbridge on the East Coast. It opens on demand for commercial boat traffic and on the hour for recreational boaters. As a child I, along with my brother and cousin, had the good luck to be walking across the bridge when a boat approached. The bridge keeper agreed to let us stay with him as opened the bridge. He headed down to a water-level room, hopped on to what appeared to be a wheel-less tractor and started the motor. Slowly winches began pulling cables and the mid-section of the bridge slid across the water to create an opening for the boat.

But the days of such simple mechanics are numbered. In the coming months the floating bridge will be taken out of service and beachgoers will no longer need to wait their turn to cross. A new multi-lane bridge will make a high arc over the Intracoastal Waterway, leaving plenty of room for boats to travel underneath. The new structure has been years in the making. There were court battles, environmental impact studies and budget woes. But now the pylons are firmly planted and the roadway mostly paved.

As for the floating draw bridge, its fate seems unclear. One group is hoping to include it as part of a waterfront park overlooking the Intracoastal Waterway. But members need to raise more than $3.75 million to bring their dream to fruition.

Farewell old friend. Thanks for all the memories.

Every Map Tells A Story

I’ve spent the past few days looking again at some of the 3,200+ maps digitized for our North Carolina Maps online collection. And, curiously, I keep coming back to the map above. I think one of the reasons is the information at the upper right of the map, Numeric and Chronologic Schedule of Cherokee Cessions (click on the closeup below to see the details).

The list extends to 36 entries on this map and if you look on a second map there are another 11 entries (Sorry, we don’t have the second map up. It covers land west of North Carolina and didn’t fit the criteria for our NC Maps site). I’m surprised at the number of treaties and land deals. Perhaps I shouldn’t be.

I started wondering about the person who meticulously documented the numerous land cessions. The name C.C. Royce is found just below the map’s title. It’s a shortened version of Charles C. Royce. Royce was an Ohio native. In 1863, just a few months shy of his 19th birthday, he enlisted in the U.S. Navy and spent the last months of the Civil War aboard a Union river monitor. After the war he joined the Office of Indian Affairs as a clerk. Royce’s work on Indian land cessions drew the attention of John Wesley Powell, the first head of the Bureau of Ethnology. Powell helped Royce with his study of the Cherokee, checking books out for him from the Library of Congress and providing him money for research trips. In 1883 Royce was appointed to a position as ethnologist on the Bureau’s staff. But a year later, he returned to Ohio to work as an accountant at the Miami County Bank.

Before leaving Washington, Royce submitted a monograph about his research on Cherokee land cessions for inclusion in the Bureau’s annual report. In a letter he wrote, “Of course I never had any conceit that in a strict sense of the term it belonged among scientific papers. It is purely historical and yet I am constrained to believe that the ‘popularity’ of a work such as the report of the Bureau of Ethnology, would not be abridged in the mind of the average reader by having a little politico-Indian History sandwiched between their ‘myths’ and ‘stone implements’ on the one side and their ‘sign language’ and ‘mortuary customs’ on the other.

In 1888 Royce became manager of Rancho Chico, a California fruit ranch. He retired in 1912 and died in Washington, D.C. in 1923.

Royce’s monograph The Cherokee Nation of Indians was reprinted as a book in 1975. In an introduction, Richard Mack Bettis, president of the Tulsa Tsa-La-Gi-Ya Cherokee Community, writes that the Cherokee owe a debt of gratitude to Royce. His “accurate reporting on treaties and boundaries” provided the data that helped the Cherokee over many years to win more than $14 million in legal claims for land taken illegally from the nation.

Krispy Kreme + Cheerwine = Tasty?

Gourmands of North Carolina rejoice! Two of the state’s iconic, sweet concoctions have joined forces. Starting today, Krispy Kreme plans to sell Cheerwine-flavored, cream-filled doughnuts. Apparently Krispy Kreme customers have long clamored for the pairing. The alliance between the Winston-Salem baker and Salisbury soft drink manufacturer will last through at least July and you can find these delectable (at least to some) treats at grocery stores in North and South Carolina.

The new flavor got us to thinking about other possible pairings between Krispy Kreme and North Carolina products. One North Carolina Collection staffer (he shall remain nameless to protect his reputation as purveyor of good taste) wondered about Texas Pete-flavored Krispy Kremes or adding Goody’s sprinkles to the classic glaze-covered doughnut. How about a Pepsi-flavored topping? Ideas anyone?

And while your tickling your taste buds with a Cheerwine Kreme Filled Doughnut (or two or three), how about some stimulation for your brain? All that sugar may have kicked it into high gear.

Cheerwine flavored cake, anyone?

How long has that “Hot Now” sign been burning?

Does the recipe for Krispy Kreme’s success include more than sugar?

Another great day at Wimbledon

As you may have heard, Greensboro native John Isner entered the record books today as one of the competitors in the longest match in professional tennis. Over the course of three days, Isner and Frenchman Nicholas Mahut slugged it out at Wimbledon for a grueling 11 hours 5 minutes. Their momentous achievement calls to mind another great day at Wimbledon —one in which another individual with Tar Heel connections played a part.

In 1951 Althea Gibson became the first African-American to compete in the All-England Tennis Championships, the formal name for Wimbledon. Six years later, in 1957, Gibson became the first African-American to claim a Wimbledon title. She defeated fellow American Darlene Hard 6-3, 6-2 to claim the women’s singles championship.

Born in South Carolina and raised in New York City, Gibson moved to Wilmington as a 19-year-old to train with Hubert A. Eaton, an African-American doctor and civil rights pioneer in the city. Eaton (pictured above with Gibson) was also a nationally-ranked amateur in the American Tennis Association, the main organization for African Americans in the segregated world of tennis.

Gibson, too, had earned some notoriety in the world of African-American tennis. But in so doing, she had neglected her studies. She arrived in Wilmington in 1946 without a high school diploma. Consequently, while training with Eaton and living with his family, she enrolled in Williston Industrial High School. Gibson was older than most of her classmates, but nevertheless sought to participate fully in school activities, joining the band on saxophone, singing with the choir and playing basketball. Still, she later wrote, she felt out of place. She “wasn’t much for dressing up,” and preferred to spend her time playing sports with the boys. “I showed off on the football field because throwing passes better than the varsity quarterback was a way …to show that there was something I was good at.”

Being good at tennis helped Gibson garner 5 women’s singles Grand Slam titles and 6 women’s doubles Grand Slam titles. Gibson retired from amateur tennis (and there was no professional women’s tennis circuit) in 1958. Her post-tennis life included small roles on television and in the movies, a recording contract and time on the women’s golf tour. In 1975 she was appointed New Jersey’s state commissioner for athletics, a post she held for 10 years. She died in 2003 at the age of 76.

The city of Wilmington is seeking to honor Gibson with a tennis center named for its one-time resident. Officials broke ground for the Althea Gibson Tennis Center at Empie Park in September 2009.

Photo of Althea Gibson from Tom Biracree’s Althea Gibson: Tennis Champion.

Photo of Althea Gibson and Hubert A. Eaton from Eaton’s autobiography, Every Man Should Try.

Black Gold in N.C.

Cover of "The Story of Esso No. 1"

With the Gulf of Mexico oil spill still very much on our minds, we thought it timely to share with you a few items from our collections about oil drilling in the Tar Heel State.

Here are a few facts garnered from the various items. From 1925 to 1976, oil explorers drilled 120 wells in search of black gold. Their quest took them to 23 counties. The first exploratory oil well in the state was drilled near Havelock, in Craven County, in August 1925. Great Lakes Drilling Company probed to 2,404 feet. Most of the exploration was along the coast, but in 1974 Chevron drilled 5,348 feet in search of oil in Lee County. The deepest well in North Carolina was drilled within sight of the Cape Hatteras lighthouse in Dare County. Standard Oil of New Jersey, a precursor of today’s ExxonMobil, drilled 10,044 feet, but found no oil. In fact, none of the exploratory wells drilled between 1925 and 1976 resulted in oil production.

More recently oil exploration has focused mostly on deepwater drilling in the Outer Continental Shelf, federally-regulated waters off the U.S. coast. As relates to North Carolina, oil companies are interested in an area known as the Manteo Unit, about 40 miles off of Cape Hatteras. In the 1980s and 1990s, Mobil and Chevron sought to drill exploratory wells in this area. But their efforts were slowed and eventually halted by court and federal government action. A federal moratorium on offshore drilling expired in 2008 and with its expiration there was renewed interest in drilling off the North Carolina coast. Currently there are no leases for drilling. But the potential for drilling prompted state legislators to create an advisory subcommittee to study the issues related to oil exploration. That subcommittee released its report a week before the explosion of the Deepwater Horizon in the Gulf of Mexico.

And here are some of the resources available from the North Carolina Collection.

Map of exploratory oil wells of North Carolina, 1925-1976 . Note Well #1 in Dare County is the 10,044 foot well. Well #1 in Craven County is the first well dug in N.C. And Well #1 in Lee County is the western-most exploratory drilling.

James C. Coffey’s Exploratory Oil Wells of North Carolina, 1925-1976 provides a background and detailed key to the map.

The drilling of the state’s first well in Havelock is discussed in a 1927 publication from the N.C. Department of Conservation and Development.

Standard Oil published The Story of North Carolina Esso No. 1, an account of the drilling of the 10,044-foot well in Dare County.

Even prior to the drilling at Havelock, the Carolina Petroleum Company was trying to interest investors in oil exploration on the N.C. coast.

Possible oil among the coal shale in the Deep River Valley prompted Frank C. Vilbrandt to pen this report in 1927.

Mobil’s Initial plan of Operation Atlantic: offshore North Carolina: Manteo Area Block 467 details the oil company’s plans for drilling in the Offshore Continental Shelf in the late 1980s.

Atlantic outer continental shelf: final environmental report on proposed exploratory drilling offshore North Carolina includes the federal Minerals Management Service’s views on the potential impact of drilling on the North Carolina coast. The draft and preliminary final reports are also available.