Wilson Daily Times, 12 June 1918.
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- Globe Theatre
- S.H. Vick — Samuel H. Vick.
- Rev. H.B. Taylor — Halley B. Taylor.
The funeral of Bertha Ayers.
News and Observer (Raleigh, N.C.), 20 August 1930.
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Members of the Ayers family were among a handful of families in the Lucama area who transitioned from black to white racial classification in the early 1900s. Bertha Ayers‘ grandfather Jesse Ayers was described as colored as late as 1914, and her aunt Harriet Ayers‘ had been prosecuted for marrying a white man in 1895. By 1920, however, this set of Ayerses had gained acceptance within the white community.
White girls wanted at the cigarette factory.
Daily News (Wilson, N.C.), 20 September 1900.
Tobacco processing work was divided by race and gender. Tobacco factories employed black men and women as redrying hands and stemmers, low-paying, hot, dusty jobs. Relatively cleaner manufacturing jobs, such as in cigarette factories, were reserved for white “girls.”
619 East Green Street, revisited.
Here is 619 East Green Street, the Charlie Thomas house, in the 1980s when photographed for the National Register application for East Wilson. The small attached cinderblock building, Bea’s Flower Shop, was demolished a few years later.
I photographed the house in 2017 when I first featured it in this series. The photo below, taken in October 2025, shows the toll of eight more years.
Two months later, I photographed 619 again.
I do not begrudge a renovation that returns a decaying house to livable condition, and I understand the hard choices that must be made when updating and making efficient a house more than 100 years old, but I am saddened by the loss of architectural detail here. The original bracketed, turned porch posts replaced by plain four-by-fours are a particular loss, as are the reduced-size windows.
N.88.2.505-507, Lewis Thomas House, 619 E. Green Street, East Wilson Historic District, Wilson, Wilson County, Survey and National Register Branch, State Historic Preservation Office.
411 East Green Street.
The two hundred-sixth in a series of posts highlighting buildings in East Wilson Historic District, a national historic district located in Wilson, North Carolina. As originally approved, the district encompasses 858 contributing buildings and two contributing structures in a historically African-American section of Wilson. (A significant number have since been lost.) The district was developed between about 1890 to 1940 and includes notable examples of Queen Anne, Bungalow/American Craftsman, and Shotgun-style architecture. It was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1988.
In the nomination form for the East Wilson Historic District, described as: “ca. 1922; 2 stories; two-bay, side-hall, gable front house with intact turned porch posts.”
In the 1922 Hill’s Wilson, N.C., city directory: Foster Hugh (c) carp h 411 E Green. Also: Foster Maggie (c) dom h 411 E Green
In the 1925 Hill’s Wilson, N.C., city directory: Foster Hugh T (c) carp h 411 E Green
In the 1928 and 1930 Hill’s Wilson, N.C., city directories: Foster Hugh T (c; Mollie M) carp h 411 E Green
In the 1930 census of Wilson, Wilson County: at 411 East Green Street, Hugh Foster, 31, carpenter,
In the 1940 census of Wilson, Wilson County: at 411 East Green, Hallie Armstrong, 48, pool room operator; wife Julia, 29; and lodgers Annie M. Brown, 39, of Mooresville, Iredell County, hospital nurse; Jeanett M. Lee, 24, of Mount Olive, Wayne County, hospital nurse; and Lawrence Peacock, 27, of High Point, sewer project laborer.
In the 1950 census of Wilson, Wilson County: at 411 East Green, widow Julia Armstrong, 39, born in Kentucky, and lodgers Mary Rose, 29; Anne Everette, 2; Herbert Rose Jr., born in July; Edward Harris, 20, construction company bricklayer; McDonald Hayes, 33, electric power company laborer; Josephine Hayes, 28, cotton picker on farm; and Willie Mack Hayes, 15, cotton picker on farm.
Wilson Daily Times, 23 February 1968.
Photo by Lisa Y. Henderson, May 2024.
Reflections on Samuel Vick’s “unquiet life” in politics.
William T. Bost was the influential political correspondent and columnist for the Greensboro Daily News. Just a few days after Samuel H. Vick died, Bost wrote an editorial about Vick’s “unquiet” political life, reflecting on the aftermath of Vick’s removal from his postmaster position.
Greensboro Daily News, 13 July 1946.
611 East Green Street, revisited.
On 29 October 1892, Hardy Tate purchased for $700 from George D. and Ella M. Green a 1/3-acre lot on Green Street between Green and H.C. Phillips.
The first house Tate erected on this lot burned to the ground under suspicious circumstances shortly after completion in 1896. Tate replaced it with this house, whose number bounced from 610 to 612 before settling at 611.
Tate died in 1938. Undertaker Columbus E. Artis and his first wife, nurse Ada D. Artis, bought the house from the Tate family. In 1951, Artis remarried.
Wilson Daily Times, 28 July 1951.
It appears that C.E. and Ruby Barbour Artis began to take in roomers in the 1960s. Artis, photographed here in the driveway, owned the house until his death in 1973, and Ruby Artis remained for several years after.
Per the 12 April 1975 Daily Times, Ruby Artis was issued a permit to “alter boarding house 611 E. Green.”
This ad for apartments in the house ran in the Daily Times in the early 1980s.
Wilson Daily Times, 3 September 1981.
Wilson Daily Times, 14 April 1983.
Wilson Daily Times, 5 July 1983.
Wilson Daily Times, 5 November 1983.
The house was demolished in the early 2000s.
N.87-12-279-280, Hardy Tate House, 611 E. Green Street, East Wilson Historic District, Wilson, Wilson County, Survey and National Register Branch, State Historic Preservation Office.
Lane Street Project: Stearns Temple Cemetery, Statesville, N.C.
There apparently is no end to abused and endangered historic African-American cemeteries, and I gain both wisdom and commiseration when I talk with others working to reclaim them. Yesterday, at the invitation of Shanetta Summers, I spoke with three dedicated fighters from Statesville, North Carolina, who have come together to save Stearns Temple cemetery.
Cemeteries like Stearns Temple, Odd Fellows, and Vick have many commonalities, but the differences — in land ownership, access, condition, age, etc. — pose interesting quandaries. I hope I was able to pass some useful tips and practices on to the Stearns Temple team, and I learned a couple of things from them that will be useful for Odd Fellows.
My maternal grandmother’s people are from Iredell County and, as we were wrapping up the Zoom call, Shanetta mentioned another cemetery she’s been cleaning up. It was established by an A.M.E. Zion church that was destroyed by Hurricane Hugo in 1989. My ears perked up when she said “Zion Hill,” and I rushed to my genealogy blog. Sure enough, Zion Hill was the cemetery in which my grandmother’s step-great-grandmother Rebecca Colvert was buried in 1917. It’s possible her great-grandfather, Walker Colvert, who died in 1905, was buried there, too.
Crummedy puts up her land.
In January 1915, Della Crummedy signed a mortgage deed to secure a $25 debt she owed C.H. Darden & Son (presumably for undertaking services.)
The land Crummedy gave as collateral was a one-quarter acre lot on the eastern side of Stantonsburg Street near the Colored Graded School, adjoining S.H. Vick, James Simms, and others.
The penciled note at the bottom of the page shows that Crummedy paid off the loan on 11 May 1915, and the mortgage was cancelled.
Deed Book 97, page 70, Wilson County Register of Deeds Office, Wilson.
The apprenticeship of Lutory Fields (1896).
On 4 July 1896, Clerk of Superior Court J.D. Bardin apprenticed Loutoria Fields, age 6 years, 3 months, to George W. Fields until she was 18 years old.
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Lutory Fields was George Washington Fields‘ granddaughter. Her mother Jane Fields likely died shortly before this indenture. Here we see an example of apprenticeship as a form of intrafamily adoption.
In the 1880 census of Cross Roads township, Wilson County: farmer Washington Fields, 30; wife Julia, 35; and children Renda, 12, Penninah, 11, Jane, 9, Christany, 8, London, 6, William, 5, and twins Isaac and Jacob, 3.
In the 1900 census of Cross Roads township, Wilson County: farmer Washington Fields, 60; wife Julia, 53; daughters Chrischanie, 25, Amanda, 15, and Lutory, 10; grandson Peter, 10; and granddaughters Julia, 5, and Lillie, 7 months.
On 9 November 1905, John H. Battle, 20, of Cross Roads township, married Lutora Fields, 18, of Cross Roads, in Lucama, Wilson County.
In the 1910 census of Cross Roads township, Wilson County: farmer John H. Battle, 28; wife Loutorie, 24; and son Johnie L., 2.
In the 1920 census of Cross Roads township, Wilson County: farmer John H. Battle, 39; wife Lutoria, 30; and children John L., 16, Lenetta, 7, Bessie L., 5, Mary L., 3, Rosa, 2, Thurman, 1, and Armetta, 1 month.
In the 1930 census of Cross Roads township, Wilson County: farmer John H. Battle, 49; wife Leutoria, 40; and children Johnie L., 21, Nettie, 19, Bessie L., 16, Mary L., 15, Roosevelt, 14, Armettie, 11, Alphnza, 8, Estelle, 7, Augustus, 4, and Harvey L., 2.
Imettie Battle died 18 September 1933 in Goldsboro, Wayne County, N.C. Per her death certificate, she was 12 years 0ld; was born in Wilson County to John Battle and Lutora Fields; was a school girl; and lived in Wilson County. She had suffered a skull fracture after being struck by a car.
In the 1940 census of Cross Roads township, Wilson County: farmer John Battle, 59; wife Lutory, 50; children Estelle, 17, Augustus, 15, Harvey, 13, Luberta, 8, and Alberta, 7; son-in-law Leondus Speight, 26, and granddaughter Katherine Speight, 4.
In the 1950 census of Cross Roads township, Wilson County: farmer John H. Battle, 70; wife Lulorie, 60; and children Agustus, 25, Harvey L., 22, Lubortha, 18, and Aberta, 16.
John Hardy Battle died 9 March 1962 at Mercy Hospital, Wilson. Per his death certificate, he was born 8 July 1878 in Wilson County to Haywood Battle and Eliza Battle; lived near Lucama; worked in farming; was married to Lutory Battle; and was buried in Mary Grove cemetery.
Lutory Battle died 22 April 1964 in Lucama, Wilson County. Per her death certificate, she was born 12 February 1890 in Wilson County to Wilbert [last name unknown] and Janie Field; was married to John Hardy Battle; and was buried in Mary Grove Cemetery.
Apprentice 1896, Miscellaneous Records, Wilson County Records, North Carolina State Archives.