Month: August 2020

Henry Joyner, whose credit is good.

Wilson Daily Times, 24 September 1929.

——

In the 1880 census of Taylor township, Wilson County: farmer Simon Joyner, 38; wife Venus, 36; and children Mary A.F., 14, William H., 11, Dossy, 9, Jacen, 7, and Charley, 2.

On 5 January 1895, Henry Joyner, 26, of Taylors township, son of Simon and Venus Winstead, married Margaret Winstead, 27, of Taylors township, daughter of Berry and Luenda Winstead, in Taylors township.

In the 1900 census of Taylor township, Wilson County: farmer Henry Jones, 31; wife Margret, 31; and children James, 14, Lou, 10, William H., 6, Herbert, 4, Maggie, 3, and Anna, 1 month.

In the 1910 census of Taylor township, Wilson County: on Thompson Road, farmer Henry Joyner, 42; wife Margaret, 42; and children Lula, 18, William, 17, Hubbert, 15, Maggie, 13, Annie, 10, Obie, 8, Bettie, 4, Luther, 2, Theodore, 3 months, and James, 24.

In the 1920 census of Taylor township, Wilson County: farmer Henry Joyner, 52; wife Margaret, 51; and children Annie, 20, Obie, 18, Bettie, 13, Luther, 11, Theodore, 9, and Lizzie, 6; and grandson Nathan, 6 months.

In the 1930 census of Jackson township, Nash County, North Carolina: farmer Henry Joyner, 60; wife Margaret, 60; children Anne, 26, Obie, 25, Bettie, 24, Luther, 21, Lizzie, 16, and Nathan, 10; and grandchildren Josephine, 14, Rosella, 12, Edward, 10, and Elmus Eatmon, 8.

In the 1940 census of Jackson township, Nash County: Obie Joyner, 38; wife Gladys, 20; father Henry Joyner, 71; mother Margret Joyner, 70; sister Annie, 40; brother Luther, 30; nephew Curtis, 7; niece Leona Eatmon, 28; nephew Nathan Eatmon, 28; and lodger Elmus Eatmon, 19.

Henry Joyner died 13 June 1944 in Jackson township, Nash County. Per his death certificate, he was 78 years old; was born in Wilson County to Simon and Venus Joyner of Wilson County; was a farmer; was married to Margaret Joyner; and was buried in Granite Point cemetery, Wilson County. Obie Joyner was informant.

Margaret Joyner died 18 October 1944 in Jackson township, Nash County. Per her death certificate, she was 77 years old; was a widow; was born in Nash County to Berry and Lurenda Winstead of Nash County; and was buried in Granite Point cemetery, Wilson County. Obie Joyner was informant.

Thanks to J. Robert Boykin III for the clipping.

Rest in peace, Roderick Taylor Jr.

My uncle, my father’s half-brother, passed away yesterday at the age of 92. Roderick Taylor Jr., a retired teacher, was well-known for his encouragement and mentorship of generations of students, who called him “Chief,” and his tireless community activism.



A classroom at the Colored Graded School (later Sallie Barbour School), circa 1935. Roderick Taylor Jr. is at center in a dark sweater.

Everyone else called him “Bud.”

Roderick Taylor Jr. was born in April 1928 in Wilson, North Carolina, the youngest of Roderick Taylor Sr. and Mary John Pender Taylor‘s three children. He graduated from C.H. Darden High School in 1947 and graduated from Johnson C. Smith University.


Part of the freshman class at Johnson C. Smith University in 1949. Bud Taylor is kneeling in the front row. Catherine A. Gibson stands over his shoulder in a black peacoat.

J.C. Smith’s Spanish Club, 1949.

Roderick Taylor Jr. and Catherine Augusta Gibson were married 20 June 1954 in Brunswick, Georgia.

Pittsburgh Courier, 10 July 1954.
Wilson Daily Times, 28 December 1998.
Roderick Taylor on his Faison Street porch, 2017.

Top photo in collection of Lisa Y. Henderson (colorized via MyHeritage.com; The Bull (1949), yearbook of Johnson C. Smith University; bottom photo by Lisa Y. Henderson.

The Old Harper Place.

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In 1918, Atlantic Coast Realty Company prepared this plat cutting new streets and subdividing the “Old Harper Place” into more than 70 lots. The proposal was ambitious, but did not get off the ground immediately. In fact, it never really came together at all.

The streets are readily recognizable today. They are not, however, lined with houses.

Neither Best, Bennett, Oliver nor Lipscomb Streets appear in the 1928 Hill’s Wilson, N.C., city directory, which was the first to include a street-by-street residential listing. Harper Street is there, however, and the directory lists five blocks. The 700 block had fifteen households, but the others were sparser, indicating larger parcels or empty lots. All the households except three are marked “colored.” W.J. Walston appears to have occupied the entire 400 block and possibly the 500 block. On the other side of the street, J.T. Strickland was the sole household listed in the 600 block.

1928 city directory.

However, the 1930 city directory notes that Harper Street was now Lipscomb Road. Unusual for the time, the street had become more integrated. White households replaced black at 238 and 300 Lipscomb. John A. Owens now lived at 400, but the 600 block on both sides of the street contained additional white households.

1930 city directory.

By time the 1941 city directory issued, Harper Street was back, but in a new place. This Harper Street is the one shown in the plat map. Or at least the two blocks of it between Best Street and Herring Avenue. This street was entirely inhabited by white families.

1941 city directory.

The description of Lipscomb Road in the 1941 directory is perplexing. On a modern map, it seems to correspond in part to modern Gold Street, which runs from Herring just past the end of Railroad Street to Reid Street. The inexplicable part is “intersecting 700 Herring av.” 700 Herring Avenue is at the corner of Herring and modern Ward Boulevard. In order to intersect with Herring, Lipscomb/Gold would have to turn back 135 degrees.

Is this 1941 Lipscomb Road? Gold Street is highlighted in solid yellow. The dotted yellow line shows the possible course of Lipscomb as described in the 1941 directory. The blue arrows show modern Lipscomb Road. (Ward Boulevard did not exist in 1941.)

In any case, this area continued to show unusual integration for mid-twentieth century Wilson. Though the majority of households were African-American, several were occupied by white families.

In 1959, per “Survivors Deeded Lucas Property,” Wilson Daily Times, 18 March 1959, George Lucas’ two daughters inherited 71 of the lots shown on the plat on Best, Benton and Harper streets. Eventually, they sold much of the land to the city for a housing project.

Plat Book 1, page 58, Register of Deeds Office, Wilson; aerial view per Bing.com.

The great black section.

The Local History Room of Wilson County Public Library’s Main Branch holds a copy of Daisy Hendley Gold’s typewritten manuscript, “A Town Named Wilson,” published in 1949. It doesn’t have anything to say about African-Americans except this:

“Evidence of prosperity and the possession of cash money was found in the large number of slave owners in Wilson town and county. This was the period when this area was one of the great ‘black’ sections of the state.

“In 1855 William Daniel was prosperous enough to pay Amos Horne the following substantial sums for slaves: $875 for slave Harry, 19 years; $875 for Alfred, 18; $800 for Oney, 17; $675 for Gray, 14.

“In the same year John Harper who lived near Wilson left three slaves, Jason, Lettice and Martha, in trust with General Joshua Barnes for the ‘sole and separate use and benefit of Mary Harper.'”

The leaders of Wilson Cullud Society.

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Wilson Daily Times, 25 August 1899.

  • Spencer Barnes — Barnes was newly returned to Wilson after service in the Spanish-American war.
  • Ward McAllister — McAllister was the tastemaker and social arbiter of Gilded Age New York City.
  • Jim Ottis
  • Colored Odd Fellows Hall
  • Miss Brinkley –– probably, one of the daughters of Dick and Charlotte Brinkley. In the 1900 census of Wilson, Wilson County: Dick Brinkley, 65; wife Charolott, 49, cook; son Hilliard, 29; and daughters Nancy, 27, school teacher, and Bettie, 23, nurse.
  • Miss Rountree

Drunk on cider.

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After the registrar noted that no physician had been in attendance at Washington Simms‘ demise, some other person added “getting drunk on cider” as a cause of death.

A newspaper article sheds some light.

Charlotte Observer, 19 October 1916.

——

There were at least two Washington Simmses in Wilson County in the late 19th century. This seems most likely to be the one above.

In the 1870 census of Stantonsburg township, Wilson County: farm laborer Washington Sims, 34, in the household of Rufus, 47, and Rebecca Edmundson, 34.

In the 1880 census of Black Creek township, Wilson County: Washington Simms, 40, common laborer.

In the 1900 census of Black Creek township, Wilson County: farm laborer Washington Simms, 64.

In the 1910 census of Black Creek township, Wilson County: odd jobs laborer Washington Simms, 71.

County schools, no. 15: Wilbanks School.

The fifteenth in a series of posts highlighting the schools that educated African-American children outside the town of Wilson in the first half of the twentieth century. The posts will be updated; additional information, including photographs, is welcome.

Wilbanks School

Wilbanks School is not listed as a Rosenwald School in “Survey File Materials Received from Volunteer Surveyors of Rosenwald Schools Since September 2002.” However, former students report that the original Wilbanks School, first a school for white students, was replaced by a Rosenwald building in the 1930s.

Location:  A 1936 state road map of Wilson County shows Wilbanks School on present-day N.C. Highway 42, just east of its intersection with Town Creek Road in the former Wilbanks community.

Per sale advertised for several weeks in the Wilson Daily Times in the fall of 1951: “WILBANKS COLORED SCHOOL in Gardners Township, containing one acre more or less, and more particularly described as follows: BEGINNING at a ditch on the public road, J.J. Baker’s corner, thence North with the public road 70 yards to a stake, thence West 70 yards to a stake, thence South 70 yards to a stake on a ditch beside the public path, thence East 70 yards to the beginning. Being the identical land described in a deed recorded in Book 111, at page 353, Wilson County Registry.”

The 8 January 1952 Wilson Daily Times reported the transfer of the Wilbanks colored school lot from the Wilson County Board of Education to Floyd W. Farmer. The school burned down sometime after, and Farmer built a house on the site.

Description: Per The Public Schools of Wilson County, North Carolina: Ten Years 1913-14 to 1923-24, Wilbanks School was a one-room school seated on one acre.

The 23 May 1948 Wilson Daily Times mentioned the performance of the Wilbanks school rhythm band at a county-wide 4-H contest.

A February 1951 report on Wilson County schools, abstracted in the 16 February Wilson Daily Times, found: “Wilbanks Colored school needs coal buckets, shovels and waste baskets …”

On 12 May 2001, the Daily Times published an article on local Rosenwald schools. Several former students or teachers provided details about Wilbanks School, which was a two-room school in which one teacher taught first through third grades and another taught fourth through seventh. The rooms were divided by a partition and lit by electricity. Odell Farmer, then 79, attended first grade in the old school building and the remaining grades in the Rosenwald building. In the old building, children sat three to bench. “They had backs in which a few books could be stored, like a church pew.” “Each room at Wilbanks had a pot-bellied stove, which the older students would help keep fueled.” The older students’ room contained a raised stage. “‘Every morning in my classroom we would have out separate devotion,’ said Ada Sharpe. ‘We would sing “good morning to you” and say The Lord’s Prayer and the Pledge to the Flag.'” Children brought their own lunches to school, often molasses-filled biscuits. She recalled having 65 pupils one year and sometimes had to assign birthdates to children who parents had not filed birth certificates. Older children sometimes were held out of school to help with farm work. On those days, their younger siblings stayed home, too, because they were too young to walk to school by themselves. Wilbanks School closed when the twelve-grade Speight High School opened.

Known faculty: principal Annie Goins Sanders; teachers O. Nestus Freeman, Willie Hendley Freeman, Ada Reid Sharpe, Piccola M. Reid, Charity Drucilla Hussey.

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Wilson Daily Times, 14 February 1941. Rural schools served as community centers, housing the meetings of 4-H clubs, scout troops, and agricultural and home demonstration groups.