Wilson Daily Times, 25 July 1934.
Samuel H. Vick‘s run of bad luck with barn-burnings continued in 1934.
Vick’s tobacco barn burns.
fire
Fire at the Globe Theatre.
Wilson Chapel burns.
Wilson Chapel Free Will Baptist Church‘s building burned to the ground in an early morning fire in November 1922.
In 1915, the church had bought a wooden structure first used by Jackson Chapel Missionary Baptist and vacated after its merger with First Missionary Baptist and the erection of the large brick building still standing at the corner of Pender and East Nash. This wooden building is apparently the one destroyed by fire in 1922. The church rebuilt, and the new building is shown here. In 1958, Wilson Chapel built the brick building in use today.
Wilson Daily Times, 6 November 1922.
Wilson Daily Times, 7 November 1922.
The 1922 Sanborn fire insurance map shows the close proximity of Wilson Chapel and the cotton seed house of Wilson County Gin Company.
Clippings courtesy of J. Robert Boykin III.
Fire at the cemetery.
Wilson Daily Times, 1 September 1932.
In this odd series of events, the “negro cemetery” appears to be the old Oakdale cemetery, located west of Stantonsburg Street (now Pender) and by 1932 abandoned.
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- Frank Austin — in the 1930 census of Wilson, Wilson County: at 318 South Lodge Street, Alas Austin, 65; son George Austin, 45; and grandchildren Pattie B., 20, Earnest, 19, Rose M., 17, Lorrine, 13, Katie B., 12, Virginia, 11, and Leroy Barnes, 10, and Frank Austin, 23. [The Barnes children were surely the children of India Alston Barnes, who was shot to death by their father Tip Barnes in 1921.]
Store damaged by fire.
Wilson Daily Times, 30 March 1924.
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- Ed Johnson — Edward Johnson died 15 April 1924 (two weeks after his store burned.) Per his death certificate, he was born 12 February 1869 in Durham County, N.C., to Martin Johnson and Francies Burks of Durham County; was married to Rachel Jane Johnson; was a self-employed grocery merchant; and lived at 406 East Hines Street. His wife Rachel Johnson was the daughter of his landlord Lewis Townsend.
- Louis Townsend — Lewis W. Townsend and his brother Andrew J. Townsend operated groceries together and separately in the warehouse district southwest of downtown Wilson.
Clipping courtesy of J. Robert Boykin III.
A small fire at Townsend’s store.
Wilson Daily Times, 24 November 1925.
The 1922 Sanborn fire insurance maps of Wilson show the location of Andrew Townsend‘s store near Trinity A.M.E. Zion Church on Banks Street.
Hannibal Lodge building burns.
Wilson Daily Times, 29 October 1997.
For more about the Odd Fellows Hannibal Lodge building, see here and here. Shortly after it erected this building, Lodge #1552 established the Odd Fellows cemetery that now lies abandoned and overgrown on Lane Street.
Iredell County Chronicles, no. 5.
Margaret Colvert Allen, seated far right, third row, circa 1915.
Greensboro Daily News, 10 March 1916.
Margaret C. Allen, second from right, second row from top. Her sister Launie Mae Colvert Jones, at left, first row of middle section, circa 1916. Both photos, I believe depict students of Statesville’s Colored Free School. The second photo may show the school itself shortly before it burned or may depict one of the other buildings in which the school met before a replacement was built in 1921.
Photos in the collection of Lisa Y. Henderson.
Three tobacco barns in three weeks.
Wilson Daily Times, 30 July 1929.
Samuel H. Vick had his finger in many pots, including tobacco farming. In a three-week span in July 1929, under circumstances that certainly strike a modern reader as suspicious, he lost to fire three barns filled with his tobacco.
Child burned to death.
Wilson Times, 11 April 1919.
The small child was Maude Reid, age 14 months. Her mother was Ida Hagans Reid. Her father Elijah Reid was not the veterinarian Elijah L. Reid.
