The Life and Times of
F. M. Wilkinson

And

Memories By George !

The Good Ole Days!

Much of the information recorded here was experienced by Francis M. Wilkinson and/or his family as they were growing up. Almost every thing that was done on the farm up through the first quarter of the twentieth century has become obsolete. Much of it has been forgotten. After writing “Memories of Francis Marion Wilkinson,” I continued to recall items of interest that related to him or effected his every day living. These things were common place to him but would be unusual to our modern generations, so I decided to write some of these recollections down also. Some of these recollections were told by old relatives, some were from printed sources, but many items were experienced by me when I was young. George K. Wilkinson           PAGE BY PAGE INDEX A. The Life and Times of F. M. Wilkinson B. The Good ? Old Days C. Illustration – Whats up Doc? D. Photo – Author 01. Index – Page by Page 02. index-continued 03. index-continued 04. Recollections of Francis Marion Wilkinson 05. Recollections 06. They called him General Blount 07a. Old Painting – Castle Island 07b. Photo – Castle Island today 08. Old Painting – Confeds shell town 09. This was necessary 10. She remembered times when general 11. One thousand barrels of tar and 12. Document – Official military pass 13. Boy grows up fast. 14. Illustration – boy with ox cart 15. Fuel – our modern day cook 16. Dad used to tell of his experience in 17. Illustration – harvesting turpentine 18. Illustration – tar kiln 19. Pine tar was valuable for med 20. Photo – young Frank Wilkinson 21. Dad worked for his father until 22. Illustration – cooper’s tools 23. Illustration – cobbler’s tools 24. Illustration – Harness maker’s tools 25. Illustration – shave horse and plane 26. copy – draw knives 27. copy – draw knives 28. copy – wedges and mauls 29. copy – froes 30. When Dad left home, the south 31. Illustration – Diver 32. Doctor – Dad became too sick- 33. Yadkin River 34. Shake, rattle and roll 35. Brooms – our modern homes have – 36. Illustration – brooms 37. Mending clothes – clothing was – 38. Illustration – mending stockings 39. Wash day on the farm 40. Illustration – washing clothes 41. Home made soa; 42. making Lye – Lye was origonnally – 43. Illustration – lye barrel 44. Persimmon Beer 45. Illustration – Home made dippers 46. Make molasses 47. Cooking molasses 48. Food for winter 49. Gardens – most people had – 50. Variety was just becoming ripe 51. Education – scurvey 52. Became a farmer 53. Document – 5 pages 94. Copies of typewritten deeds 55. " 56. " 57. " 58. On the 31st day of Dec. 1890 59. Photo – First wedding 60. Photo – Ida E. Pippin Wilkinson 61. Ida E. Pippin – Back in the – 62. Mortgage – On Dec 26, 1893 63. Document – two pages, copy of 64. Original mortgage 65. Ben Field 66. Shooting Marbles 67. Something new at the circus 68. 1903 – Residents in Beaufort County 69. Copy – Picture of Post Office staff 70. They were thick “heavy” blankets 71. Illustration – mail carrier’s transportation 72. Copy Picture – Main Street, 1907 73. During this time, Dad and the Burcerons 74. Illustration – Old wall telephone 75. The old record player on the phone 76. Illustration – old record players 77. Copy – Old record player advertisements 78. Wedding on the 20th Day Nov. 1912 79. Photo – 2nd wedding 80. Photo – Mary Sarah Koonce Wilkinson 81. Sept 3, 1913 – The Weather Bureau 82. Copy pictures – Flood waters in Washington 83. Copy picture – Rail Road Bridge washed away 84. The flood waters came up in to the street 85. Copy – Picture Main Street 1915 86. Photo – Baby George 87. Dad bought his first auto about 1919 88. Photo – Chilson and Model “T” Ford 89. In later years, he used commercial fertz. 90. Home made tools, back in the days – 91. The old time farmer 92. Continued, old time farmer 93. –of crops-is to be planted 94. Illustration – cotton plows, etc. 95. Illustration – cultivator plows, etc. 96. Illustration – home made plow 97. Illustration – tobacco barn 98. It so happened that Dad had a neighbor 99. There is no plant life in the water 100. When Dad was in the Mail Service 101. All the other brothers and sister 102. Illustration - old gas pump 103. Photo – cranking Model “T” Ford 104. Dipped in the tank to see how high 105. Some would open an oyster and say – 106. Buster Keaton was a perfectionist 107. Illustration – big hat 108. Public entertainment – opera house 109. Street carnivals 110. While testing his equipment, the diver 111. The show boat was pulled 112. George and Hazel Wilkinson attended 113. Copy picture – show boat 114. Illustration – show boat 115. Copy – picture – interior – show boat 116. Copy – picture – show boat stars 117. Cecil Blount De Mille 118. Theaters – the first play house 119. Main Street, the ground floor 120. Back of the same building that 121. Copy picture – The Glory Days 122. Copy picture – Corner of the old stage 123. Copy picture – Old fancy work 124. Keeping warm – did you ever have 125. Illustration - Dad’s fireplace – den 126. Illustration – Dad’s heater and den 127. Copy picture – Dad’s flag 128. Decorations –Dads bed room – den 129. Until about the year 1922 130. When you went to bed on a cold night 131. Space heaters – about 1922 132. Out door bath room 133. The old ‘traditional’ cartoon 134. Copy picture – 1927 bridge cave-in 135. Hot bread – before heading for home 136. Crow, the super 137. Live stock – Dad had a horse 138. The factory next door 139. He was almost buying his own 140. To stop that, an eight foot 141. Illustration – barge unloads 142. Big factory fire 143. Illustration – big factory fire 144. Tar paper high into the air. 145. Was afraid the weight of the snow 146. Illustration – birds eye view of factory 147. Photo – Dad sits in chair on lawn 148. Photo – Chilson and 56 pound melon 149. Document – U.S. bureau of Pensions 150. News paper clipping – Dad retires 151. About 1924 Dad traded Ford 152. When I reached the ground floor 153. Windows, and it was a 2 door model 154. Mama ran a back yard store 155. There were 4 storage rooms 156. Homeless – we hear a lot about 157. Was to keep insects from coming 158. Photo – sweet potato harvest 159. Dad had some home made horse 160. Photos – grape vines 161. Good straight grained durable 162. Illustration - Dad’s barn 163. As soon as I was old enough 164. Picking through his food 165. The Literary Digest Magazine 166. Photo - Mom and Pop with Star Auto 167. Document – Clifton electric bill 168. Illustration – radios 169. Reunion – on Dad’s 70th birthday 170. by 1929, Dad had been losing 171. Then Dad started leasing land 172. Christmas 173. Transportation 174. The Pamlico River to New York 175. Copy picture – Washington Water front 176. Copy picture – Ocracoke boat 177. Potatoes – in Dad’s time; the 178. There was a long conveyor belt 179. Growth of mechanized transportation 180. With so many rail road locomotives 181. Saw a monsterous contraption 182. Antique cars – Cadillac 183. Antique cars – Columbia Electric 184. Antique cars - Ducenburg 185. Antique cars – Pierce Arrow 186. Antique cars – Franklin Air Cooled 187. Antique cars – 1906 Ford Six 188. Antique cars – Toledo 189. Antique cars – Lexington 190. Antique cars – Apperson 191. Possum- turtle 192. Lye hominy 193. Serve hominy with butter 194. Stiff dough that can be formed 195. Home remedies 196. Sulphur and molasses 197. A country hog killing 198. Get a few short logs 199. If the water is too hot 200. The hogs are later taken down 201. After ridding them, a sharp 202. Illustration – hogs on gallows 203. Illustration – grinding, cutting 204. Lard and cracklings 205. Illustration – cooking cracklings 206. Neighbors – it takes more workers 207. Chiterlings – this narrator was 208. Start at burning, she also 209. Smoke house – back in the horse 210. Illustration – Dad’s last smoke house 211. Circus Day 212. Given an inch, take a mile 213. There were others who didn’t 214. No smoking, - Dad used to smoke 215. Photo – Dad checks out Joe’s car 216. Alcohol – while Dad was in the 217. and he was an ordained minister 218. Overlap – grace 219. The Lord will bless you 220. Why lie about your age 221. Neighbors to the east 222. Charlie Willis attempted to buy 223. Mellons to the Myers farm 224. Mama or Dad would check the beans 225. Cartoon – Jolleys 226. Cartoon – Little Jolley girl 227. Photo – Mom – Dad – Baby Betty 228. Sticks – green tobacco was 229. Him with owing it, he was also 230. Photo – Pop holding Baby Robert 231. Good impressions, it was some time 232. Photo – young Hazel Waters 233. Dad was always a hard worker 234. Dad plowed his garden till 235. Sleeping habit – as I remember 236. Illustration – Dad shaving 237. Town of Bath – a lot of history 238. It was one of the bloodiest pirate 239. While Francis M. Wilkinson was 240. Ride ‘em, cowboy 241. Illustration – for dear life 242. Photo – bookkeeper George 243. English – I remember reading 244. Kitchens old – in the good old 245. Many old time families 246. Metal sink, and ran the water 247. The cat slept under the stove 248. Illustration – Great Grandma’s kitchen 249. Illustration – F. M. Wilkinson’s kitchen 250. Illustration – F. M. Wilkinson’s pantry 251. Out of the mouth of babes 252. Large families – in the 1800’s 253. Dad’s family – although Dad 254. The family Photographs are 255. PHOTOS: Francis Marion Wilkinson 256. Frank M. and Mary K. Wilkinson 257. Group – Chilson, Alma, Guy, Mary K. and Joe 258. 2 groups of F.M.W. children and wives 259. 2 family groups 260. Walter Marion Wilkinson 261. Walter 262. Violet Kathrine Wilkinson 263. Evelyn G. Wilkinson 264. Walter, Evelyn, Robert 265. Bruce A. Wilkinson 266. Bessie Ricks Wilkinson 267. Bruce and family 268. Guy V. Wilkerson 269. Genevieve Gordon Wilkinson 270. Clara Gaither Wilkinson and Guy Wilkinson 271. George and Jacqueline Lowman, Guy and Clara 272. Gwendolyn Caroline Wilkinson 273. Gwen on Steps 274. Gwen and Jake, Gwen and John 275. Joseph G. Wilkinson 276. Helen Powell Wilkinson 277. Joseph C. Wilkinson – U. S. Navy 278. Joe and Helen 279. Francis Chilson Wilkinson 280. Alma Manning Wilkinson 281. Frank C. and Frank M. family group 282. Frank – Alma and children 283. George Wilkinson 284. Hazel Waters Wilkinson 285. Hazel, George, Mary K. Wilkinson 286. View across Wilkinson farm 287. South view, Wilkinson house and yard 288. South view, F. M. Wilkinson’s house 289. Frank Wilkinson’s river front in winter 290. {blank} 291. Wilkinson Family Records 292. Pippin Family Records 293. 5 pages Pippin Family “tree” 294. “ 295. “ 296. {blank} 297. Obituaries 298. Obituaries 299. {blank} 300. The following copies, old hand written deeds 301. “ 302. “ 303. 3 pages 1824 – John McWilliams deed 304. “ 305. “ 306. “ 307. 4 pages – 1977 Francis C. Douty deed 308. “ 309. “ 310. “ 311. “ 312. 5 pages – 1878 – John Doughty and wife to John B. Ross 313. “ 314. “ 315. 3 pages –1899- John McDoughty & Henry Dougy to John B. Ross 316. Following - 2 sheets- John Ross to F.A.W. 317. July 1884 – John B. Ross to F.M. Wilkinson 318. Dec 1884 – John b. Ross to F.M. Wilkinson 319. X 320. X 321. 16 pages – Civil War in Washington, N.C. 322. X 323. X 324. X 325. X 326. X 327. X 328. X 329. X 330. X 331. X 332. X 333. X 334. X 335. X 336. Civil War 337. Community Information Transcribed as written by: Cheryl R. Whitley PAGE 4 RECOLLECTIONS Of FRANCIS MARION WILKINSON This booklet contains bits and pieces of events and recollections in the life of Frank M. Wilkinson as remembered by the narrator. These items are being recorded so that his decendants may get to know him better. The following pages were copied from notes scribbled on rough paper and sorted and assembled, and a few copies were run off on copying machines to distribute to his few close descendants.. George K. Wilkinson           Page 5 This was the end of an era that began 86 ½ years previously on July 30, 1956, when a little boy was born. The two men were carying shovels. They wanted a square Frame nailed together out of wood strips to form a rectangle about a yard wide and a little more than two yards long. I don’t remember the exact dimensions. It was a cold day – March 4, 1943. There was a light snow falling, making a thin white cover on the ground. After I made the frame, the men had me to point out the exact spot where they were supposed to dig a grave in the old family grave yard. The frame was a guide to dig by. I pointed out a space Dad has previously selected between Caroline Lewis Wilkinson, his mother, and Ida Pippin Wilkinson, his first wife. Francis Marion Wilkinson had died during the early part of the night of March 2, 1943, and he was to be buried on the afternoon of the 4th. My wife, Hazel, had walked over to Dad’s house, and about an hour later, she came out, shouting for me to hurry over. She said Dad had had an attack and was dying. When I arrived, Mom was holding him in her arms. That was the end of a long and interesting life. Now – Let’s go back to the beginning. Page 6 They called him General Blount. He was a well-to-do plantation owner in the south of Beaufort County, North Carolina. Since the General was a so-called “gentleman farmer”, he trusted the actual operation of the plantation to a person that our present generation would call an “agricultural engineer”, or supervisor. This supervisor was a man named William Henry Wilkinson. Mr. Wilkinson remained with General Blount until the War Between the States made farming in the traditional way impossible. The laborers on Blount’s plantation were not like the migratory Mexicans, etc. that are often employed now. They were slaves brought from Africa and bought as you would buy horses and cattle. William Henry Wilkinson was married to the former Caroline W. Lewis. This marriage produced 5 children, - three girls and two boys. On July 30, 1856, Caroline presented Henry with their first boy baby. They already had three girls, - Emily, Martha and Josephene, but this baby, named Francis Marion Wilkinson, was their first boy. Boys were important in those days, as a family’s helper. Girls were useful for housekeeping, cooking, spinning, weaving, making clothes, washing and tending the children, but they needed male members in the family to do the work. As soon as a child was old enough to do any kind of work, he or she had duties assigned. One of these duties was pulling lint from cotton seeds so that the cotton could be carded and prepared for spinning. Cards were 2 paddles about 4 x 6 inches with one side covered with wire bristles. A ball of cotton was placed between and the brushes were rubbed across one another until the cotton formed a soft fluffy oblong ball. The spinning wheel could pull long threads of fibers from it and spin or twist it into a strong thread, which could be woven into cloth. Page 7a CIVIL WAR – Washington, N.C. – April 16, 1863 The Union forces occupied Washington 3 years and the two opposing armies fired shells across the river attempting to drive the other out. Castle Island ‘in center of picture’. There was a mill there to convert oyster shells to lime. Years later, a “business Woman” moved to the island and established an entertainment house for sailors and other male clients. Page 7b Photo Castle Island – 1990 a jungle with a few goats. Page 8 Old Painting – Confeds shell town Page 9 This was necessary to hand-pick the cotton lint from the seeds because after the Civil Was, most all mills and cotton gins had been destroyed. Dad would tell us that when he was a child, every night, each family member was required to pick the lint off of enough cotton to fill his shoe with cotton seeds, before going to bed. Our modern kids watch television till bed time. Back in those days before our waterways were polluted and over-fished, our rivers and sounds abounded in both finned fish and shell fish. The streets of our costal towns were paved with oyster shells, just as modern day dirt roads are sometimes covered with crusted stone. There is an island in the Pamlico River, just opposite down town Washington, N.C. , that is called Castle Island. There was once a mill on the island that processed oyster shells into lime. People said that buildings on the islands looked like a castle. That’s how the island got its name. People found other uses for oyster shells besides making line and paving streets. One was to use them for small dippers or scoops. On every farm, there were milk cows. The surpulus milk became sour and turned to clabber, which was good to eat when sweetene. Someone at General Blount’s cook house had a long wooden trough built and it was filled with clabber and sweetened with molasses. The little Negro children were called in and each was given an oyster shell to eat with. They would gather around and eat clabber, and Dad, who was a small boy at the time, said it looked so good, it made him want to eat clabber. Incidently, old fashioned sour milk clabber is good with sugar. Dad’s sister, Martha would recall things that happened in the period before the Civil War. Page 10 She remembered times when General Blount and his wife would go for rides in their carriage. Sometimes, they would take Dad’s sisters along, with the girls sitting in the foot of the carriage. General Blount was very cordial and would tip his hat and speak to people they passed on the road. Mrs. Blount would remark, “My Dear, why do you speak to those poor Tackeys”? In 1861, when little Frank was 5 years old, the Civil Was started. That was the beginning of the end for life as it was known at that time. Beaufort County became a battle ground. Washington, N.C. was occupied by the Union Army for three years, and battles were fought in the streets sometimes. Five forts were built around the town, and the town was sometimes bombarded by cannon fire from across the river, and also from land. General Blount was once warned of yankee soldiers on the march toward his plantation. He had just finished building a new barn, and it wa filled with bales of cotton. He knew the Yankees would destroy the cotton, so he had all the cotton hauled out into the barn yard and set on fire. When the Yanks arrived, their commanding officer remarked, “I see some of our men have already been through here”. That saved Blounts’ new barn. They went on and didn’t disturb anything. Lets go back a while, before the Union soldiers arrived in Washington. The confederates made preparations before evacuating in 1861. They destroyed all cotton and naval stores that would be an aid to the enemy. At Taft’s Store on the Tar River, they dumped Page 11 one thousand barrels of tar and turpentine into the river. Later in the summer, two flat boats carrying four hundred yankee soldiers from the prison in Salisbury to be exchanged, tied up at Taft’s Store. That night it was very hot and the soldiers asked to be allowed to bathe. Permission for a bath was given, and guards were stationed on each side of the river with torches. As the soldiers waded in, they stirred up the tar and turpentine from the river bed and they got all smeared wit it. It was a busy four hundred who used their ration of meat and a stick to scrape off for dear life saying “we heard of the Tar River, but we never believed there was such a place; but we found the whole bed of the river is pure tar”. The town of Washington, N.C. was occupied by the Union Army from 1861 to 1864. At the beginning of the war, the town had a population of 3,000. After the war, the men who returned home from the fighting found only 600 inhabitants – women, children and old men. Much of the town was destroyed by fire. It had been bombarded by cannon fire by the departing Yankees. Before departing, they had taken the hoses out of the fire station and cut them up in little pieces a foot long. They set fires and left. From April 27 to April 30, 1864 the town had been thoroughly sacked and pillaged by evacuating federal troops. Private homes and stores, as well as public supplies were looted and pillaged. An official report states that troops “did not even respect the charitable institutions, but bursting open the doors of the Masonic and Odd Fellows Lodges, pillaged them both and hawked about the streets the regalia and jewels”. Page 12 OFFICIAL MILITARY PASS The town of Washington, N.C. was occupied and fortified by the Union Army for about three years during the Civil War. The above pass was issued to William Henry Wilkinson so that he and his family could enter and leave Washington through army check points when going to and from town. William Henry Wilkinson was Francis Marion Wilkinson’s father. Page 13 BOY GROWS UP FAST As time passed, it became dangerous for any able bodied man to be seen by union soldiers because he might be arrested as a spy; or conscripted into the Union Army, so William Henry Wilkinson could no longer go to town. Somebody had to go to town occasionally for supplies. That was when little eight year old Frank had to turn from boy to man. He had to drive an ox cart through a dirt road with thick woods on both sides and always the chance of meeting a bear. Dad told me that sometimes the ox would bolt and try to run away. There was a rope tied to a ring in his nose. He said he would have to jump off the cart and run as fast as he could until he came to a tree that he could wrap the rope around and pull the ox back. Dad recalled years later that he was very scared to make those trips, with bears in the woods, the ox unpredictable, and the Yankee soldiers might do most anything. A child can be more frightened than an adult in such circumstances. Page 14 Boy With Ox Cart Page 15 FUEL Our modern day cook has only to turn a knob to start heat in the kitchen stove. Just flick a thermostat to adjust the heat in the house. During the years when Dad was growing up, he had to go to the woods, cut down threes, cut and split the logs, load the wood on a cart and haul it to the wood pile at the house. There it was stacked to dry. Most rooms, both down stairs and up stairs had fireplaces. The food was also cooked in a fireplace. Houses were drafty and not insulated and a lot of the heat from the fire went up the chimney. Since Dad was the oldest boy in the family, it was his daily task to keep all the wood-boxes filled. Dry wood had to be cut and split to fire place size and length and carried in, one arm load at a time. That included the up-stairs wood-boxes too. They burned fuel like it grew on trees ! AUNTIE Young Frank had an aunt that lived with the family. She occupied an up-stairs room with a fireplace. Occasionally, some of the wood would be smutty on a side due to forest fires. Now, Auntie was very particular about not getting her hands soiled. If she found a piece of smutty wood, she would throw it out the window. Now our boy thought that if he could carry it all the way upstairs, she could at least throw it in the fire place. He never forgot it. Page 16 Dad used to tell of his expierence working in the woods gathering turpentine, when he became old enough. I remember some of the tools he had that he once had used to harvest turpentine. There was a “spoon” that he used for dipping pine sap out of “boxes” secured to the side of a long leaf pine. The “spoon” was about eight inches wide and about ten inches long, egg shaped, flat, with a sleeve at the butt end to fasten the handle. He had a bark scraper to remove bark. A set of herring bone-like grooves were scored into side of the tree to bleed the sap and send it flowing down the center of the score marks into the box. The sap was spooned out of the boxes into wooden buckets and taken to barrels and poured in. Dad also had some “coopers” tools that he used to make barrels. Old lightwood knots and stumps were scattered through the forest. When this lightwood is burned, concentrated turpentine in the old wood becomes hot and runs out, in the form of pine tar. Young Frank would gather lightwood through the year, and in the winter, he would burn what he called a “tarkil” for Christmas money. His “tarkil” consisted of a circle in the ground abut 12 or 15 feet in diameter, draining to the center, with a drainage trench from the center to a hole in the ground large enough to handle a barrel, located a safe distance away. Lightwood was piled in the circle till it was piled high. When the time came, it was set afire. The tar freed from the burning lightwood would flow down the chute and into the barrel. Page 17 Illustration – Harvesting Turpentine Page 18 Tar Kiln Page 19 Pine tar was valuable for medicinal purposes and for treating rope, wood and numerous other uses back in those times. People could not freeze food in those days, and home makers didn’t know much about canning, so the only methods of keeping food over a period of time was by salting and smoking. Dad used to recall having lunch in the turpentine woods. Sometimes, it consisted of corn bread and salt fish. Sometimes, they wouldn’t get enough salt soaked out of the fish before cooking it and it would be so salty that, as he said, “I would take a big bite of corn bread and a little bite of fish”. Sometimes, when he got thirsty, and didn’t have water with him, he would cut a straw and drink stale rain water out of a boxed pine. Dad loved candy. He never got enough of it when he was growing up. Once, when he was due to get some money, he left his work in the woods and walked four miles to a store for a nickel’s worth of candy. He promised to bring the money for the candy as soon as he got paid. The store deeper told him to first bring the money and he could get the candy. No credit. Well, our boy had to walk 4 miles back, empty handed, and work just as hard as he could to make up for all that lost time. When Dad became a man, friends learned of his love for candy, and in his older years, they sometimes gave him a box of fancy chocolates for Christmas. He would put the box of candy away and eat one piece about once a week, making it last as long as possible. Page 20 Picture: Francis Marion Wilkinson July 30,1856-March 2, 1943 Son of William Henry and Caroline Lewis Wilkinson Page 21 Dad worked for his father until he was 24 years old. Before his father gave him permission to leave home and seek his fortune on his own. Dad felt that he had been cheated of three years. When his sons reached maturity he was determined to see that it didn’t happen to them. When they became 21, he made his little speech. He wasn’t trying to “push them out of the next”, but he wanted to let them know they were their own free men. Dad used to recall a treat that he enjoyed on an occasional trip to Washington. There was an old colored woman that cooked molasses ginger bread and sold it on the street. She sold a square of ginger bread for three cents that was about 2 ½ inches thick and 4 inches square. He said it was almost too good to eat. It was enough to make him a whole meal. In Dad’s early years, they made and repaired their own shoes. I rember his set of shoe lasts. That was a set of various sizes of steel forms to hold a shoe up side down while nails or wood shoe pegs were driven in the soles. He had bee’s waxed linen thread for sewing leather, various punches, awls, sewing awls, a few wood shoe pegs for use as nails and a riveting device for making harness for horses. An education was not available to Dad during and right after the Civil War, so he had to teach himself to read with the help of a “Blue Back Spelling Book”. I don’t know what was in the book, but by his description, it sounded like it was more complicated than anything the kids have today. Page 22 Page 23 Illustration – cobbler’s tools Page 24 Page 25 Illustration - through 1930 Old Time Brace does not lock the bit in. Frank M. Wilkinson's shaving horse. The iron clamp holds work down while drawing knife. Shaves bits from work. Long Wood Plane These antique tools were used by F. M. Wilkinson Page 26 Image – Draw Knives Page 27 Photo Page 28 Image – Wedges and Mauls Page 29 Image – Froes Page 30 When dad left home, the south was still in the process of recovering from the aftermath of the Civil War and good jobs were scarce, and Dad had no schooling. Dad would tell us about a job he had at a saw mill. He was paid a whopping $8.00 per month. His task was to keep the saw dust moved away from the saw, as fast as it accumulated around the blade. He moved it out in a wheel barrow. It would build up so fast that he had to run with the wheel barrow to the pile to dump it and run back or it would pile up ahead of him. As time moved on, our young man worked at various jobs including a job as under water diver. The government was clearing water ways of stumps and snags that were hazardous to shipping. One of his duties was to go down and set dynamite charges and blow stumps out of the river bed or loosen them and break them up so they could be removed. The captain of the boat became sick and lost his appetite. He decided he wanted some rice, so Dad volunteered to cook him some. Dad was not an expert cook but he knew rice had to be boiled, so he filled a pot with rice, added water and put it on the stove. Soon, the rice began to swell and overflow. Dad had to stay by the pot, dipping out the swelling rice and throwing it overboard, to keep from flooding the galley with rice. From that expierence he learned to put a little rice and a lot of water. Page 31 Illustration – Diver Page 32 DOCTOR Dad once became too sick to work so he went to see a doctor for a cure. The doctor examined him and prescribed a bottle of medicine with instructions to take a dose each day for a week and he would be well enough to go back to work. That didn’t satisfy Dad because he wanted to go back to work the next day. If it took seven applications of the medicine to cure him, why string it out for a week? He took it all at one time so he could get well at once. He found it didn’t work that way. He became really sick that time. He also got a serious lecture from his doctor. Page 33 YADKIN RIVER There is a river in North Carolina named the Yakin River. It begins near Blowing Rock, N.C. and it meanders eastward and on through a system of lakes and then emerges as the Pee Dee River. The Pee Dee flows south east through North Carolina and finally reaches the Atlantic Ocean at George Town, South Carolina. Dad was once called upon to do something he had not done before. Far up the Yadkin River were unassembled parts of a steam boat. They wanted the boat brought down the river. They sent him to put the steam boat together and launch it and steam it down the river. He went and he assembled the craft. Frank Wilkinson was the first person to ever pilot a power boat down the Yadkin River. He was amused at the people along the river. They would hide behind trees and point at the smoke belching monster floating past them on the way down stream. Because of his experience with river boats and his experience with the clearing of local waterways, Dad was contacted by the Corp of Engineers to take over a project to clear the Yadkin River and make it safe and efficent for river traffic. This would have been a good job for Dad but he felt that he was not really qualified. He realized that this would require a person with the knowledge of surveying and engineering skills that he did not have, and he had no intentions of trying to fake it. Therefore, he declined. Page 34 SHAKE, RATTLE AND ROLL When Dad was about 30 years of age, there was a disturbance that had every one in the house frightened. Dad immediately guessed what was happening. Someone said there were people outside trying to turn the house over, and he ran out to stop them. Dad told them what it actually was. This was August 31, 1886. Charleston, South Carolina was almost flattened by an earthquake. Few buildings were left undamaged. 110 people lost their lives. The quake cracked walls in Chicago 750 miles away; it was felt over an area of 1.5 million square miles, from Massachusetts to Wisconsin to Bermuda. It was about 7 on the Richter scale. Earthquakes are not as frequent in the eastern part of the United States as they are in the west, but the ones that do occur cover a much larger area. page 35 BROOMS Our modern homes have floors covered with carpet or the floors may be varnished hard wood or vinyl. The housewife cleans her floors with a vaccum cleaner, dust mop and stick broom. Her great grandmother swept her floors with a “straw broom” and got down on her knees and scrubbed them with water and lye soap. The wood was bleached almost white. She made her straw broom herself. She cut a bundle of “broom straw” and wrapped twine around about two feet of the butt ends and used the bushy ends to sweep with. The broom straw was found on ditch banks and the un-plowed edges of fields. It looks like a form of grass, about 3 or 4 feet tall with a stiff stem running most of the way up the plant. Grass like blades run out the sides of the stem and the top is bushy with fluffy seed pieces that float away in the wind. YARD BROOMS She swept the fallen leaves from the yard with a brush broom which was a bundle of small straight branches with bushy ends cut from small selected hardwood trees or branches. They were cut about five feet long and the butt ends were tied into a bundle with wire or strong cord. Fan rakes had not been invented. Page 36 Illustration – Brooms Brooms to sweep floors made from broom sedge grass Yard broom made from bundle of twigs Page 37 Page 38 MENDING CLOTHING Clothing was made from hand spun threads made with a spinning wheel and woven by hand on a loom. This cloth was dyed and cut and fashioned with a needle and thread. Worn and ripped clothing was mended, darned or patched and re-patched as long as possible. Frank Wilkinson recalled the skill of a relative who could darn a hole in a dress so skillfully that when she finished, you could not find the place she had mended. Knitting played an important part in the wardrobe. Sweaters and head pieces and especially stockings and sox were made at home. If a sock had a hole in it, it went into the mending bag. When the housewife of daughter had a spare moment to sit down, she might get out the old mending bag and start patching and darning. To darn a sock, she slipped a “darning Gourd” in the sock and pressed the hole tight against the gourd. She then proceded to weave threads across the hole and vertically with needle and thread until she made a new piece of woven cloth where the hole had been. Ironing was done with a hollow iron that was filled with live burning coals. When iron cook stoves became available, cast iron irons were heated on the stove and tested for “hotness” by licking a finger and quickly hiting the iron with it. If the moisture on the finger sizzled just right, the iron was hot enough Page 38 illustration No stocking or sock was ever thrown away just because it had a hole in it. A darning gourd was slipped in the stocking and a new piece of cloth was woven across the hole by using a needle and thread. Page 39 WASH DAY ON THE FARM Our old time housewife did her laundry the hard way. First, she went out in the back yard and started a fire around a large iron kettle called a “wash pot”. The pot was filled about two thirds full of water and left to come to a boil. In the mean time, white clothes were soaked in one wooden tub and colored clothes were soaked in another. They were then boiled with lye soap and taken up and put in a tub of cold water. The lady put a “wash board” in the side of the tub and rubbed soap on the dirtiest spots and rubbed the fabric up and down the wash board until the soil disappeared. A wash board was a frame about 14 inches wide and 2 feet long. The lower 4 inches was two legs that rested in the bottom of the tub. The next 14 inches was either corrugated metal or a similar pattern of wood. This was the rough surface the fabric was scrubbed on. Above the corrugated section was a thick cross bar that a block of soak could be rested on. If a child was available, he was kept busy carrying buckets of water from the well or pump to the “wash bench” and pot. After washing, the clothes were rinsed in a tub of clean water and put on the solar dryer (clothes line). My mamma was stooping down, starting a fire around a wash pot once, and as she was picking up bits of kindleing, one stick started moving in her hand. She looked. She was holding a black snake. She screamed and jumped over the pot! Page 40 WASH DAY Dirty clothes were scrubbed on the corrugated surface of the wash board The only time Grandma’s “bikinis” were seen Dirty clothes were boiled in water and lye soap to loosen the dirt Clothes were soaked, boiled, scrubbed and rinsed and hung out to dry Page 41 HOME MADE SOAP Our ancestors had to make things they used because some of those necessities were not available or because it was more economical to make them themselves. Soap was one of those items. Nothing useable was thrown away. They saved dirty grease at hog killing time. They saved left over kitchen grease that could not be used for cooking. All this fat was saved to make into soap. Two containers were put over the fire. One was filled with grease. The other was filled with an alkaline solution called lye. When hot, they were removed from the fire and the grease was poured in the lye solution and thoroughly stirred with a wooden paddle. The soap maker usually knew from experience about how much of each to use for the best soap. Too much lye burned the user’s skin and damaged the laundry. The original home made lye usually produced a soft soap. Store bought chrystal lye produced a hard soap that could be cut into blocks. Care had to be taken to pour the grease into the lye – not the lye into the hot grease. Mama made that mistake once and her mixture boiled over and flowed across the floor and almost chased her out of the kitchen Page 42 MAKING LYE Lye was originally a strong alkaline solution obtained by leaching wood ashes. Its main use was for cleaning and making soap. To make lye, our ancestors use a simple arrangement. They made a small slanted platform large enough to hold a barrel. The slanted platform drained into a tub or some sort of catch vessel. A barrel with several drain holes in its bottom was placed on the stand. A layer of clean fine straw lined the bottom of the barrel. The straw served as a filter. A supply of wood ashes was dumped in over the straw. Water was poured on the ashes. The water soaked through the ashes absorbing the alkali and filtered through the straw, out the holes in the barrel and into the catch vessel as a brown liquid. Page 43 Old time soap makers used a rig similar to this to make an alkali substance to react with waste grease or animal fat to make soap. They also had other uses for the lye, such as some cleaning job, and sometimes a little lye was poured in hog’s slops to make it taste sweet to the hogs. A somewhat similar rig was used to make persimmon beer. A faucet was fitted in the bung hole of a keg and green pine needles were used for filter instead of straw. Page 44 PERSIMMON BEER An arrangement similar to the lye barrel was used to make a drink called Persimmon Beer. A keg or barrel with a faucet in the bung hole was used. A layer of green pine needles was placed in the bottom of the keg as a filter. Add some wild myrtle twigs for flavor. Add a few baked sweet potatoes and some baked corn bread. Pour in lots of wild persimmons. Pour in water until persimmons are well covered. Let stand ten days or more. Get the gourd dipper and draw some and taste. Not bad – really. Page 45 Need a good water dipper? Select a gourd of the right size and shape. Carefully saw off one side, clean out the seeds and dried spongy pulp and soak the gourd in plenty of fresh water a couple of days to take out the bitter taste. Now you have a dipper. Don’t crack that coconut shell. Saw the end off and dig the coconut meat out without damaging the shell. Bore a hole in each side of the shell and make a wood handle and pass it all the way through and secure it. Now you have a coconut dipper. Hang it on a post by the well or pump so that you and your passers-by will have something to drink from. Rinse off the tobacco juice left by previous users before drinking. Page 46 MAKE MOLASSES If our ancestors wanted something sweet to eat or drink, they usually had to grow their own. To do that, they planted a crop of sugar cane or sorghum. When growing, it looks like a cross between a corn patch and a bamboo thicket. At harvest, the leaves are stripped from the stalks and the stalks are cut and hauled up to where a cane mill is set up. Someone in the area usually had a cane mill and it could be set up when and where needed. The main part of the mill consisted of a press which was a pair of vertical rollers. There were turned by a mule. A long pole was fastened overhead and geared to the rollers. The mule pulled the end of the pole around and around in a circle activating the rollers. An operator stood at the press feeding stalks in as space was available. There could be at least six or eight stalks in the rollers at a time as they passed through. The rollers exerted great pressure squeezing the juice out. The juice flowed down in a catch vessel. Along with the juice press came the cooking vat. Page 47 COOKING MOLASSES A cooking vat was set up to cook the juice down, much the same way as maple syrup is cooked. The vat consisted of a vessel with a copper bottom and was possibly six or eight feet long and four feet wide. There sides were possibly a foot high. A fire pit or trench was dug in the ground or it could temporarily set up on bricks. Fuel was fed to the fire at one end and a smoke stack was placed in the other end of the fire pit. The watery juice was boiled and constantly stirred with a wooden paddle to prevent it from scortching. When it was cooked down to a fraction of its original bulk, it became thick brown mouth watering delicious molasses. Page 48 FOOD FOR WINTER People of bygone days planned ahead to keep food on the table. Hanging in the smoke house were smoked hams, shoulders, bacon and sausage. There was salt port and salt fish. They stored sweet potatoes in mounds called sweet potato banks which was a large pile of potatoes covered with a foot thick layer of pine straw, over which was a protective layer of 4 to 6 inches of soil. Over this bank was a rough rain shelter made of scrap lumber. They planted a spring crop of Irish potatoes and a fall crop which furnished potatoes through the winter. Bundles of onions and strings of red peppers hung in the pantry. Dried and preserved fruits lined the pantry shelves and they canned some fruits and tomatoes in glass jars. They were not always successful in canning meats and vegetables because they were still learning how to time the periods to boil and destroy the bacteria that spoils some types of foods. They dried surplus beans and peas in summer for winter use. Until winter became too severe, they had collards and a few other vegetables in the garden. The took corn and wheat to the grist mill to have it ground into meal and flour. The miller kept 1/5 of the grain for grinding. Page 49 GARDENS Most people had a few herbs in their garden. One herb in most gardens was the sage bush. Some grew mint and other herbs. They could get bay leaves from the woods to season meats and freshly made lard. Every one grew hot red pepper. Some of it was strung, with the aid of a needle and strong thread, into long strings and tied into a circle and dried. Some hot pepper was put in bottles and filled with vinegar to make hot “pepper vinegar”. I remember How Frank M. Wilkinson planned his garden so he would have a steady supply of vegetables most of the year. He visited ditch banks and hedge rows in the summer and dug wild asparagus roots which he transplanted in his garden. Asparagus was his first fresh vegetable in the spring. When it came time to stop cutting asparagus, it was time to pick early dwarf garden peas. When they stopped producing, he had a larger late variety of peas ready to start harvesting. From that he had a variety of greens and other vegetables ready. He had a wide variety of vegetables for the table all spring, summer and fall. He had a system for planting sweet corn. In the early spring he planted a variety of small early sweet corn and at the same time he planted a standard variety. When the early variety was used up, the standard. page 50 missing page 51 missing page 52 BECAME A FARMER Frank Wilkinson grew up on a farm and he knew that he could make a successful carrer of it so he began looking for available farm land. One plot he considered was located adjoining Washington’s east side, which is now part of the town. Another plot he considered is now part of the town of Washington Park. Certain events possibly led him to buy the land that became his permanent farm and home. On July first, 1884 John B. Ross and his wife, Emily, who was Frank’s sister, mortgaged 27 acres of land to Frank M. Wilkinson for $500.00. Of the 27 acres, John B. Ross and wife owned a total of 83 acres, more or less. The 83 acres was more land than either of the other two plots he had considered. For reasons I don’t know of, the Rosses sold the 83 acres to Frank M. Wilkinson. On December 30th, 1884, a deed was drawn up and John B. and Emily W. Ross sold the farm to F. M. Wilkinson for $1800.00. A typed copy of that deed follows on the next pages. Copies of old original deeds to this land appears in the back of this book starting back in 1824 and following through to copies for the origonal deeds to John B. Ross. Page 53 STATE OF NORTH CAROLINA BEAUFORT COUNTY THIS DEED, made this 30th day of December, 1884 By John B. Ross and Emily W. Ross, his wife, of Beaufort County and state of North Carolina of the first part to Frank H. Wilkinson of Beaufort County and state of North Carolina of The second part. WITNESSETH: That said John B. Ross and wife for and in Consideration of the sum of eighteen hundred dollars ($1800.00) To them paid by Frank M. Wilkens, the receipt of which is Hereby acknowledged, have bargained and sold and by these Presents does bargain sell and convey to said Frank M. Wilkens And his heirs of the right, title, interest and estate of the Party of the first part in and to a tract of land in Long Acre Township, Beaufort County, state of North Carolina, adjoining The lands of Howard Wiswall and others described as follows, viz: Being the share or lot of land decreed by F. M. McWilliams in The division of the estate of his father, John McWilliams, as Will appear by reference to said sale for partition in the court Of pleas and quarterly sessions of Beaufort County and containing Twenty-seven (27) acres, more or less, it being the land Conveyed to the said John. D. Doughty by Thomas B. Bowen by deed Dated September 25, 1877, and recorded in the register’s Office of Beaufort County in book 43, pages 246 and 247, also One other tract or partial, situated in the state and county Aforesaid on the north side of the Pamlico River containing Twenty-seven (27) acres, it being the lot or partial drawn by Frances C. McWilliams, wife of the said John D. Doughty, in the Partition among the heirs at law of John McWilliams to which Partition references is made for a more particular description Page 54 Also the life estate of the said John D. Doughty in twenty-seven (27) acres of land more or less, adjoining the two pieces hereinbefore conveyed, it being the piece of land drawn by Sarah McWilliams at the partition among the heirs at law of John McWilliams deceased, also see deed from the heirs of John McWilliams to John B. Ross registered in the register’s office Of Beaufort County in book 43 pages 469 and 470, making in all eighty-three (83) acres. TO HAVE AND TO HOLD, the aforesaid tract or Partial of land and all privileges and appurtenances there to Belonging to the said Frank H. Wilkinson and his heirs and assigns To only use and behoof forever. And the said John B. Ross and wife covenant that They are seized of said premises in fee, and have right to Convey the same in fee simple; that the same are free and clear From all encumbrances and that they will warrant and defend Said title to the same against the claims of all persons whatso- Ever. In testimony whereof, the said John, B. Ross and Wife have hereunto set their hands and seals, the day and year Above written. John B. Ross (seal) Emily W. Ross (seal) State of North Carolina Beaufort County I, G. Wilkens, clerk of the superior court, do Hereby certify that John B. Ross and Emily W. Ross, his wife, Appeared before me this day and acknowledged the due execution Of the annexed deed of conveyance, and the said Emily W. Ross Being by me privately examined, separate and apart from Page 55 Fear or compulsion of her said husband or of any other person, And that she doth still voluntarily assent thereto. Let the same with this certificate be registered. Witness my hand this 1st day of January, 1885 G. Wilkins Clerk Superior Court Received for registration Jan 1, 1885. At 4:00 p.m. and registered January 8, 1885 B. Stilley Register Registered in book 58, page 26, Beaufort County Records. Page 56 THIS INDENTURE made and entered into this 15th day of January , 1878 by and between John D. Doughty and wife, Frances C. Doughty parties of the first part and John B. Ross party of the second part all of the county of Beaufort and state of North Carolina. WITNESSETH: That the said parties of the first part for and in consideration of the sum of $700.00 to them paid by the said party of the second part the receipt whereof is hereby admitted have given, granted, bargained, and sold, and by these presents to give, grant, bargain, sell, and convey to the said party of the second part and his heirs the following described tracts or lots of land situated in the county and state aforesaid on the north side of the Pamlico River adjoining the land of Howard Wiswall and others, being the share or lot of land drawn by F. M. McWilliams in the division of the estate of his father John McWilliams, as will appear by reference to said suit for partition in the court of pleas and quarter sessions of Beaufort County and containing twenty-seven (27) acres more it less, it being the land conveyed to the said John, D. Doughty by Thomas B. Bowen by deed dated September 25, 1877 and recorded in the registar’s office of Beaufort County in book 43, pages 246 and 247; also one other tract or partial of land situated in the state and County aforesaid on the north side of the Pamlico River containing twenty-seven 927) acres, it being the land or tract drawn by Frances C. McWilliams, wife of the said John D. Doughty in the partition among the heirs at law of John McWilliams to which partition reference is made for a more particular description, also the life estate of the said John D. Doughty in twenty-seven (27) acres of land more or less adjoining the two tracts hereinbefore conveyed, it being the tract of land drawn by Sarah McWilliams at the _____ ? _____ ? _____. Page 57 TO HAVE AND TO HOLD with all the privileges thereto belonging to the said party of the second part his heirs and assigns first two tracts, and as to the third tract, second part for the life of the said John D. Doughty and the said parties of the first part do hereby warrant and defend the lands and tenements aforesaid, to the said party of the second part his heirs and assigns against the lawful claims of any and all persons. In testimony whereof the said parties of the first part have hereunto set their hands and seals the day and year aforesaid. John D. Doughty (seal) Frances D. Doughty (seal) Witness: John G. Blount STATE OF NORTH CAROLINA IN THE PROBATE COURT BEAUFORT COUNTY JANUARY 15, 1878 Personally appeared before me John G. Blount, Probate Judge for said county, John D. Doughty and Frances C. Doughty his wife, and acknowledged the due execution by them of the foregoing deed, and therefore, the said Frances C. Doughty being by me privately examined separate and apart from her said husband, touching her free consent in her execution of the said deed, and she doth on such her examination declare that she has executed the same freely of her own will and accord, and without any force, fear, or undue influence of her said husband or any other person, and did still voluntarily assent thereto. THEREFORE, let the said deed and this certificate be registered. John C. Blount Probate Judge page 58 On the 31st day of December, 1890 Francis Marion Wilkinson and Ida E. Pippin were joined in marriage. He was 34 years of age & She was 22 years of age. This union produced the following children: February 11, 1892 --Walter Marion-- lived 71 years May 11, 1893 --Bruce Arnold-- lived 93 years December 12, 1894 --Ida L.-- lived 19 months May 16, 1896 --Guy Vernon-- lived 88 years July 2, 1898 --Gwendolyn Caroline-- lived 83 years September 11, 1900 --William G.-- lived 7 months January 4, 1902 --Joseph Garland-- lived 94 years June 6, 1904 --Francis Chilson-- lived 74 years page 59 Photo Frank Wilkinson and first wife, Ida Pippin Wilkinson 12-31-1890 page 60 Photo Ida E. Pippin Wilkinson page 61 IDA E. PIPPIN WILKINSON Back in the “Good Old Days” before motion pictures, television and radio, people had to furnish their own entertainment. They had barn dances and picnics, and the ladies had quilting parties. The men played baseball and had shooting matches. Baseball? Yes, even George Washington played baseball. In the homes, they played games, such as checkers and card games. They sang songs together. If a musical instrument was available, they sang along with music. Miss Ida E. Pippin and her sister, Lucy were musicians. Lucy played the violon, Ida the piano and organ. Ida was a talented musician. She played the church organ. She also taught music lessons. Ida was well known in her area for her skill at nursing the sick. She was called by both white and black folks when anyone was sick. Neighbors always sent for her to deliver babies. Ida E. Wilkinson had many friends among both white and black, and if she needed help, her friends were always willing and anxious to help “Miss Ida”. page 62 MORTGAGE On December 26th, 1893 F. M. Wilkinson and wife, Ida E. signed a mortgage on the farm for the sum of $400.00 payable on the first day of January, 1898 at eight percent interest. F. M. Wilkinson was indebeted to George H. Brown, Jr. by a note of that date. In case of failure to pay, the whole bond would be considered due and payable and the holder of the bond could sell the land at public sale at the court house door to the highest bidder. signed by: F. M. Wilkinson Ida E. Wilkinson This bond was paid and canceled Jan. 22, 1913. Dad said he paid the interest when due, but he would save up a sum of money to pay on the principal and Judge Brown would refuse to take it. He would tell Dad, “Frank, when you can pay me the whole amount of the loan at one time, I will take it. I am not going to take it piece-meal”. On several occasions, he almost had the amount saved up, but had to use some to pay doctors bills and other emergencies. During that twenty years, he was paying interest on the entire amount. Judge Brown was smart. He knew how to make money. At his widow’s death, his money was left to the town of Washington to build a library to be named – The George H. and Laura E. Brown Library. page 63 photo copy mortgage On Dec. 26, 1893 F. M. Wilkinson and wife obtained a loan of $400.00 from Geo. H. Brown at 8% interest. Loan was secured by a mortgage on 83 acres of farm property. The loan was paid off 20 years later, Jan. 22, 1913. page 64 mortgage page 65 BEN FIELD Farmers sometime give names to areas of their farms so family members will know which part of the farm he is referring to. Dad had a section of bottom land that was referred to as the “rice patch”, although it had been years since he cultivated rice. There was a clearing near the edge of the woods that was the “Ben Field”. Before the Civil War, there was an outlaw black man named Ben Soon. Been soon lived in the woods in a range stretching from Washington, N.C. to New Bern, N.C. He made his living by raiding farms in his territory for supplies. any white man that got in his way, he shot. Ben Soon set up camps in various spots. Dad’s Ben Field had once been one of Ben Soon’s camps. It was dangerous for a white man to go in the woods because if Ben Soon saw him, he might shoot him Dad’s father, William Henry Wilkinson and another white man were in the woods, walking a log when a gun was fired and William Henrys companion fell dead from Ben Soon’s ambush. When the civil war started, Washington and New Bern were occupied by the union army. Ben Soon went to the union army headquarters in New Bern and boasted about how many white southern men he had killed. Ben was taken into custody, tried for murder by a military court and hanged. page 66 SHOOTING MARBLES Before television and TV games were invented, kids entertained themselves with such things as games. One popular game consisted of a circle drawn on the ground and knocking marbles out of the ring with a glass or hollow steel “shooter” marble. The shooter was wedged in the crook of the index finger and thumped or shot out with the thumb. The shooter served in a similar manner as a cue ball does when playing billiards If you are able to red a very old deed in the back of this book, you will notice John McWilliams bought 200 acres of land in 1824 which was surveyed, using cedar stumps, pine trees, etc as survey markers instead of iron rods, as is used at present. One of the line markers between Dad’s farm and Mrs. Lucy Myers’ farm was an old pine tree about ten years from the river shore. On an occasion, many years ago, some men chased a black beau up that pine tree. They had nothing in their guns but small shot and that only stung the bear and made him angry. Dad solved the problem. He rammed a glass marble down the barrel of an old muzzle loaded gun and fired away, and got his bear. That was Dad’s way to shoot marbles. page 67 SOMETHING NEW AT THE CIRCUS Dad always grew a crop of sweet potatoes for home consumption and he would occasionally sell a bushel if someone asked to buy them. His main sweet potato crop as a variety called Porto Rico Yams. He also panted a few Hayman potatoes. Most people prefer the Porto Rico’s which cook to a rich deep orange color under the skins. The Haymon potatoes cook to a pale creamy yellow under the skin. Dad used to tell of a time when he took Walter and Bruce to the circus when they were small children. He bought each of them a banana. Bruce peeled his and took a bite and said to Walter, “Buddy this is the best Hayman tater I ever did eat”. After they went in to the main tent the show started. An elephant was brought in to the ring. Walter exclaimed excitedly, “Look Papa, younder is a horse with a tail at each end”! page 68 1903 Residents in Beaufort County had no rural mail delivery in 1903, and dad was contacted and asked if he would organize a rural mail route out of Washington. He took a sample mail box from house to house, explaining what rural mail delivery would be like. some objected, for fear their taxes would increase to pay for the service. He had to explain the 2 cent stamp paid the cost of delivery. some would see him coming with his sample mail box and think it was a doctor’s medicine kit and before he could speak – “Doctor, they ain’t nobody sick at our house, but Mrs. Alligood down the road a piece is laid up with something and needs some doctoring”. He eventually got his route established and it grew to be too long for one carrier, so it was divided in two and Will Burgeron was assigned the second route. Dad carried the mail nineteen years and he used a horse and buggy to deliver in all but the last three years. He bought a model “T” ford and used it the last three years. Dad would get out of bed at 4:00 o’clock every morning, get breakfast and report for work at the post office at 6:00 o’clock. “Neither rain nor snow nor the gloom of night” stopped this man from his rounds. When there was a freezing wind and snow, he tried to keep warm in his open buggy by keeping a lighted lantern between his knees and his lap covered with a heavy “buggy blanket”. There were such things as buggy blankets at that time. page 69 Tideland Scrapbook – Remember these Postal Men? page 70 They {buggy blankets} were thick heavy blankets made of course fiber, and they made good insulation for lap and legs. His was printed with large red roses on a black background. This blanket was finally stolen out of the open model “T” ford, one night along with a lantern while left unattended in a circus parking lot. Dad’s fingers would get so cold in the winter that it would become difficult to separate mail or pick up letters. One incident he recalled was the time a snuff dipping lady bought a stamp and licked all the glue off the stamp so it wouldn’t stick. She held the snuff smeared stamp up to him and said, “will you lick this stamp for me? I can’t get it to stick”. On December 31, 1906 Dad’s wife, Ida Pippin Wilkinson died in childbirth, leaving children, including Joe who was less than five years old, and Chilson who was about 2 ½ years old. Their grandmother, Caroline Lewis Wilkinson died September 14, 1911, leaving Joe and Chilson still quite young without a woman in the house. Gwendolyn was only 13 years old. Of the 19 years that Dad delivered the mail, He only lost one day from work. that was the day his wife, Ida, was buried. He was absent from work a few others times from sickness, such as mumps and the influenza, but he used his vacation leave to cover it. Through the years that he delivered the mail, they never gave the Postal Employees Christmas Day off. Page 71 Illustration Francis M. Wilkinson delivered the U.S. mail for 19 years, 16 of these years, he delivered by horse and buggy through heat of summer, and through chill of winter. The last three years, he delivered by use of a Model “T” Ford. GOOD OLD DAYS Page 72 Photo Main street looking east towards Market Street in Washington, N.C. in 1907 Unpaved street minus street lights. Horse drawn vehicles only. Page 73 During this time, dad and the Burgerons shared a party telephone line. They jointly owned the wire and poles from Washington Park to the houses, and had to pay for line repairs. Dad’s phone consisted of a wood base and box on the wall with a hand cranked ringer-generator, and a black ear piece on a cord, and a mouth piece on an adjustable arm that could be lifted up or down for a short or tall person. The phone was as useful then as it would be today. Sometimes, dad had to call the house when he was off on the road. It was useful to call the doctor, who then made house calls. The Burgeron Farm was about a quarter mile down river from dad’s place. They had a variety of fruit trees, large scuppernong grape arbor, figs, etc. along with regular farming operations. The boys had motorcycles. Mr. Ben Burgeron, the daddy, called “Pa”, owned one of several saloons in Washington. Mr. Ben Burgeron never bought commercial fertilizer for his farm. He mixed his own. He also distilled his own whiskey for his saloon, until prohibition closed all legal whiskey sales. Mr. Burgeron had a government licensed whiskey distillery. Dad met a young lady who worked at J. K. Hoyt’s Department Store as stenographer and bookkeeper. This was Miss Mary Koonce. She and dad became interested in one another and they occasionally “courted” over the telephone. Since the phone was a party line, the Burgerons could listen in on their court-ship. Sometimes, they would play…………. Page 74 Illustration - This is the type telephone dad had on the wall in the hall. Page 75 The record player in the phone. That obviously made private conversations impossible. The background music would also be disruptive. The record player was one of those old Edison Victrolas with a large amplifier horn shaped like a morning glory blossom. The records were cylinder in shape, 2 1/8 inches in diameter and 4 inches long, and with grooves cut around the outside of the cylinder. About 35 years later I had an occasion to do some remodeling in the Burgeron house and along with various antiques I noticed was 2 victrolas in the parlor with morning glory horns. The house was built on a foundation of 12” X 12” square hand hewn sills, mortised and fastened with wood pegs. The studs (posts) were hand hewn or hand sawn 4 X 4 and 4 X 6. The screws in the door hinges were made by a black smith. The brass door locks were as large as cigar boxes. We dug lead bullets out of the doors and door faceing that had lodged there during a shoot out in the civil war. The walls were plastered with a mix of oyster shell lime, sand and hog’s hair spread over hand split wood laths. All nails used were square iron nails. All Frame work was mortissed and pegged. If you are not familuar with those old time record players, I have provided the following illustrations. Page 76 Illustration - Examples of old time “talking machines” Victor Talking Machine Company Other styles Victor and Victrola $ 12 to $450. September 1919 Edison also produced a disc record – 9 ½ inches across and ¼ inch thick. The above machine also came with “morning Glory” type horn. This old cylinder type Edison record is 2 1?8 inches in diameter and 4 inches long. Cylinder walls ¼ inch thick. _Title _ “ Bonnie Blue Flag Polka” and Old South Quartet. Page 77 Illustration - The Brunswick Ad All phonographs in one The Tone Amplifier Music Lovers Choose the Brunswick Dad bought a Victrola simular to the above. Page 78 (missing) Page 79 Frank Wilkinson & 2nd Wife Mary Sarah Koonce Wilkinson Nov. 20, 1912. Page 80 Mary Sarah Koonce Page 81 SEPTEMBER 3, 1913 The weather bureau now gives names to this type of weather disturbance. In 1913, it was just a bad storm. Eastern North Carolina was swept by a severe hurricane. The eye of the storm passed over Washington, N.C.. When dad left for work before daylight that morning, mama said it looked like the wind might blow his buggy over. He reported for work, but the carriers were not sent out in the storm that day. In the meantime at home, the tide began to rise. Dad had lumber stored under the house for the purpose of making a second story on the house. The lumber floated away. Chickens were seen riding across the field on a floating door. The family loaded up in a horse drawn cart and left the house. They were given shelter in a house on a hill about half mile from home. Water came up to the floor and caked up the flour in the bottom of the flour barrel.That afternoon, dad and Will Burgeron could not get home by land because the bridges were washed away, so they took a row boat. Dad said Will was scared to death because the water was so rough. The waves were so high they could’nt see over the top when the boat was in a trough between two waves. If the boat had turned sideway to the waves, it would probably have been swamped. If that had happened, they wouldnt have had a chance. They were luck and made it home safe. Page 82 Photos September 3, 1913 Hurricane Top – Dr. Baynor’s home, corner of Bonner and Water Streets completely surrounded by flood waters which swept low lying parts of Washington. Bottom left photo displays the Beaufort County bridge and keeper’s house listing into the Pamlico River. Parts of the bridge was washed away and traffic was disrupted until repairs were made. Bottom right photo depicts the east side of Market Street between Main and Water Streets as flood waters inundated the down town area. Page 83 Photo - Turbulent Pamlico left Norfolk Southern rail trestle a mass of debris. Page 84 The flood water came up into the streets in parts of Washington and they were going down the streets in boats. Bridges were out. Even the rail road bridge was destroyed. Many business houses had heavy losses. The day after the storm, dad delivered the mail as well as he could under the circumstances. Roads were blocked with trees and bridges were washed out. He had to detour through the woods to get around downed trees and stop and make temporary repairs to bridges sufficiently enough to get his horse and buggy across. He had to do so much wadeing through water fixing bridges that he had removed his pants and only covered his lap with the buggy blanket. A lady came out and bought a 2 cent stamp with a nickel. He stood up to get change out of his pocket. After he stood up, he realized he wasn’t wearing pants. Back in those “Good Old Days” of the horse and buggy, Washington Park had less than a dozen houses. It was not called Town of Washington Park. There were many open fields. Someone landed a “flying machine” in one of the open fields and was chargeing $15.00 to see it. It must have been near the road because they were stopping traffic coming off the bridge into Washington Park, to collect the $15.00 fee. They refused to led dad pass without paying. He was quick to tell them they were interfering with the United States Mail and he could quickly get legal action. They took down the bar and let him through. Page 85 Photo - place here 10:14 PM 10/8/2003 Main Street in 1915 This is how Main Street looked in 1915 as viewed from the corner of Market Street. The picture was taken from “Pen and Picture Sketches” on Greater Washington. The brochure from which the picture was taken was provided the Daily News by J. Phil Roberson. Page 86 Baby George Wilkinson Dad’s last surviving child was b. Feb 10, 1915 to Frank & Mary Wilkinson. Page 87 Dad bought his first automobile about 1919. That was the model “T” Ford I mentioned previously. That model did not have a self starter. You had to start it yourself with a hand crank. Dad had rheumatism in his right arm and had difficulty cranking it so Joe or Chilson (Frank, Jr) went with him to drive on his mail route. Sometimes, especially in cold weather, the Ford was hard to start in the morning. One thing that helped was to jack up one rear wheel so the drive shaft and gears could turn freely in stiff grease. If they couldn’t start it in time, Dad would take the buggy to town, sort his mail and by that time, they usually had it running and would meet him where our lane met River Road ( now NC 32). There, he would trade buggy for car and proceed on his way. When dad delivered mail with a horse, it was necessary to keep 3 horses all the time. He kept a horse and a spare for the road, and a farm horse. The spare could also pull a plow. With so many horses to feed, he had to plant about half the farm in corn and hay for horse feed. In dad’s early years of farming, corn was planted in 4 foot squares. They plowed furrows 4 feet apart, length way the field and 4 feet apart across the field, marking in off in squares. A hole was dug at each cross point and a few shovel fulls of manure or wood mold was put in as organic fertilizer. Wood mold was well rotted leaves from the ground in the woods. This stuff was covered and one hill of corn planted in that square. Page 88 Young teenaged Chilson Wilkinson stands beside the new Ford. Page 89 In later years, he used comercial fertilizer. When the corn stalk matured and just before the leaves (or blades) on the stalk were ready to start turning yellow, the blades were stripped from the stalk, tied in bundles and hung on a broken stalk to dry in the sun. When dry, three or four of these bundles were tied into a larger bundle and hauled to the barn and stored for “fodder”. This fodder was used the same as hay for feed. Stripping fodder was hot, itchy, tireing work that blistered and tore skin from fingers and hands. It was just the way of life on the old time farm. Dad bought the first horse drawn cotton planter in the neighborhood. It had 2 large wooden disc wheels, one on either side of a green hopper box. The wheels turned an eight inch metal drum in the bottom of the hopper. The drum had teeth that would grap the seeds and drop them in the row. The machine opened the row to receive the seed and then closed it over the seed. A neighbor borrowed the cotton planter. When dad finally located it, it was in the other side of Beaufort County. It had been borrowed from one to another ‘till no one even knew who it belonged to. Dad raised scuppernog grapes, watermellons and cantelopes to sell to local merchants. He saved his seeds from the best of the crop each year so that he constantly improved his varieties of cantelopes and watermellons. Page 90 HOME MADE TOOLS Back in the days before every household tool and utensil was made commercially, people had to rely on home made products to work with. If they broke a tool handle, they made another one. They made their own baskets, wood buckets, wood tubs and barrels, or had some one in the neighborhood to do it for them. Most of their plows were home made. The black smith made plow points, horse shoes, axes, froes, and most anything of metal that was needed. The old time black smith was far more skilled at metal work than modern metal workers. He could bend, twist or shape a piece of hot metal to make almost any simple shape. He could weld two pieces of metal by heating them and hammering them together. He could cut a bar of steel by heating it and cutting it with a cold chisel as easily as cutting a stick of butter. Modern metal workers cut with acetylene torches or electric saws and weld with electric arc welders. They shape their material with lathes and milling machines. The country black smith had no need for such equipment. Page 91 (with illustrations) about 1900 - 1930 The old time farmer prepared his land for planting by starting in the fall and winter pileing and burning the residue so it could be plowed. Ditch banks and hedge rows were shrubbed of previous year’s growth. This shrubbing was done with a heavy hook ended ax called a bush ax. It required many hours of finger blistering work through the winter to do this work. After the ditch banks and fields were cleared of the previous year’s growth, plowing could begin. The “turn plow” would cut about eight inches deep and lift and turn a furrow of soil about eight or ten inches wide. A man and horse could break about one acre of land in five continous hours of work. Then the surface would have to leveled by dragging over the plowed surface with large grate-like drag called a spike tooth harrow. A modern tractor can break up about forty acres in the same 5 hour period and drag it at the same time. The tractor can clear ditch banks with a mowing attachment and cut field stalks in……….. Page 92 & 93 After the ground is broken, it must be prepared for planting. When the weather warms in the spring and the danger of frost is past, spring planting begins. Most crops on old time farms were planted in rows 3 ½ feet apart and 4 feet apart. Corn rows were 4 feet, with stalks thinned to 20” to 24 inches apart. This method was used in the period around 1925. First, rows opened, usually with a turn plow. Two poles, sharpened to a point at one end, are set up in the field, one at the center of first row and one at far end of field on first row. Start plowing out a furrow at front of field, in line with the 2 distant poles, sighting down the two poles as you would use sights on a gun barrel. As you arrive at each pole, take it up and re-set it over the width of 2 rows. On your rturn trip across the field, plow between first furrows, making single width rows. The horse soon learns to head straight for the pole and stop. After the rows are opened, fertilizer is applied, at a specified tunnage per acre. A turn plow passes on each side of the row, banking a ridge of dirt over the fertilizer. Another pass with a drag flattens part of the ridge. Then a mechanical planter passes if that type of crop is to be planted. If the planter is not designed for the seed to be planted, then several other operations take place. A seed groove is opened in the row. The seeds are dropped by hand and either covered with the foot or a special wooden drag covers them. Modern tractor open 4 rows at a time, apply fertilizer, plant the seeds and cover them all in one fast operation. The old time farmer had to chop weeds and grass out of his crop land every 10 days to 2 weeks and plow or the unwanted growth would crowd out his crops. Boll weevils would spoil his cotton. Tobacco worms would have to be picked off of each leaf by hand, in the hot August sunshine. The modern farmer uses herbicides to rid his crops of grasses and weeds. Pesticides takes care of worms and bugs. It used to take the farmer’s family and several tennant families to run one fair sized farm. A modern mechanized farmer needs several fair sized farms to have a reasonable income. Ride through the country and you will see many old abandoned tennant houses along the way. Page 94 illustrations The cotton plow which had parts of various sizes that could be used separately or in combination to preform various plowing operations. The turn plow. The steel mould board was invented for this plow and it revolutionized farming for the American farmer in colonial days. George Washington and Thomas Jefferson expiermented with the steel mould board. The spike tooth harrow – useful for smootheing over plowed fields. These “store bought” plows were to be found on every small farm. Some larger farms had two horse turn plows and cultivators and harrows. Page 95 illustrations through 1930 PLOWS – STORE BOUGHT The cultivator was used to keep weeds and grass under control in the rows of growing crops. There was an assortment of plow points for various jobs. Frank Wilkinson bought a cotton planter like this. He loaned it to a neighbor. He located it some time later on the other side of the county. It had been loaned from neighbor to neighbor until no one knew who owned it. The Fertilizer distributor. Page 96 illustrations possibly dates back as far as 1870 to 1930 A home made plow to be used to make a groove in the top of the row to drop seeds in. This home made drag was used to scrape the tops of rows off flat to prepare for planting. This home made drag was also used to scrape the tops off of the rows. The above are some of the home made plows on the farm of Francis Marion Wilkinson. Page 97 illustrations Looping leaf tobacco on sticks to hang in the tobacco barn. It will be dried in the barn with heat from a wood burning furnace, 24 hours a day, 5 days. July 1923 Page 98 It so happened that dad had a neighbor that wanted to raise melons as good and sweet as dad’s, so he asked him one day, “Frank, how come your watermellons are so sweet?”. Dad jokingly told him that he put a cup full of sugar under each hill of melons when he planted them. The next summer, the man came to dad , very angry. “Frank, I went to town and hauled a whole barrel of sugar to my place and planted my melon patch with a whole cup full of sugar under each hill and they are no sweeter than before”. Dad was surprised that he didn’t catch the joke the first time. He was sure he would’nt fall for it again, so he just told him he should put two cup fulls instead of one. The next summer – you guessed it. Two barrels of sugar. Same kind of mellons. P.T. Barnum said “There’s a sucker born every minute”. To suppliment his living off farming, dad fished and salted them down for future use. On one occasion, his nets were so full of fish that they overloaded his boat and it swamped with water over the side before he reached shore. That’s more fish than a present day fisherman would catch in a month out of our much poluted river. I have seen a drastic drop in marine life in our river in the last 60 years. There used to be water lillies, several kinds of sea weeds, an abundance of crabs, flounder and plenty of other fish to catch with hook or net. Page 99 There is no plant life in the water, very few fish, and crabs are almost non-existant a couple of miles down stream from Washington. I once heard dad say he sold a barrel of salted shad for three cents each. The same fish would now cost about $5.00 each from the fish store. Incidentally, he never got paid for his barrel of 3 cent shad. After dad’s father, William Henry Wilkinson died, his mother, Caroline Lewis Wilkinson came to live with him. The old home place was somewhere near an area in Beaufort County called Wilmar. Dad paid taxes on the place for a number of years but none of the other heirs took an interest in it or helped pay taxes so he finally stopped. Then, his sister Emily’s son, Jesse B. Ross, paid the taxes after dad stopped. When Jesse died, the place was finally sold, presumable for taxes. All the heirs, cousins by the dozens, and others including myself signed a release to make the sale final. If there had been any profit realized, we would have received a share. I never heard any more from it. Dad’s mother was near-sighted. She also hated to see cats sitting on the dining room table. She came in one day and yelled “Get off the table, you darned cat!” and she slapped the old black tea pot off the table and across the floor. We guess she should have had eye glasses. Page 100 When dad was in the mail service, he had to file a monthly report with the postal department. These reports required some arithmetic to figure answers to some standard questions. Since dad had a total of three weeks education, it was’nt easy. I once picked up a piece of scratch paper that had some of his mathematical calculations on it. He did his multiplying by adding. For example, nine times 275 would be a column of 275 written down nine times and added. He made it work for him. He was never taught to read, but he read the Washington Daily News from cover to cover every night. He also read his bible, the Progressive Farmer Magazine, The Literary Digest Magazine, The Southern Planter Magazine and a publication called the R.F.D. News. He occasionally studied his world atlas. He could say the abc’s backward faster than I can say them forward. Dad’s second wife, Mary was delivered of her second child by caesarean section on May 23, 1917. It was a girl with black hair. Unfortunately, she only lived a few hours. Hospitals were not equipped to give the kind of post natal care that babies get now. They either lived or they did’nt. Many years later, Gwendolyn recalled her expierence in the event to me. She had deep regrets about their inability to save the baby. Gwendolyn was the only girl in the family and she had always wished for a sister. She said it was a beautiful baby. I also wished they could have saved her. I would have enjoyed having a little sister near my age. See Page 101 after images for 102 & 103 below: Page 102 illustration Frank M. Wilkinson bought gasoline for his model “T” Ford from a country general store for 18 cents per gallon. The pump delivered one gallon each time the cylinder was cranked all the way up. I might not have my picture accurate because it has been 70 years since I saw the pump. Page 103 Pop’s new model “T” Ford automobile Francis Chilson Wilkinson – cranking It had kerocine parking lights and tail light. The head lights ran on magneto. The faster the engine turned, the brighter the lights. It had a spark coil for each cylinder (4). You cranked it on 6 volt dry cell battery and then switched over to magneto. The gas tank was under the front seat. Lift the cushion and there it was. No filter on the carborator. Page 101 & 104 All the other brothers and sister had grown up and left home by the time I was ten years of age. That left me to be the only young one at home. I needed some one to help me plow and chop wood and shrub ditch banks. __Just Kidding __. But Seriously, I would have enjoyed having another child in the home. I have made previous mention of dad’s Ford. It had special features not found on modern cars. It had kenosine parking lights on either side of the windshield (which was never lit), and a kerosine tail light. It was a custom while dad was a mail carrier, and a long time after, to make use of all available daylight working time at home, and go shopping at night. Many people did it back then. The stores stayed open from seven a.m. to midnight. The usual procedure was to load the family in the “T” Ford and crank up and start to town. The dirt roads were bumpy, and I don’t think the car had shock absorbers, because the bumps in the road would bounce the passengers up against the cloth top sometimes. After we were on the way, dad would ask the driver, “did you light that rare lamp”? Dad used quaint english sometimes. Then we would stop at Alfred Clark’s General Store, at the intersection of Brick Kiln Road and River Road, and we would get gasoline. The Clarks lived upstairs, and had a business on the ground floor. They sold everything from soda crackers to horse collars. Mr. Clark would come out and start pumping gas. The gas tank was located under the driver’s seat cushion. The gas guage was a wooden stick dipped in the tank to see how high up the stick got wet. The gas pump had a hand crank that was turned to raise a plunger through a cylinder that held exactly one gallon. Every time the plunger was cranked up, it was another gallon, at 18 cents per gallon. Mr. Clark was a heavy set man with a growth on the side of his neck the size of a hen’s egg. I think it was called a goiter. Mrs. Clark was an inquisitive woman very much like the store keepers wife on the television story, “Little House on the Prairie”. Their son Bryan was sort of spoiled, and throught his entire lifetime, he worked hard, but never could save a single dollar. He lived his final years on welfare. After gassing up, we would leave Clark’s with a tank full of 18 cent gas and head up town. The first few blocks of Main Street were not paved. Then you came to the part that was paved with bricks. When the car was parked, dad and mom would go to McClure’s Store with the grocery list. A box full of groceries usually cost about three dollars. Dad would go over to Dudley’s Fish Market and if Mr. Dudley had some nice trout or mackrel that weighed about 2 pounds or more, he would buy some. If he didn’t, Mr. Dudley would stop dad before he reached the counter and say, “sorry Frank, But I don’t have what you want this time”. In oyster season, there would be six to a dozen oyster boats tied up at the docks and oyster men would swarm prospective customers, praising their oysters. Page 105 Some would open an oyster and say “taste this oyster, Mister. It’s fat and fresh and as big as your foot”. Dad would get a quart or more already opened. Sometimes he would get a bushel in the shell. Other items he would get at the meat market was beef steak and stew beef. We raised our own pork and poultry. Occasionally mom and dad would do other shopping. Then they headed for the picture show. The movies were black and white silent movies. The piano player up front selected music to set the mood for whatever was showing on the screen. Sad music for tear jerkers, fast music for a chase. The pop corn boy would walk up and down the aisles calling out, “get your pop karn – both de-lish-us and new-trish-shus, get your pop karn”. The actors would move their arms and mouths furiously and what they were supposed to be saying would print on the screen. Someone sitting behind you who could barely read would slowly read out loud what he could of part of the lines before it flashed off, and that would confuse everyone around him. Some of the actors and actresses were famous silent screen stars; like Mary Pickford and Pearl White to name a few. Then there were the western heroes such as Buck Jones who would actually kiss the girl on the mouth at the end of the picture. Tom Mix never-never would kiss a girl in front of a camera. We had some good comedians such as Ben Turpin, the guy with the square mustache, Fatty Arbuckel, Charlie Chaplin and his child side-kick, Little Jackie Coogan and of course, the famous Buster Keaton who never changed his facial expression. Page 106 Buster Keaton was a perfectionist. He didn’t rely on stunt men to do his difficult parts. He did them himself. Every Saturday, the theater showed an episode of a serial called “The Perils of Pauline” where they would get the girl out of last week’s life threatening danger, and end up with her in another perilous episode, continued to next week, but some way, the managed to get her out next week. After the show, Pop would take mom and I to Worthy and Ethridge Drug Store and he would treat us to a chocolate ice cream soda. They were delicious! I can’t remember much about how Joe spent his time on those trips, but I think Chilson spent a part of his time at the pool room. He picked up some spending money working there part time. A few years later, talking pictures were introduced to the public. Then came technicolor pictures. Dad took mom and I se see “Cleopatria” starring Caludette Colbert. She was real pretty in technicolor. In one scene, Cleopatria was bathing in a large pool of milk. The slaves were milking she-asses and carring jars of milk and pouring in the bath. Dad nudged mom and grinned and pointed to several cats standing around the bath drinking milk. Page 107 illustration Back in the good old days, every lady wore a hat. It was customary to buy the hat and have the lady running the millinary shop to decorate it like the customer wanted it. Sometimes the decorations were elaborate. You especially noticed in when you sat behind her in the theater. Page 108 PUBLIC ENTERTAINMENT There was an “opera house” in Washington located on the second floor of a building on the north east corner of Market and Main Streets. Traveling theatre companies made their rounds of towns and the opera house was one of their stops. The public was always anxious for entertainment, so the house was usually filled. On one particular night, the house was packed, waiting for the show to begin. The actors and actresses were on the stage behind the closed curtain preparing for the preformance. The curtain was designed to raise by winding around a long pole like an up-side-down window shade. The two boys who pulled the ropes to raise the curtain were waiting for their cue. One of the actresses was wearing a long flowing dress and she happened to be on stage backed up behind the curtain. By some mistake, the boys thought they had the cue so they started vigorously raising the curtain. As the curtain began to roll up around the pole and rise, it caught the skirt of the actress. The audience saw the curtain rising and the surprised lady standing on stage with the curtain slowly pulling her dress up and lifting her off her feet. Everyone in the audience was roaring with laughter. They got the curtain back down and after the actress regained her composure, the show started. Unfortunately, every time this actress came on, the audience would again roar with laughter. Page 109 STREET CARNIVALS One of the first motion pictures of any length was “The Great Train Robbery” which was made in 1903. Sometime afterward this film was the feature attraction in one of the the tent shows in the Hatch-Adams Carnival showing for the first time in Washington, N.C. Did you ever catch yourself humming tunes from songs by Jerome Kern and Oscar Hammerstein like “old man ribber, he don’t do nothing, he just keeps rolling along”, “pick up dat bale, git a little drunk and you land in jail” “can’t help lovin’ that man o’mine”. These songs were written for the long running play “Show Boat”. Show Boat novel sold 320,000 copies in the United States the first 12 years the book was published. Show Boat has been made into several movies, adapted from the novel by Edna Ferber. This novel has been translated and sold in eleven countries. Musical and dramatic rights were sold to Jerome Kern and Oscar Hammerstein. The broadway production was produced by Florence Zigfield. Where was this novel born? In Frank M. Wilkinson Country - on the banks of the Pamlico River. Page 110 CAPTAIN JAMES ADAMS Captain James Adams came to Washington, N.C. with a carnival. One of the feature attractions was a high dive act. They set up a tall ladder with a small platform near its top on Market Street between Main and Second Streets. While testing his equipment, the diver fell to the ground when a guy rope became loose and caused the ladder to break. He was seriously injured and spent several months in the hospital. A fire destroyed valuable costumes needed in another feature act. From these misfortunes, James Adams quit the carnival business and decided to enter into the theatre business. FLOATING THEATRE James Adams had observed the flat bottom barges or scows used by the Washington lumber companies so he decided one could be modeled into a floating theatre. Captain George Leach, President of the Eureka Lumber Company of Washington furnished a barge – 122 feet long and 32 feet wide and furnished the lumber, and Chauncey’s Boat Yard did the work. The flat bottom boat would float in 14 inches of water. Every time Guy Wilkinson went to town he would go by Chauncey’s Boat Yard on the river in down town Washington and when he came home, he would up-date the family on the progress of the floating theatre they were building. In addition to the stage and auditorium The James Adams also had room for living and dining quarters for cast and crew of 26 and storage space. All personnel had at least two or more jobs on board. Page 111 & 112 The show boat was pulled by the boat from town to town on the shores of North Carolina and Virginia waters, remaining in each town a week, and each night a different play was presented. The James Adams Floating Palace Theatre presented its first public preformance in Washington in the spring of 1914. The plays they presented were usually “tear-jerkers”. Novelist Edna Ferber heard of a floating theatre making the rounds of the river towns of North Carolina and Virginia and she wanted to write a novel based on the theme of a show boat, so she came to Washington in 1924 to contact the James Adams Floating Palace Theatre, but it had finished its season and was tied up for the winter in Elizabeth City, but it would be back in Bath, N.C. for a new season in April 1925. Edna Ferber came to Bath in April 1925 and was invited on board where she lived for a while, attending rehersals, selling tickets, serving as a walk-on actress, dining with the crew and cast, and becoming a temporary member of the troupe. She went back to New York and used her material to write her novel, using some of the actual caracters she met in her book. She based her Show Boat on the Mississippi River. George and Hazel Wilkinson attended two shows in the late nineteen thirties or early nineteen forties. The acting was good. They had a good orchestra (tug boat crew) and we can still remember some of a song by the male singer. They tied up at dock side back of the old Louise Hotel. They had temporary utilities conections including phone. Possibly due to objections of the local movie theatre owner who owned 2 theatres, they were required to buy expensive one year license to show one week. Captain Adams told his audience that would be the last visit the theatre would make to its birth place. Page 113 photo The James Adams Floating Theatre, renamed The Original Show boat following publication of Edna Ferber’s book. Shown here in winter quarters it is docked at Water Street in Elizabeth city. (All photos courtesy of Fred Fearing, reproduced by T. H. Pearce, published with “Showboating in the Albemarle” by Joseph O. Green, III, in “The State,” February 15, 1972) THE STATE, November 1979 Page 114 illustration The James Adams Floating Palace Theater. Your narrator only saw this boat twice, both times at night, fifty years ago, so my illustration is not accurate. One of the things I noticed was a row of steel post and guy rods along the side to protect the hull from stress of unbalanced loads. Customers boarded a gang way up front and purchased tickets and went in the front end and selected a seat. The theater was connected with telephone and city utilities. The music and shows were good. Page 115 photo The theatre intself, inside the boat, had a seating capacity of 700, and measured 122 x 34 feet. Most of the plays were “tear jerkers”. Page 116 photo Two of the showboat’s leading ladies; the lady on the left is probably Beulah Adams Hunter, billed as “The Mary Pickford Of The Rivers”. Her husband Charles Hunter (______) welcomed Edna Ferber aboard and helped her with her book. Many people later saw the Hunters reflected as characters in “Show Boat”. Page 117 CECIL BLOUNT DE MILLE Viewers all over the world have seen and are still watching famous motion pictures byone of the outstanding motion picture directors of all time. Cecil B. De Mille. He directed such pictures as “King Of Kings” and “The Ten Commandments” and other master pieces of motion picture art. Cecil B. DeMille was a local man. He was born and raised in Washington, North Carolina. His birthplace was across the corner from the site of the old high school building on Bridge and Second Streets. Frank Wilkinson was acquainted with members of his mother’s family. Unfortunately, the last owner of the Cecil B. DeMille home sold the property to an oil company which demolished this historic home and built a filling station. Page 118 & 119 & 120 THEATERS The first play house in Washington, N.C. that we have record of was called The Opera House. It was located on the second floor of a building on the north east corner of Market and Main Streets. Local plays were sometimes presented and traveling theater companies presented vaudivilles and plays on its stage to packed audiences. There was no radio or television for entertainment, and the old spring wound “talking machine” was a novelty and curiosity that few families owned. The recorded sounds for these machines came either on a thick disc or a cylinder about two inches in diameter and four inches long. The records turned much faster than our present disc records. The needle or stylus picked up vibrations off the record and sent them into a small drum head or diaphram that connected to a long wood or composition horn for amplification. No electricity was involved. I don’t know when The Opera House closed, but there was a new theater that opened in 1913 that appropriately was named “The New Theater”. The New Theater was located on the second floor of a building in down town Washington, N.C. on Main Street. The ground floor of the building currently houses a shoe store, a long wide hall way and a soda shop. The soda shop was origonally Shaw’s Soda Shop. It is now Jean’s Grill. The remains of the old “New Theater” are still there, a ghost of a reminder of the past. All the seats have been removed and used else-where. I remember the New Theater as the first picture show I ever attended as a child with my parents. My parents usually attended every Saturday night and we saw a short comedy, a feature film and an installemen of a serial. The serial would compare to modern soap operas on T.V. except the star actor was always left in an impossible and often life threatening situation to be continued next week! The New Theater often presented vaudeville shows. All through the silent movie, the piano player down front played “mood music” to fit the scene on the screen. It is showed a sad scene, he played sad music. If a chase was in progress, he played music to fit the scene. TURNAGE In 1930, Mr. Collier A. Turnage opened a large beautifully designed theater on the ground floor in the back of the same building that housed the old New Theater. The old New Theater was closed. The newly opened theater was named for its owner “Turnage Theater”. This was entered through a long wide hallway between a shoe store and Shaw’s Soda Shop. The Turnage showed only the best movies. I remember the first showing of “Gone With The Wind”. The line waiting to buy tickets was long enough to stretch around the block. Mr. Turnage opened another theater across the street to show “B” class movies. This was named for his wife. It was called the “Rita Theater”. The Rita closed when television became popular and took away customers. It was in the nineteen eighties before the Turnage Theater closed its doors and sent its customers to a triple cinema at the Washington Shopping Mall. Some time after World War Two, a drive in theater opened on River road and one opened in Chocowinity. They are now just memories. Page 121 photo The Turnage Theater, its glory days gone forever. THE GLORY DAYS ARE GONE AT TURNAGE Ric Carter photos Page 122 photo and news article Page 123 photo Fancy wordwork marks the spot where the theater’s chandelier once hung. Page 124 KEEPING WARM Did you ever have your furnace break down or the fuel give out in the middle of winter and all the house becomes freezing cold except a little spot in front of an electric heater or a fireplace? At the turn of the century, Francis M. Wilkinson and thousands more people didn’t have it that good. Houses were drafty. They were not insulated. Most wood houses were constructed with the framework covered on the outside with a single coat of clapboard. If the inside rooms were not plastered, they were ceiled with tongue and groove lumber. The clapboards would shrink and warp allowing wind to pass through. The ceiling would also shrink allowing the passage of air. A calendar hanging on the wall would swing on a windy day. The floors in many houses were tongue and groove lumber, six or more inches wide, nailed directly to the supporting joist, with no air or vapor barrier. These tongue and groove boards would shrink, allowing air to pass through. I have seen newspapers on the floor, flutter and lift when it was windy outside. Page 125 illustration 1918 The only means of heating the room was a wood burning fireplace. Page 126 illustration About 1922, F. M. Wilkinson installed a wood burning heater in his bedroom – sitting room. Page 127 This is the flag that hung on the wall over Frank M. Wilkinson’s mantel through the years of World War One. The flag has only 46 stars. It was made before New Mexico became the 47th state in 1-6-1912 and before Arizona became the 48th state in 2-14-1912. PAGE 128 DECORATIONS Dad’s sitting room had an American flag draped on the wall over his mantel piece. It was in support for his country and his three sons who were in France fighting German Kaiser Wilhelm’s army in World War One. Also, he had silk plack hanging to the right of the flag that represented his family’s participation in the military effort. This silk plack or banner was approximately seven inches wide and eleven inches high. There was a pencil size rod across the top, tipped on either end with a wooden gilded spear point. A piece of gold color silk cord was fastened by the ends to the spear points. The cord was a hanger so the banner could be hung on the wall. The banner had a wide red border on the four sides of a white center. In the certer was displayed the number of five point starts that the family had in the military service. The stars were blue. Walter was in the mounted (horse) cavalry. Bruce was in the army’s early air force as a camera spotter. Guy was in the infantry. Guy expierenced attacks of poisoned gas. {Illustration of flag} page 129 Until about the year 1022, the room that dad used for sitting and sleeping was warmed ? with a fire place. When it was freezing cold, and especially when there was a chill wind blowing, you sat close to the fire and radiant heat baked your front, and your back would have goose bumps from cold. BEDDING Many old time beds had springs consisting of a grill work of chain link wires hooked upto form a rectangle the size of the bed and the whole suspended in place with coil stretch springs. Dad’s mattress was a core of animal hair padded on either side with cotton. It was very heavy and very – very firm. When I was young, my room opened in to mom’s and dad’s room. My mattress was softer than dad’s. It was made of corn shucks, stripped in bits about half an inch wide and stuffed in the ticking material. All beds in the house were padded with a soft “feather bed”. That was a mattress size ticking, filled with chicken feathers until it stood at least eight inches thick. When the bed was made up for another night, the bed had to be patted in the high spots so as to shift the feathers evenly across the whole bed. That took a little more time than modern beds. When you lay in a feather bed, you lay in, not on it. You take your place in it and the bedding rises up around you as you sink in. Page 130 When you went to bed on a cold night and in a cold room, the sheets were ice cold and you would draw up into a ball with knees touching chin and arms clasped around ankles. The bed would gradually get warm enough to straighten out. The sleeper was covered with several home make patch work quilts. They were so heavy that it was difficult to turn over. They “bath room” was very convenient. You didn’t even have to leave your bed side. It was a pot with a flared top rim and it had a convenient handle on the side. It was slid under the bed in easy reach. It was necessary to slip the pot far enough under the bed so you wouldn’t step on the side of the pot and turn it over when getting off the bed. Also, if it was left too far out, you would step in it and give your foot a cold bath. Some times