Politics

Lane Street Project: 2 September 2025 letter to city officials.

The letter I wrote to the Mayor, City Manager, and City Council Members in the wake of last week’s “false” alarm (as to bones, not erosion) at Vick Cemetery:

I first raised question about Vick more than five years ago. While some progress has been made with its general maintenance, for two years the City has completely ignored the myriad issues that remain. I urge everyone who cares about Vick Cemetery to contact city leaders directly to express their concerns. Carping on Facebook feels good, but doesn’t reach the right eyes or ears.

If you are new to this issue, please reach out to me at blackwideawake@gmail.com, and I’d be happy to answer any questions you have. Thank you.

Lane Street Project: Police open investigation at Vick Cemetery. UPDATED.

Have our worst fears come true?

A profound thank you to Castonoble Hooks for sounding the alarm about worsening erosion at Vick Cemetery; to Olivia Neeley and Drew Wilson of the Wilson Times, whose immediate investigation spotted what may be bones in the ditch; and the Wilson city and county officials who quickly reported to the scene today.

If these dry bones are human, whether recent or ancestral, we honor the memory of the deceased and commit ourselves to ensuring a more peaceful rest for this person and all who lie in Vick Cemetery.

——

Mercifully, the bones are not human. Nonetheless, we urge the City to take steps to address the erosion issue at Vick Cemetery, starting with additional ground-penetrating radar of the public right-of-way. Human bones have been found in these ditches before. We can forestall more.

The beauty in our block. The stories in our skin.

A controversy erupted over the weekend stemming from the content and placement of two photographs in this year’s Eyes on Main Street  outdoor photo exhibit. The issues are complicated, and I have both thoughts and feelings about them, but I want to focus on the immediate aftermath of the brouhaha.

Black Wide-Awake is my ministry, and I do a fair amount of preaching here. This passage from a talk I delivered at Barton College in 2023 captures my main theme:

“The received history of Wilson is anchored in admiring tales of immigrant English younger sons, Mexican War soldiers, county fathers, Civil War generals, and money-minting tobacconists. Though we have been here from the beginning, dragged behind the colonizers, African Americans have largely been omitted from historical records, which inevitably has led to our erasure from both memory and place. Wilson County was built on the backs of Black people, but neither we nor our works are remembered or celebrated.

“Black History in general is often siloed – boxed into a single month that hyperfocuses on a small set of big names and grand feats. We all know Frederick Douglass and Sojourner Truth and George Washington Carver and Harriet Tubman – as we absolutely should. But what of our own heroes? Our own freedom fighters? Our own revolutionaries? What great minds and deeds sprang from our own sandy soil?

…

“In researching for the blog, I have been astonished by what I’ve uncovered. How did I not know of these people? How have the aspirations and achievements, the trials and triumphs, the resistance and the resilience of so many Black people been so quickly rendered invisible? How much taller would we stand if we knew these stories? As singer and social activist Bernice Johnson Reagon has counseled, “when you are in touch with your history, you can see yourself as evidence of the success of your ancestors.””

After the furor died down, and some of the misassumptions and accusations were dispelled, some folks convened a community meeting at a 500 block business to open a dialogue among citizens, city leadership, and arts leadership. Others decided to find out for themselves what Eyes on Main Street and the related American Center for Photographers are about and what they have brought to Wilson.

Derrick Ruffin‘s Facebook post yesterday seized me by the throat. I am grateful that he allowed me to republish it here. From a slightly different angle, he is preaching Black Wide-Awake‘s gospel of reclamation, of discovery, of being “seen, celebrated, and respected.”

Derrick is speaking specifically to creative spaces, but I urge you to apply his message to the way you think about Wilson as a historic space, too. Contrary to some of the commentary over the weekend, the legacy of 500 block of East Nash Street is not confined to violence and desolation. We have forgotten so much of our greatness. The present blinds us to the past.

The principle of sankofa tells us to “go back and get it.” Wilson is ours, too. Get to know our heroes. Get to know our history.

An important correction.

Wilson Daily Times, 19 May 1936.

By early 1936, J.D. Reid had been out of prison a little over four years for his part in the Commercial Bank scandal, which may have fueled this hasty correction. Also, he had moved to Washington, D.C., where he found federal work as a messenger for the office of the U.S. Speaker of the House.

——

S.H. Vick’s letters to John C. Dancy.

This catalogue of twelve years of correspondence received by John C. Dancy contains nearly a dozen letters from Samuel H. Vick.

The summaries of the letters are somewhat vague; I am searching for the originals.

The first, dated 21 April 1899, makes reference to a reference for “Dr. Price,” who I jumped to conclude was Rev. Joseph C. Price. Price died in 1893, though, so, no.

In the second, from 21 January 1902, Vick asked Dancy for help finding work for Grant Foster, who was “out of business,” noting that Foster was “a good penman and thoroughly competent.” Foster was a butcher, and we have evidence that he operated a shop both before and after this letter was written.

Both Vick and Dancy held political appointments, and Vick’s 21 May 1902 letter suggests they leaned on each other for support, privately and when “intercession” was called for.

On 13 November 1902, Vick wrote the first in a series of letters (and a telegram) to Dancy about his fight to retain his postmaster seat.

On 17 January 1903, Vick acknowledged the risk to Dancy of involvement on Vick’s behalf and urged cautious action.

Now out of office, Vick’s 26 and 28 September 1906 letter touched on Odd Fellows politicking. Without context, this summary is difficult to interpret, but clearly makes reference to Vick getting Dancy to represent Zion Hall Lodge No. 5952, Wilson’s Grabneck-area Odd Fellows lodge.

On 26 November 1906, Vick sent another letter about the Odd Fellows, this time inviting Dancy to an all-expense-paid anniversary observation.

Vick’s 26 September 1910 letter refers to high drama at the Biennial Movable Committee of G.U.O.O.F involving internal politics. He also asks Dancy to look into “that matter” for “Henry,” who, presumably, was Vick’s brother William Henry Vick, who was practicing pharmacy in Atlantic City, New Jersey, in 1910.

Calendar of the John C. Dancy Correspondence 1898-1910, The Michigan Historical Records Survey Project (1941), Division of Community Service Programs, Works Project Administration, www.hathitrust.org.

Tribute to Dr. Frank S. Hargrave.

The New Jersey State Republican Committee commissioned E.H. McGhee of Trenton to create a hand-lettered resolution in tribute to Dr. Frank S. Hargrave upon his death on 11 March 1942. 

Below, detail of one of the illustrated letters, bright with faux gilt, that decorated each page.

Many thanks to Vicki Cowan for sharing this beautiful document.