agriculture

Recommended reading, no. 22: One Third of a Nation.

 

In the early 1930s, journalist Lorena Hickok traveled across the United States investigating the plight of Americans struggling through the Depression. One Third of a Nation: Lorena Hickok Reports on the Great Depression. is an annotated compilation of Hickok’s contemporaneous letters, composed as she moved from state to state.

Hickok passed through Wilson in February 1934 and duly filed a letter to Harry L. Hopkins, head of the Federal Emergency Relief Administration, the agency charged with doling out relief to millions of unemployed and needy. She arrived in the midst of a farming crisis, as reductions in crop acreage forced hundreds of farm families off the land.

“As they move to town, they apply for direct relief. The intake office in Wilson today was so crowded you could hardly get into the place. Every house, every abandoned shack, is filled with them. They even break the locks off empty houses and move in.

“Members of the relief committee, two clergymen, the administrator, and the case work supervisor in Wilson today told me that 300 of these displaced tenants and their families have moved into Wilson — a town of about 13,000 population — in the last three years, and of that 300 families, 200 have moved in this winter. The case work supervisor told there were AT LEAST FIFTY CASES in which the landlord, to get rid of them, had moved them in himself and had paid their first week’s rent!

“Seventy-five percent of these families that have moved into Wilson, they told me, are Negroes. Most of them are illiterate. They are afflicted with tuberculosis and the social diseases. Of the white families many have pellagra and hookworm, although hookworm isn’t so common up here as it is farther South. They are a dead weight on the community, both from the social and the economic standpoints. They don’t even want to live in town. The administrator and the case work supervisor both said that there is a constant stream of them in and out of their offices, begging for a chance to ‘git a place on some farm.’

“They’re NOT all bums, either. They HAVEN’T come to town to get work in the mills or on CWA. They’ve come because there’s no place for them to live in the country. Every abandoned shack in the countryside is filled up.”

Where we worked: Sam Vick’s employees.

A running tally of the men who worked in Samuel H. Vick‘s multiple enterprises, their job title, and the year for which I have found evidence of their employment:

  • Robert Hill Sheridan, farm laborer, 1918

  • William Wells, laborer, 1917; auto mechanic, Vick’s Garage, 1920, 1922
  • Jacob Bowen, farmer, 1918
  • Johnie Best, laborer, 1917
  • George Brown, auto garage employee, 1917
  • Leon Bryant, carpenter, 1917
  • Stacy Edwards, carpenter, 1917
  • Buck Claude Reid, carpenter, 1917
  • Dave McPhail, auto driver, 1917
  • Louis Thomas, carpenter, 1917
  • Daniel L. Vick, wage employee, 1917
  • Lawyer Whitley, transfer driver, 1917

Augusta Caple Ford, farmer and learner.

Wilson Daily Times, 17 August 1945.

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In the 1930 census of Black Creek township, North Carolina: farmer James Caple, 36; wife Mary, 37; and children Willie, 16, and Augusta, 12.

On 29 December 1937, Clinton Ford, 23, of Crossroads township, son of Jonathan and Annie Ford, married Augusta Caple, 20, of Crossroads township, daughter of James and Mary Caple. Primitive Baptist minister David Bynum performed the ceremony in the presence of Leslie Lee Miller, Robert Bynum, and Lonnie H. Rose.

In 1940, John Clinton Ford registered for the World War II draft in Wilson County. Per his registration card, he was born 18 April 1914 in Wilson County; lived at R.F.D. #1, Lucama; his contact was wife Agusta Ford; and he was self-employed.

In the 1950 census of Oldfields township, Wilson County: farmer John C. Ford, 35; wife Augusta C., 32; and roomer Nathaniel Williams, 20.

Augusta Ford died 16 September 1951 at Mercy Hospital, Wilson. Per her death certificate, she was born 6 September 1917 in Rockingham County, N.C., to James Capel and Mary Riggins; was married to Clinton Ford; worked as a farmer; lived at R.F.D. 1, Simms; and was buried in Rest Haven Cemetery.

Clipping courtesy of J. Robert Boykin III.

Winners of the rural garden contest.

Wilson Daily Times, 10 February 1950.

Even without a photo, we would have known Lizzie Atkinson and Martha Mitchell were African American because the Daily Times did not grant Black women the honorific “Mrs.”

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  • Lizzie Atkinson
  • Martha Mitchell — in the 1940 census of Toisnot township, Wilson County: farmer Kester Mitchell, 45; wife Martha, 44; and children Flora Lee, 23, Mamie, 21, Kester Jr., 20, Roy, 18, Christine, 16, Amanda Gray, 14, Purnell and Inell, 12, Cash, 10, and Mildred, 8.

Mitchell’s home demonstration club meets.

In the lead-up to my February 8 talk at Wilson County Public Library, every day I’ll feature a post related to Wilson County’s Rosenwald schools. (Or schools, like Mitchell, which were not Rosenwald-funded, but were contemporaries.)

Wilson Daily Times, 21 February 1944.

  • Fannie Parker — in the 1940 census of Toisnot township, Wilson County: James Parker, 44; wife Fannie, 42; and adopted children Annie, 13, and Silas, 8.
  • Carolina Brodie
  • Louise Chisel
  • Minnie Winstead — in the 1940 census of Toisnot township, Wilson County: Clarence Winstead, 42, farmer; wife Minnie, 44; and adopted son Robert Featherson, 14.
  • Dorthea Parker — in the 1940 census of Toisnot township, Wilson County: farmer John Parker, 39; wife Doretha, 28; children Nora Lee, 18, James Earl, 14, Elmer, 12, and John S.T. Parker, 8; and stepson Joseph Evans, 8.

Rocky Branch School hosts citizenship program.

In the lead-up to my February 8 talk at Wilson County Public Library, every day I’ll feature a post related to Wilson County’s Rosenwald schools. Here, extension agent Carter W. Foster invited farmers from the Rocky Branch, Williamson, and New Vester school districts in southwest Wilson County to attend a citizenship program.

Wilson Daily Times, 27 April 1950.

In an era in which few African-Americans qualified to register to vote, it is interesting to consider what “responsibilities and privileges as a good citizen” were being imparted.

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Rocky Branch home demonstration club has monthly meeting.

In the lead-up to my February 8 talk at Wilson County Public Library, every day I’ll feature a post related to Wilson County’s Rosenwald schools. Rocky Branch home demonstration club’s members lived in Rocky Branch school district.

 

Wilson Daily Times, 9 April 1943.

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  • Della O’Neal — in the 1950 census of Springhill township, Wilson County: farmer James O’Neal, 46; wife Della, 46, farm helper; son Rubin, 23, farm helper; daughter Ruby Barnes, 23; and grandsons Tyren W., 2, and Joe Ann Barnes, born in February.
  • Lossie Shaw — in the 1940 census of Springhill township, Wilson County: farmer James R. Shaw, 51; wife Lossie, 44; and James Ray, 12, and Arlene Dixon, 11.
  • Esther Barnes

Williamson Home Demonstration Club news.

In the lead-up to my February 8 talk at Wilson County Public Library, every day I’ll feature a post related to Wilson County’s Rosenwald schools. As seen here, the schools became the centers of rural communities. The Williamson Home Demonstration Club was comprised of women who lived in Williamson’s district. In this contribution to the Daily Times, the Club reported on members’ gardening, canning, and sewing work; their contribution to a fire fund for demonstration agent Jane Amos Boyd; a successful picnic with the clubs affiliated with Sims, New Vester, and Rocky Branch Schools; a baby shower; and the sick and shut-in.

Wilson Daily Times, 3 July 1945.

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  • Lillie Powell
  • Ida M. Finch— in the 1940 census of Cross Roads township, Wilson County: farmer Eddie Finch, 30; wife Ida M., 28; and sons Joshua T., 7, and Willie G., 1.
  • Gladys Graham — in the 1940 census of Cross Roads township, Wilson County: farm laborer James Graham, 24; wife Gladys, 20; and daughter Mary F., 1.
  • C.W. Foster — Carter W. Foster.
  • Lizzie Atkinson
  • Mamie B. Williamson