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.
tobacco barn
Dawes suffocates in tobacco barn.
Wilson Daily Times, 6 August 1946.
Here’s another example of the value of newspaper accounts in providing broader context to the clipped conclusions set forth in death certificates. Per the coroner’s conclusion, the certificate said only “found dead, no sign foul play.”
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In the 1900 census of Saratoga township, Wilson County: farmer Ed Dawes, 38; wife Cora, 27; and children Jesse, 14, Lena, 12, Della, 10, Lonny, 2, and Ned, 1 month.
In the 1910 census of Saratoga township, Wilson County: on the Plank Road, farmer Edward Dawes, 52; his second wife Cora F., 33; and children Lena, 18, Mary D., 17, Lonnie, 11, Ned, 8, Isaih, 7, Charlie, 6, Estelle, 3, and Cora F., 9 months.
In the 1920 census of Jackson township, Nash County: farmer Ed Daws, 62; wife Cofranza, 41; and children Lonie, 21, Mary D., 25, Ned, 18, Izel, 17, Charlie, 14, Estella V., 12, Cora, 9, David L., 7, Mathew, 5, Claudy, 3, and [granddaughter?] Dolly May Edwards, 1.
Ned Dawes, 27, son of Ed and Cora F. Dawes, married Martha Goones, 40, daughter of Arthur and Minnie Goones, in Pitt County, N.C., on 21 December 1925.
In the 1940 census of Toisnot township, Wilson County: farm operator Ned Dawes, 41, and Martha, 30.
Ned Dawes registered for the World War II draft in 1942 in Wilson County. Per his death certificate, he was born 28 December 1898 in Wilson County; lived at Route 1, Elm City, care of R.H. Hinton; his contact was R.H. Hinton; and he worked for Earl Gardner, Saratoga, N.C.
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.
Where we worked: tobacco barn.
Over the last couple of decades, the once ubiquitous tobacco barn has largely disappeared from the rural Wilson County landscape. I was surprised to find this one, then, completely enclosed in a grove of trees near a Springhill township cemetery, but otherwise in remarkably good condition.
After tying freshly picked tobacco leaves to wooden sticks with twine, workers hung the sticks from racks inside the barn to be dried, or “cured,” in the heat delivered via flue from an external fire box. The grueling work of barning season ended around this time of year.
I invite anyone knowledgeable to estimate the age of this barn. Thank you!
Photographs by Lisa Y. Henderson, July 2019.