We are our ancestors’ wildest dreams.
Specifically, Vicey Artis and Solomon Williams‘.
I am descended from their son Adam T. Artis, and Teresa Artis Neal from their son Richard Artis. I followed Teresa from Chapel Hill to Cambridge, and here we are this past weekend at Harvard Law School’s Celebration of Black Alumni.
Photo by Lisa Y. Henderson, September 2025.
On 21 January 2025, Doris Lula Henderson Ward passed peacefully at her home in Wilson. She was 94 years old. Cousin Doris was the last surviving child of Jack Henderson and Pauline Artis Henderson.
In this photograph taken at my uncle Jesse A. Henderson‘s funeral in August 2005, Cousin Doris is fourth from right. With her passing, only the bookends remain. Rest in peace, Cousin Doris.
Cousins Hattie Henderson Ellis, Rederick C. Henderson, James Beasley, Mildred Henderson Hall, Doris Holt Beasley, Doris Henderson Ward, Louise Holt Tisdale, Margaret Holt Brown, Barbara Hall Jones.
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In the 1940 census of Wilson, Wilson County: at 309 Pender Street, Alice Artis, 56; daughter Pauline Henderson, 39, household servant; granddaughters Bessie L., 23, hotel elevator girl, Alice, 20, household servant, Joyce, 18, household servant, Mildred, 16, and Doris, 10; and grandson Robert, 4.
Around 1945, Doris Henderson married Thomas Person Ward, who would go on to become a legendary gospel music disc jockey, promoter, and recording artist, as well as general manager of Wilson’s AM radio station WGTM.
In the 1950 census of Wilson, Wilson County: at 707 East Vance, Thomas Ward, 25, shoeshine boy at barbershop; wife Doris, 21; and children Doris Lee, 5, Merl, 4, and Purline, 1.
Doris H. Ward is survived by her children Doris Lee Ward Wilkins, Mary Lee Ward Miller, Thomas P. Ward Jr., James F. Ward, and Ray A. Ward, and many, many grandchildren and great-grandchildren. Her husband and daughter Pearline Ward Hardy are deceased.
Top photo borrowed from obituary; bottom photo in collection of Lisa Y. Henderson.
My uncles moved North; my father and his sister cast their lots in Wilson. Both had two daughters, born in age-matched pairs. Monica Ellis Barnes was born exactly nine months before I was and was my very first bestie. Here we are, with her little sister, in front of their house on Faison Street. Happy milestone birthday, cousin! May it be filled with laughter and all the love your heart can hold!
A quick chart I drew up.
Among the most rewarding aspects of researching for Black Wide-Awake are discovering, uncovering, and recovering lost family connections, both my own and others’. I was particularly excited to piece together the Taylor family puzzle, which linked three of my childhood friends. Wilson County is small enough that it’s not surprising that many of us share distant common ancestry, but just who those long-lost cousins are can be surprising indeed.