Indianapolis Recorder, 20 April 1940.
Hampton Institute (now University) sponsored the first National Interscholastic Basketball Tournament in 1929. The tournament aimed to “furnish an opportunity for state champions, runners-up, and teams with unusual records to play in a National Tournament, and to decide the National Championship.” Wilson High School (later Charles H. Darden High) of Wilson was among the field of teams at the first tournament.
Pittsburgh Courier, 9 December 1945.
Apparently, librarian Margaret J. Gillespie lived in Wilson only briefly before her marriage to George Cooper of “Little” Washington, N.C.
Pittsburgh Courier, 7 November 1942.
Hampton Institute’s 1942 freshman class included Parthenia Robinson of Wilson, right, a member of the Kampus Kamera Klub.
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In the 1930 census of Wilson, Wilson County: at 202 Vick Street, barber Golden Robinson, 30; wife Bertie, 23; and children Parthenia, 5, Gold M., 3, and Glean, 1.
On 7 June 1951 in Nottoway County, Virginia, Anne Parthenia Robinson, 25, daughter of Goldwyn Robinson and Bertie Parks, born in Wilson, resident of Washington, D.C., married Berkeley Graham Burrell, 31, son of Hayward G. Burrell and Fannie Mae Miles, born in Washington, D.C., and a soldier at Camp Pickett, Virginia.
Wilson Daily Times, 5 November 1938.
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In the 1880 census of Savannah, Chatham County, Georgia: at 518 West Broad, laborer Green Lovett, 28; wife Julia, 30; and children Almus, 5, Mary, 3, and Floyd, 1.
In the 1900 census of Chesapeake District, Elizabeth County, Virginia: at Hampton Normal & Agricultural Institute, Almus A. Lovett, 25, student, born in Georgia.
Third-Year Trade School Students, Catalogue of Hampton Normal & Agricultural Institute, Hampton, Virginia 1902-1903.
Lovette appears in Savannah city directories between 1904 and 1913 at various addresses and working as blacksmith, post office carrier, and driver. [Which begs the question of which years he taught in Greensboro.]
On 6 July 1908, Almus A. Lovett and Letitia H. Jones, both 33, were married in Savannah, Georgia.
Almus Ashton Lovette registered for the World War I draft in Wilson on 12 September 1918. Per his registration card, he resided at 415 Stantonsburg Street; was born 8 April 1876; worked as a horseshoer for G.T. Purvis, 212 Tarboro Street; and his nearest relative was Letitia H. Lovette.
In the 1920 census of Wilson, Wilson County: Almus Lovett, 42, blacksmith in shop, and wife Letitia, 43, seamstress.
In the 1930 Wilson city directory: Lovett Almus A (c) (Letitia H) horseshoer Stallings & Riley h 301 N. Vick.
Almus Ashton Lovett died 5 November 1938 in Wilson. Per his death certificate, he was born 7 April 1877 in Sylvania, Georgia to Green Lovett; resided at 301 North Vick Street; was married to Letitia Lovett; and worked as a blacksmith at a repair ship. Letitia Lovett was informant.
On 2 February 1941, Letitia H. Lovett, 57, daughter of Frank and Sarah Jones, married Edwin D. Fisher, 47, son of Edwin W. and Nannie D. Fisher, at Lovett’s home. Baptist minister Fred M. Davis performed the service in the presence of Milton W. Fisher, Mrs. Almina Fisher, Mrs. Rosa E. McCullers, and Mrs. Eva L. Brown.
Letitia Lovette Fisher died 1 November 1969 in Wilson. Per her death certificate, she was born 10 January 1876 in Georgia to Franklin Jones and an unknown mother; had worked as a teacher and seamstress; resided at 301 North Vick; and was married to Edwin D. Fisher, who served as informant.
Carrie Cooper, 20, school teacher, was living alone in Wilson township, south of the Plank Road, when the 1880 census taker arrived.
Mahala Williamson was born in Old Fields township, Wilson County, to Patrick and Spicey Williamson. On 11 June 1892, she married Henry S. Reid, of Nahunta, Wayne County, son of Washington and Penninah Reid, in Wilson in the presence of Samuel H. Vick, Elijah L. Reid, and M.H. Cotton. (Henry was a brother of veterinarian Elijah Reid and principal/banker/hospital officer J.D. Reid. His first wife, Emma E. Hicks, daughter of Mariah Hicks, was a sister of Owen L.W. Smith.) Mariah apparently died soon after the wedding, as Henry again married in 1896.
Lucy Leary Robinson‘s father — who “fell in the John Brown raid” — was Lewis Sheridan Leary (1835-1859).
From Twenty-Two Years’ Work of the Hampton Normal and Agricultural Institute at Hampton, Virginia (Records of Negro and Indian Graduates and Ex-Students with historical and personal sketches and testimony on important race questions from within and without, to which are added, by courtesy Messrs Putnam’s Sons, N.Y., some of the Songs of the Races gathered in the School (Hampton Normal School Press, 1893).