Law

Lane Street Project: response to the 23 July 2023 records request, part 2.

First, let me show you the public records request I submitted on 8 September 2023.

The request goes to my attempts to find out what happened to the headstones removed from Vick Cemetery circa 1995-96. My 2019 records request to the City yielded nothing helpful. The calls by me and others for an investigation into their disappearance has fallen on deaf ears. I’ve heard bits and pieces though. Second-hand and third-hand accounts of their removal and storage in a city warehouse, possibly near Maplewood Cemetery. A recent rumor describes the warehouse being damaged or flooded during a hurricane, perhaps Floyd, perhaps some other.

I screenshot this image from the Wilson County GIS website.

It shows the “city lot” adjacent to Maplewood. The superimposed blue shaded area is the “Flood Hazards” layer. There are faint outlines that appear to have been left by demolished buildings. Is this flood-vulnerable area where the headstones were stored? Or were they in some altogether different location?

My public records request is an attempt to determine where the headstones were and when and h0w they left the City’s custody. In the total absence of information from the folks charged with caring for these relics, I crafted my request in the broadest terms.

Here’s what City Manager Grant Goings had to say about that:

A few thoughts:

(1) No, Mr. Goings. Not “one individual.” I’m seeking the truth as a descendant of the dead of Vick Cemetery and a representative of everyone who wants to see a terrible wrong righted.

(2) In other words, we are too busy trying to get the Mudcats to come to Wilson to go on wild-goose chases for dusty documents related to embarrassing chapters in recent city history?

(3) “It is unfortunate that the law allows an individual to use up so many tax-payer resources and further harm the City by taking so many hours of staff time away from current opportunities.” North Carolina has had a Public Records Act since 1935. What’s “unfortunate” is that the highest-ranking administrative manager of the City of Wilson views as a nuisance a law fundamental to good governance and an informed public.

(4) “One (non-resident) attorney.” I was born and raised in Wilson. I don’t have to prove my bona fides to anybody at City Hall. Moreover, anyone may make a public records request.

(5)  I’ve responded to FOIA requests in my day. If we received one that seemed overly broad or vague or burdensome, we would contact the requestor to ask a few questions aimed at clarifying or narrowing the scope of the request. Simple as that. In fact, both the City Attorney and the City Clerk have reached out to me before concerning requests I’ve submitted. One time resulted in my withdrawal of the request. The second time resulted in a fine-tuning of the request to make more clear the information I was seeking. I have to assume that Grant Goings understands how public records requests work. Why he chooses to cavil and complain to council rather than contact me for clarity is a question only he can answer. As soon as I read his email, however — or, rather, as soon as I picked my jaw up off the floor — I emailed the City Attorney and others: “Mr. Cauley, given Mr. Goings’ concerns about my exercise of rights afforded under NC law, if there are questions about the scope of any request I submit, including that submitted on September 8, please let me know and I will do my best to clarify or even narrow said request.”

Lane Street Project: response to the 23 July 2023 records request, part 1.

Yesterday, I received 961 pages in response to my 23 July 2023 public records request. Some of documents duplicate information already in my possession, such the final GPR report. Other pages duplicate one another, as various email threads are forwarded or responded to by multiple City employees and elected officials. In a series of posts, I’ll share the documents I consider most informative, both substantively and in terms of what they reveal about the City of Wilson’s collective approach to dealing with Vick Cemetery (and me).

First, the request itself. With (1), I sought documents that would explain New South Associates’ specific reasons for returning in June to mark the edges of Vick. With (2), the scope of the survey work Bartlett was contracted to perform. With (3), in the absence of any communication from the City, I sought documents revealing any plans for work at Vick. With (4), again in the vacuum created by the City’s lack of responsiveness, I sought documents that would show whether they were speaking with subject matter experts about Vick. With (5), I sought to ascertain whether the City was communicating with anyone in the descendant community.

Let me cue up the first exhibit. After the May 11 Vick Cemetery open forum, Councilmember Gillettia Morgan and Mayor Carlton Stevens asked me to send them some quick-hit items they could take to council quickly. I sent this email on May 24. (The highlights were later added by someone to whom the email was forwarded.)

On June 16, after learning the City had not and would not obtain a survey map be provided for the survey I’d requested, I sent Morgan and Stevens this email (highlights added by someone else):

Neither Morgan nor Stevens responded to me. Rather, one of them forwarded the email to City Manager Grant Goings. Goings forwarded both my emails to the mayor and council with this message:

Let’s break this down:

  • “Several have complained ‘goalposts being constantly moved’ on Vick Cemetery and some have concluded that true resolution is not goal of all parties.” 

Goings wrote this email on June 16, less than two months after the City turned over the Vick Cemetery GPR report it had been sitting on for more than six months. It’s not clear who “several” are. Councilmembers? City officials? More critically, how could the goalposts be moved when we have no idea where they should be set? We learned only in April of the approximate number of graves in Vick. Only two of seven council members came to the open forum convened for discussion of the report. City officials do not respond to emails about Vick. They do not ask questions. They don’t share information. The City has yet to propose any kind of “resolution,” much less a true one, for Vick’s future. Instead, city representatives talk behind their hands and accuse Vick descendants of acting in bad faith.

  • “Please read the two emails below. The first email request [sic] that the 4 corners of the cemetery be surveyed. The second email blasts the City and claims we are doing things ‘on the cheap’ and ‘behind closed doors’, for doing exactly what was requested in the first email. Intentionally moving goalposts to continue conflict is not anything new. It is a tactic used frequently in politics by all kinds of groups. However, it is rare to actually catch proof in writing like we have below.”

First, on 30 December 2019, in my first letter to mayor and council, among other things I stated: “For clarification of the boundaries of Vick cemetery and the Rountree and Odd Fellows cemeteries adjacent to it, I request a plat map of the property.” So, actually, I’ve been quite consistent on this point. However, Goings is correct that my May 24 email was inartfully worded. In my experience, getting a survey to determine the boundaries of a parcel of land results in a survey map that shows rights-of-way, property lines, surface features, etc. It never occurred to me that the City would ask the surveyor to do no more than place stakes. Hence my June 16 email to Morgan and Stevens asking for clarity — an email that Goings and the anonymous “several” see as a smoking gun of bad intent.

Since 2019, when I began asking questions about Vick, the City’s posture has been defensive, rather than engaging. My persistent attempts to get to the truth about Vick have required that I grope about in the dark because the City will shine no light on the subject without compulsion. I’m puzzled that Grant characterizes my requests for information and action as “political.” I’m not a representative or agent of the political body that pulled headstones out of the ground, lost or destroyed them, and ran power poles through two cemeteries. I have no motive to “continue conflict,” but I know who might.

  • “I’m not sure where ‘once again the City is trying to deal with Vick on the cheap’ comes from. My recollection is that Council spent over triple what was originally requested for the radar scan. You also have instructed us to find attractive, and more expensive, fencing options, etc.”

Goings isn’t sure because he hasn’t asked. Let me refresh his recollection re the GPR scan. When the mayor first raised this issue to council, a Cemetery Commission employee hazarded a guess about the cost. When the City actually got a quote from industry leader New South Associates, the cost was much higher. After some grumbling among council members, they agreed to pay it. As for the attractive, expensive fencing options, Goings is once again missing the point. Maybe the fence is workable option. Maybe it’s not. But before we talk about pretty fences, we need to talk about these power poles. And the unscanned graves in the public right-of-way. And other matters that more likely than not will cost money. (Money that doesn’t have to come from local taxpayers, by the way. Other cities and organizations are getting tens of thousands of dollars in grants or other funding for historic African-American cemeteries. You know why? Because they’re actively seeking it.)

  • “Considering the numerous false allegations to date, the evidence below, and the fact that Ms. Henderson has publicly and in writing falsely accused your Communications Director, Assistant City Manager, City Engineer, and City Manager of being untruthful and/or unethical, I think it would be wise for the City to establish alternative communication relationships to represent Vick’s best interests. In no means do I wish to diminish the valuable research Ms. Henderson has contributed or the volunteer efforts she leads to clean up the private cemeteries. I do not know her nor intend to judge or defame her as she has done to staff. However, the City relying on her as the ‘voice’ of the public on this issue is appearing to be, at best, a questionable practice…”

The first part apparently is reference to my comments here. While strongly critical of certain actions taken by public officials, my remarks are in no way defamatory. I suggest Goings brush up on the First Amendment. This paragraph does get at the heart of things though. Goings (and perhaps the “several”) don’t like my style. They apparently don’t like my refusal to shut up or back down. I get it. No one wants to dwell on destroyed headstones and power poles in cemeteries, and I’m sure it would be easier to deal with someone compliant and undemanding. But Grant Goings doesn’t get to decide who represents “Vick’s best interests” or who acts as the “voice of the public” concerning this sacred space. (Thanks for the compliment though.)

Four days later, Councilman Michael Bell responded to Goings:

Bell repeats the moving goalposts charge and makes a startling suggestion. “… [W]e need to establish if the additional graves are within or out of the surveyed boundary. If the additional graves are within the surveyed boundary then if would be our responsibility.” Does Bell not understand that the surveyed boundary marks modern boundaries, not the boundaries of the cemetery when it was in use? The deed for Vick notes it covers 7.84 acres. The present-day estimate is 7.75 acres. That .09 acres is likely the strip of land now included in the public right-of-way. We know there are graves in that strip of land. Is Bell actually suggesting that the City bears no responsibility for what happens to these dead?

“As I said, we need to be careful,” Bell continues. “Let’s hope the fencing will resolved [sic] this situation. Moving the goalposts will not help the effort. If we allow the area of the cemetery to be expanded then the next discovery might be 50 feet to the north or south. Then we find ourselves in a delicate situation.” Wow. If nothing else, I guess, I appreciate Bell’s candor.

As for the fable of the man, the boy, and their donkey, the moral of the story is that everyone has their own opinion, and there is no way one can satisfy all. I’m struggling to apply this lesson to the situation at hand, but Gillettia Morgan apparently is not, for she responded to Bell, “Very well said.”

Lane Street Project: response to the 18 August 2023 request re power poles.

Yesterday, I received responses to my July 23 and August 18 requests to the City of Wilson for public records concerning Vick Cemetery. Below is the response to the August 18 request, which concerned the power poles we recently deduced were placed in Vick Cemetery after the site had been cleared of headstones, graded, and adorned with a single monument.

As set forth in the letter below beginning at the third paragraph, the City has not located any documents related to the planning and installation of power poles in Vick and Rountree Cemeteries. Its sole responsive documents are references to data and maps found in the GPR report or at the City of Wilson’s GIS website. It provided screenshots of those images, which I have excerpted below. Bottom line: the poles were manufactured in 1997, which confirms they were installed no earlier than that year.

 

The red lines present power lines. The power poles are represented by blue dots. Date was provided for four steel poles, which are marked with blue rectangles. I have been way off with my estimates of their height. The first (closest to the substation) is 95 feet in height. The rest are 90 feet. If 90 to 95 feet is the height above ground (and not the length of the pole), the section of pole below ground is roughly 11 to 11.5 feet. In the middle of graves.

The poles were last inspected eight years ago and were found to be in good condition. What happens when they need to be replaced?

Rules and regulations for patrollers.

Prior to Wilson County’s formation in 1855, much of its present-day territory lay in Edgecombe, including everything east of a line running a couple of miles inside present-day Interstate 95 and north of Contentnea Creek. In 1844, the Tarboro’ Press published “Rules and Regulations to be Observed by the Patrollers of the several Districts in the County of Edgecombe.” Slave patrols, known as patrollers or patty rollers, were government-sanctioned groups of armed men charged with monitoring and enforcing discipline upon enslaved people.

Edgecombe County patrollers operated under a set of comprehensive and precise rules. Tasked with visiting ever house inhabited by enslaved people at least once a month, they rode at night. They searched for firearms and “seditious publications” and kept a sharp lookout for any enslaved person out and about more than a mile from home. They could beat people — up to 15 lashes — for having too much fun. On Sundays, their job was to make sure enslaved people were not “strolling about” enjoying their one day off or selling trinkets for pocket change. Patrollers ran down runaways and, if met with “insolence,” could drop a whip 39 times across a black back. They were compensated for their services.

Tarboro’ Press, 9 March 1844.

The near-lynching of George Hobbs.

On the morning of 12 October 1927, George Hobbs died quietly at his home “across N.& S.R.R.” in Wilson. As a 59 year-old railroad section laborer (and former farmer), he had likely seen a lifetime of hard, debilitating labor, and he succumbed to kidney disease. Two days later, Hobbs was laid to rest in “Rountrees Cemetery” — almost certainly what we now call Vick Cemetery.

Hobbs’ quiet end gave no hint of the events that had upended his life seven years earlier when he narrowly escaped a Cumberland County, North Carolina, lynch mob.

I was trying to glean the facts of Hobbs’ ordeal from contemporary news reports when I found Betty Richardson’s “Trouble at Victory Mill Villages.” Richardson, too, pulled an outline from news article, but not without interrogation. Interspersing recollections from eyewitnesses and contemporaries, Richardson questions the accepted account of the events that sent George Hobbs to prison. That Hobbs served fewer than seven years of two sheriff’s deputies suggests her skepticism is well-founded.

——

“Cars packed with armed men jammed the rain drenched streets between Fayetteville and Victory Mill Village on Friday night, May 21, 1920.

“Women and children peeked from behind window curtains along Camden Road as the roar of the cars and the yells of the angry gunmen were occasionally punctuated by rifle fire.

“An orange glow in the sky added to the frightening scenario as members of the giant posse used torches to set fire to the home of a black mill worker named George Hobbs.

“Sheriff N.H. McGeachy and his handful of deputies tried to bring some order to the confusion ‘but was unable to do very much on account of the unorganized crowd of excited villagers,’ the Fayetteville Observer reported on Saturday, May 22.

“At Camp Bragg, the commanding officer ordered 500 soldiers into trucks, and they were standing by to move into Victory Mill Village (known as Lakedale today), but the governor called off the Army, saying the trouble was not a race riot, ‘but an effort to get one Negro.’

“One Cumberland County deputy had been killed and another mortally wounded late Friday afternoon, and the mob wanted vengeance.

“‘There was no race riot as stated in the papers of other cities,’ the Observer declared. ‘It was merely an effort on the part of the villagers to bring to justice the colored man who had taken the life of Deputy Sheriff Herman Butler.’

“Butler died when a bullet struck him in the neck as he and another deputy, W.G. ‘Billy’ Moore, marched toward the barn where Hobbs had barricaded himself against the mob. Moore was shot in the back and died at 5 p.m. on Saturday at Pittman Hospital.  William Garrison Moore’s death certificate states: “Bullet wound in abdomen.” [italics in original]

“A coroner’s report by Dr. Vance McGougan was to show the deputies were not shot with the same weapon.

“It all started on Thursday when Hobbs’ daughter and two white girls, Bessie Wrenn and an unidentified friend, met while walking along the Cut — a deep ravine between Camden Road and Southern Avenue where a trolley once ran between Fayetteville and Victory Mills.

“Newspaper reports stated, ‘The trouble arose when the daughter of Hobbs brushed against two white girls while on their way to the mill and, after knocking one of the white girls several feet, she [one of the white girls] came back and handed the Hobbs woman a thrashing.’

“The Observer, in its May 22nd edition, states that on the following day, Friday, ‘the Hobbs woman used vile threats and fired a pistol several times in the air, using at the same time profane language of the worst kind. She was pursued down the railroad cut by several white men. She went to her home, reloading her pistol and came back and finding the same two white girls with whom she had had the previous trouble fired five times at them, none of the bullets hitting their mark.'”

“There are some wide differences in the story told in newspapers in 1920 and the recollections today of a granddaughter of Deputy Moore — Mrs. Doc Jackson, who lives in Pearces Mill Township. Mrs. Jackson remembers stories told by her grandmother, Mrs. Lizzie Newton Moore, and other older Massey Hill residents, and those stories indicated the Wrenn girl went to Puritan Mill, where her brothers worked, and told them about the fight, that the brothers ran home and got their guns to go look for Hobbs’ daughter.

“The Observer continues its report of the trouble: ‘About 6 o’clock, a couple of white men (not identified by the newspaper but probably members of the Wrenn family) went to the home of Hobbs (which was located near Camden Road and Orlando Street, not far from the Massey Hill Recreation Center) and finding the Negro with his wife sitting on the porch, informed them the trouble must cease. Instantly, the two Negroes dashed into the house and in a moment one of them fired a shotgun through the window at the white men, one of them being peppered on the neck with bird shot. He then leveled his gun and fired into the house, and the Negroes scattered, the women members of the family going off toward the top of the hill and Hobbs going into his barn.’

“Mrs. Jackson remembers her grandmother’s oft-told story. Deputy Moore was at home, having just completed his regular duty tour. Butler came to the house and urged Moore to go with him, saying there was going to be serious trouble. Moore, who was 70, agreed, and the two officers drove to Hobbs’ home.

“Newspaper reports state Butler walked to a spot near the barn, carrying a lantern on his arm. A bullet was fired from the barn, the newspapers said, and Butler was hit. The bullet struck him in the neck and exited his body on his left side near the heart.

“A huge crowd of villagers began to gather, most of them armed. ‘Hearing of the deputy’s death, they became incensed and set fire to the dwelling house of Hobbs, also to the dwelling house of his sister,’ the Observer reported. (The newspaper erred in its report. The men actually burned the home of Hobbs’s wife’s sister, Rebecca Evans, according to recorded deeds.)

“Moore apparently tried to reach the barn and was shot. The bullet entered his body near the end of his spine and came out through his stomach.

“The crowd finally discovered that Hobbs had escaped from the barn during the confusion. Angrily, men set fire to the barn and chased Hobbs’ stock off into the darkness.

“Hobbs’ 15-year-old son [Preston Hobbs] was captured by members of the posse and turned over to deputies. The youngster had been shot in the legs during the gunfire. McGeachy found Hobbs’ wife, Alice, and took her to Fayetteville and placed her in the Cumberland County Jail.

“Mrs. Cathleen Turner was a teenager whose family lived next door to Deputy Moore. ‘I’ll never forget that night,’ she says. ‘We had been to Tolar-Hart that afternoon and were coming home when we saw the glow of the flames from Hobbs’ house in the sky. We heard the shooting and daddy told us not to leave the house when we got home. I remember it was raining that night and we could see the people passing by through our windows,’ she says.

“Law enforcement in 1920 was still a long way from becoming a science. There were no ballistic tests, no fingerprint experts. Apparently, the crowd and the officers refused to accept the significance of the fact that Moore was shot in the back while walking toward the barn where Hobbs was believed to have been barricaded. The angle of the bullet striking Butler also failed to raise any doubt in the minds of the investigators.

“The size of the mob continued to increase, and search parties scattered in all directions. Dozens of armed men remained throughout the night around the ashes of the fires that had destroyed two homes and a barn.

“The search continued through the weekend. On Monday, May 24, the Observer reported Hobbs was still a fugitive roaming the swamps somewhere in lower Cumberland. ‘Armed men are continuing the hunt all along the country roads and woods where he is suspected of being,’ the newspaper stated.

“Hobbs reportedly had gone to Butler’s Store near Cumberland Mill on Saturday night, carrying a pistol wrapped in a handkerchief in his right hand and a rifle under his left arm.

“There is an account from ‘a traveling man’ (apparently a traveling salesman) who was quoted by the Observer saying he had been stopped by a black man as he drove toward Fayetteville from Hope Mills, that the man asked him if he was hunting him. The traveling man said he assured the man he was not, that he didn’t even know what he was being hunted for.

“Deputies and members of the posse stationed themselves in Ardlussa, the community where Hobbs’ wife had been born and where she had a number of relatives living. But they couldn’t find their quarry.

“Moore, born in Pender County, had lived in Cumberland for 21 years. He had been a deputy for 16 years. He was buried in a graveyard next to his home on Camden Road. Approximately 2,000 persons crowded into his front yard and the cemetery near his house late Sunday afternoon for the final rites.

“Butler’s body was taken to his native Clinton in Sampson County for burial. He had lived in Fayetteville for about 20 years and owned an automobile delivery business here.

“Finally, on Wednesday, May 26, Charles Young, a friend of Hobbs, contacted Sheriff McGeachy and announced Hobbs was ready to surrender, but only to the sheriff or Deputy Al Pate, that he feared the other members of the department.

“McGeachy and Pate drove to Snow Hill Church, just beyond Little Sandy River, about four miles from Fayetteville.

“At 8 p.m., Young arrived at the church and told McGeachy that Hobbs was hiding nearby. In a few minutes Hobbs walked out of the woods, unarmed and holding his hands above his head. McGeachy drove to Fayetteville and switched cars. He and Pate slipped Hobbs to Raleigh for safekeeping. Hobbs told McGeachy he had wanted to give himself up earlier but could not get word to the sheriff or Pate.

“McGeachy said Hobbs was worried about his family, and the officers assured him they were safe. Hobbs said he was tired and went to sleep after hearing the news about his family. He slept on the back seat most of the way to Raleigh.

“Hobbs remained in state prison until Sept. 1 when Deputy A. O. Patrick brought him back to Fayetteville to stand trial. They arrived at about midnight, and the trial was scheduled to begin in superior court on Sept. 2. Judge Owen H. Guion of Craven County was presiding and Solicitor S. B. McLean was prosecutor. But as the arraignment began, defense attorneys H. L. Cook, John H. Cook, John G. Shaw, and Duncan Shaw announced they wanted a conference with their client. Judge Guion granted the request.

“The lawyers and Hobbs left the courtroom and shut themselves behind closed doors in an anteroom. They returned about two hours later. Hobbs was flanked by his wife, daughter and son.

“Attorney H. L. Cook in a brief speech to the court announced that Hobbs was pleading guilty to second degree murder, saying he and the other lawyers had advised the defendant to plead guilty to second degree.

“Cook said the defense counsel had searched the state’s evidence and he did not believe state could find Hobbs guilty of first degree murder. He also said there would be much difficulty in even proving he fired the shots that killed Butler and Moore, that ‘in fairness and justice to all’ he felt that ‘the ends of justice would be met by letting him serve a term in state prison.’

“Judge Guion congratulated the attorneys for the defense, as well as the prosecutor. ‘The tremendous crowd that packed every inch of space listened intently at every word, spoken slow and deliberately by his honor,’ according to a reporter’s account of the court proceedings published in the Observer on Sept.2.

“It is obvious today, reading the accounts of the proceedings, that Solicitor McLean and the defense lawyers had been involved in some fancy plea bargaining before the day of the trial.

“Judge Guion told McLean that he had ‘served the state and county well,’ Guoin said, ‘I heartily concur in your course. You are doing the best that can be done that the ends of justice be served.’

“Later in the day, Guion sentenced Hobbs to serve from two to 20 years in prison.

“On the surface, it was an amazing sentence. A black man accused of murdering two white deputies in a mill village in 1920 would be eligible for parole in less than a year.

“But the action of the attorneys spotlights the weakness of the state’s case and prompts speculation that Moore and Butler probably were shot by members of the giant posse that had cornered Hobbs in his barn.”

Fayetteville Observer, 26 May 1920.

——

In the 1900 census of Pearces Mill township, Cumberland County: section hand George Hobbs, 33; wife Alice, 28; children Mable, 7, Georgia, 6, and Lear, 2; and stepdaughter Pearl Williams, 9.

In the 1910 census of Pearces Mill township, Cumberland County: George Hobbs, 47; wife Alice, 34; children Mabell, 16, Georgia, 14, Lena, 11, Preston, 5, and Tinie, 2; and stepdaughter Pearl Williams, 19.

On 27 June 1918, Georgia Hobbs, 21, daughter of George and Alice Hobbs, married Cicero Campbell, 20, son of Martin and Frances Campbell, in Cumberland County.

In the 1920 census of Pearces Mill township, Cumberland County: cotton mill watchman George Hobbs, 50; wife Alice, 46; and children Mable, 24, silk mill winder, Georgia, 21, silk mill winder, Preston, 14, Tiny, 11, Ila, 8, and Otha, 7.

In the 1928 Hill’s Wilson, N.C., city directory, entries appear for Alice, Georgia, Mabel, Otha, and Preston Hobbs, all living at 900 New Street. Alice and Georgia worked as laundresses; Mabel as a domestic; and Otha and Preston as laborers.

Perhaps feeling it was then safe to do so, the Hobbses returned to Cumberland County en masse within a year or two of George Hobbs’ death.

In the 1930 census of Cross Creek township, Cumberland County: widow Alice Gibbs, 56, and children Mabel Hobbs, 36, silk mill doubler, Georgia Cameron, 31, silk mill doubler, Preston Hobbs, 27, cafe cook, and Illa, silk mill doubler, 19.

Preston Hobbs died 21 November 1942 in Friendship township, Clarendon County, South Carolina. Per his death certificate, he was 35 years old; was born in Fayetteville, North Carolina, to George Hobbs and Alice Evans; was single; and worked as a laborer.

Otha Hobbs died 23 August 1952 in Fayetteville, Cumberland County. Per his death certificate, he was born 7 May 1902 in Fayetteville to George Hobbs and Alice Evans and worked as a cook.

Alice Hobbs died 12 February 1962 in Fayetteville, Cumberland County. Per her death certificate, she was born 4 June 1875 in Cumberland County to Mars Evans and Rebecca [maiden name unknown] and was the widow of George Hobbs.

Alice Evans Williams Hobbs. (Detail of) photo courtesy of Ancestry.com user HerbertLorenza.

Georgia Campbell died 29 June 1964 in Fayetteville, Cumberland County. Per her death certificate, she was born 14 October 1900 in Cumberland County to George Hobbs and Alice Evans and was married to Cicero Campbell.

Mable Hobbs died 6 November 1968 in Fayetteville, Cumberland County. Per her death certificate, she was born 15 November 1896 to George Hobbs and Alice Williams and worked as a silk mill employee.

My thanks to Francena F.L. Turner for bringing George Hobbs to my attention.

Lane Street Project: the latest public records request.

Last week’s release of the Vick Cemetery ground-penetrating radar report came as the result of a request I made per North Carolina’s public records act. Public money funded the report; citizens have a right to know what’s in it.

Yesterday, I followed up with a second request, whose text I set out below. The City acknowledged its receipt today; I’ll keep you posted.

——

On April 11, 2023, I requested:
For the period from March 1, 2022, to the present, I hereby request copies of all documents, including but not limited to, city council minutes, correspondence, proposals, contracts, invoices, reports, maps, surveys, and photographs, related to New South Associates and a ground-penetrating radar survey of Vick Cemetery.
In response, I received a copy of a contract and a report marked “September 7, 2022-Draft Report.” I did not receive copies of correspondence or any other documents.
I hereby reiterate, clarify, and expand my request to include all documents showing or constituting:
(1) correspondence among representatives, employees or agents of the City of Wilson, its divisions or departments, and between such representatives and New South Associates (NSA), including, but not limited to documents showing (a) the date(s) the City of Wilson received NSA’s report(s) on the ground-penetrating radar survey of Vick Cemetery, (b) who received NSA’s report on behalf of the City of Wilson, and (c) dates and to whom the report was distributed after receipt, 
 
(2) any and all discussion of NSA’s report by representatives, employees or agents of the City of Wilson, including but not limited to emails, memoranda, notes, minutes, letters, voicemail messages, and instant messages, 
 
(3) the final version of the report NSA submitted to the City of Wilson,
 
(4) deeds, maps or other charts showing the ownership of and grant of an easement for utility poles placed along the southwest side of Bishop L.N. Forbes Street (formerly Lane Street), including documents showing when said easement was granted,
 
(5) correspondence, notes, minutes, requests, approvals or court orders relating to the establishment of said utility easement,
 
(6) surveys, assessments, reports, public notices, correspondence, and other documents concerning establishment of said utility easement within the boundaries of a cemetery
I am willing to pay reasonable costs for the reproduction and mailing of such documents if they are not available digitally. Thank you.