The Week of January 29th, 2012

This photograph is inscribed with a caption naming the figures in the foreground as, “Alfred Adams, Barnard Dougherty, James Marsh.” The woman pictured in the door is not identified. Alfred Adams was a prominent Watauga County businessman, active in the Northwestern Bank, and a chair in Banking at Appalachian State is named for him. Courtesy Historic Boone.

January 29, 1907

The regular column “Washington Letter,” a report of federal government news, reported in this week’s edition of the Watauga Democrat that “(t)he meeting of the National Board of Trade failed in one of the essential points which the delegates believed would be carried when the convention first assembled. That was in failing to recommend the establishment of a parcel post in this country. It had been held that such a board would be an immense advantage to retailers and consumers all over the country, and would relieve them from the tyranny of the express companies.”

February 1, 1940

“Asks Relief for War Sufferers” was the headline of a story in this week’s edition. “Mrs. James H. Councill, chairman of Watauga Chapter, American Red Cross,” states that there is “a growing demand for clothing for the civilian population of the warring nations of Europe, and asks for the continued co-operation of the people in donations of materials or cash to be used for this work,” the text of this item relayed. The county’s affiliated youth organization was reported to have “already knit 24 sweaters and made twelve heavy dresses for the relief work,” with a further 24 sweaters being in production for the cause.

“Area to Get More Valued Publicity: Chamber of Commerce to Meet with Blowing Rock Group to Consider Publicity” told this week that, “Mr. J.H. Quattlebaum, traffic manager of the Queen City Coach Company, informs Mr. Herman Wilcox, president of the Boone Chamber of Commerce, that he will be able to secure stories and pictures of this section in the National Trailways Magazine.” Wilcox had called a meeting in the “Watauga Hotel Friday evening at 7:30 for dinner,” inviting Blowing Rock officials and businessmen to join with their colleagues from Boone to take part in this enterprise. “We feel that what is good for Blowing Rock is good for Boone,” Mr. Wilcox was quoted as stating, “and the Chamber of Commerce here is anxious for the two towns to work together on all matters of this kind.”

January 30, 1958

“Snow, Cold Hold Boone And Environments in Icy Grip,” announced the headline to a news story by Joe C. Minor. “The weather continued cold and snowy in Boone last week,” began the article. “More than five inches of snow blanketed the town Thursday and Friday, falling on light snows which had fallen earlier in the week.” Temperatures during the week had topped out at 46 degrees, which “felt almost like a spring day,” and allowed for some melting of accumulated snow, after a period of days with temperatures in the twenties or low thirties.

A 1935 Chevrolet advertisement, from the Watauga Democrat newspaper.

The Week of January 22nd, 2012

 

This photograph from the 1949 Centennial of Watauga County’s foundation shows four costumed citizens, identified as “Ann Carroll Blackburn, Dr. J.T.C. Wright, Barbara Jones, and Cecil Miller.”

January 25, 1940

“Officer Seizes Whiskey Cargo” announced a bold headline in this week’s edition of the Watauga Democrat. “Police Chief Edward Mast seized fourteen cases of tax-paid liquor Monday afternoon, and George Horn of Gastonia, one of the occupants of the Ford coupe, which was carrying the illicit liquid, was placed in jail,” the item related. “Officer Mast noted the car passing through the business section of the town, and his suspicions were aroused. He succeeded in stopping the machine near the Baptist church where one of the occupants of the vehicle made his escape, and Horne taken into custody. He was carrying a revolver at the time and the weapon together with the nearly new automobile are being held,” according to further details in the story.

“Tour of Mayors To Florida Arranged” recorded that “Mayor Grover C. Robbins of Blowing Rock, was a visitor to Asheville Friday, where he attended a meeting of mayors and other officials from Piedmont and Western North Carolina, who are laying plans for a tour of Florida, along about the 12th of February, the purpose being to interest tourists in that state in stopping in this area on their return north at the end of the southern resort season.”

“Ancient Letter Recalls Freeing of Slaves Prior to Emancipation” read the headline to a special feature, which began “(a) yellowed scrap of note paper indented with a few well-penned lines was brought to the Democrat office yesterday by Joseph S. Winkler, local business man, and its message again reminds students of history that human slavery was taboo in Northwest Carolina long before President Abe Lincoln’s proclamation of emancipation.” The article reproduces in full the contents of a letter “(a)ddressed to ‘Col. E.C. McCarty,’ doubtless attached to some frontier military post, and signed by A.W. Finley prominent Wilkes (County) plantation owner.” The letter was said to have been “placed in the hands of the late Joshua Winkler, founder of one of Watauga’s leading families, back in the spring of 1859, for the purposes outlined in its text.”  The letter tells that the original bearer of the letter, Joshua Winkler, was accompanying “a dozen slaves in a covered wagon to Kansas and freedom” – the twelve African Americans having been “freed by his uncle, Joshua Pennel, with the request that the bearer would take them to some free state and purchase land for them.” The trip to Kansas “consumed eight months,” according to “(s)tories, now vague, (which) were passed on to Joshua’s sons and daughters,” including to the pioneer’s son Joseph, who presented the letter at the offices of the Watauga newspaper some eighty later.

January 23, 1958

“Twenty-Seven Schools To Attend Band Clinic: College, Town Again To Host Music Event” was front-page news in this week’s paper. “Appalachian State Teachers College and the Town of Boone will be hosts again to the annual Band Clinic which is being held on the campus Friday and Saturday, January 31 and February 1.” The item mentions that, “Mr. Herbert Fred, who will direct the band (clinic), is director of bands at the University of North Carolina, and is widely recognized in the field of instrumental music as an educator, conductor, and composer of many compositions for band.” One hundred band students from the region were expected to participate in the event.

“Court Apt To Finish Today” reported that “Watauga Superior Court convened here Monday with about 100 cases scheduled to be heard,” most of which “involved speeding, traffic violations, liquor law violations, driving drunk, larceny, and other misdemeanors, with no cases of major interest on tap for the term.”

 

The Week of January 15th, 2012

This wintry view shows two older buildings from the Appalachian State campus amidst considerable snowfall. The date of the photograph is unknown. Courtesy Historic Boone

January 17, 1907

“In these latter days one is denied the right to regulate even the affairs of one’s own family,” lamented an article under the title “A Georgia Case” which appeared in this week’s edition of the Watauga Democrat (the dateline indicating that the item was reprinted from the Statesville Landmark newspaper). The item relays news of a “dispatch from Monticello, Ga.”, which told “of the killing of James Falk, a merchant, by a young man named Rupert Waldrup.” It seems that “Waldrup had accompanied Falk’s two daughters to a dance. Falk objected to their going but finally yielded on conditions that they return home before midnight. The young people got in at 2 a.m. and Waldrup opened a window and endeavored to put the girls in the house without arousing their father. Falk was aroused, however, and he appeared on the scene and chided the young people for coming in at that hour – a very natural thing to do, by the way. Waldrup resented Falk’s remarks, an altercation ensued and Falk was shot dead by Waldrup.” The author of the article expressed concern that the murderer would “either be acquitted… or let off with very light punishment” in light a recent case called the “Charlotte precedent,” in which “a married man invaded (a) home with evil purpose,” and, when being confronted and ordered to leave by the head of the household, the intruder, who had been “drinking wine and making merry,” according to the newspaper account, “not only didn’t go promptly, but stopped to argue the fact that he was a ‘gentleman’.” When “the father, as he had a right to do, caught hold of him to put him out, he was shot dead.” The offender in this North Carolina case received, says the article, “five years in the penitentiary – a most infamous travesty on justice” for “that cold-blooded murder of a man who was endeavoring to protect his own household.” The piece concludes, “(w)hat fathers should do when young men are guilty of misconduct about their homes – as in the Charlotte case and Georgia case – is to argue only with a shotgun.”

January 18, 1940

“Armed Plot Against United States Is Foiled” was a front-page headline in this week’s newspaper. Following a dateline of “New York, Jan. 14,” the news item told that, “(a) plot to overthrow the United States government with bombs and other arms – some looted from the arsenals of the army itself – was charged tonight against 18 members of the ‘Christian Front’ who were arrested and accused of revolutionary intentions. The 18 men were charged specifically with conspiracy to create a revolution and overthrow the government.” The article said that “J. Edgar Hoover, chief of the bureau of investigation, said they intended to bomb and shoot their way to power and set up a government similar to Hitler’s dictatorship over Nazi Germany.” Targets of the group were listed as “key government agencies such as federal reserve banks, post offices and vital public utilities,” with an anti-Semitic agenda (“aimed against Jews generally,” in the words of the article)  forming a major component of the thwarted group’s ideology.

The “Local Affairs” column noted, “Mrs. Bessie Brown has returned to her home in Boone after visiting for several weeks with Mr. and Mrs. Walter Brown at Laxon. While away Mrs. Brown suffered an attack of influenza, from which she has appreciably recovered.”

This week’s newspaper also included a feature entitled “From Our Early Files,” in which a selection of short “Items from the Democrat of January 10, 1901” and “Items From the Democrat of January 17, 1901” were reproduced.

The Week of January 8th, 2012

Photo caption:

“Physical Education Building (Now completed and in use),” reads the caption to this photograph showing a period of building and expansion at the Appalachian Training School for Teachers (later Appalachian Normal School, now Appalachian State University). Courtesy of Historic Boone.

By Ross Cooper

alookbackatwatauga.wordpress.com

January 10, 1907.

A feature in this week’s Watauga Democrat entitled “Restore the Ancient Landmark” (reprinted from the News and Observer of Raleigh) encouraged the revival of the observances of the traditions of the spelling bee and of watch-night church services to usher in the New Year. Beginning with the former, the editorial asserted that “( o)nce people were good spellers and the cutting up and down and the Spelling Bee gave pleasure and instruction. With their departure come poor spellers and too little attention is given to spelling.” The writer, who opened his opinion piece by asserting that “(t)he tendency is marked in North Carolina to let the good old customs go into disuse,” announced that “(t)his paper has started the New Year with an agitation for a return of the old time tournament  and the old time spelling bee.” As a remedy, the columnist writes, “(w)hy not have a tournament social at the next State Fair and make it the crowning event of the annual gathering? It would be a splendid idea, too, to get up a spelling bee with one entry from each county and give an hundred dollars to the best speller.” As if in afterthought, the advisement continues, “(a)nd why not have the fiddling contest, with a splendid prize to the best fiddler in North Carolina.” Turning to religious observance, the column continues, after noting that “(t)he year 1907 ought to be marked by a return to the ancient landmarks, that “(t)he time was when the departure of the Old Year was a solemn religious festival and watch-night services were held in many churches. Why has this means of grace been neglected?” After lamenting the decline in such services, the author encouraging notes this item of news from Tarboro, N.C.: “Midnight services to see the Old Year out and the New one in were held in the Ediscopal (sic) church Rev F.H. Farthing conducting them. They were solemn and impressive till the bells and whistles rang out the end of 1906, then there were disapasons (sic – “diapasons” is apparently meant) in both voice and music greeting 1907.”

January 9, 1958

“Dimes Drive Aim Is Helping Polio Victims” reported that “(t)he March of Dimes will launch a 1958 polio fund campaign here and throughout the country in January on the dramatic note that for thousands of polio-blighted individuals ‘Survival Is Not Enough.’ Most of the money sought in the drive is needed to help disabled polio patients stage ‘comebacks’ from helplessness to usefulness.”

The article “Cherryville Men Bring Muskets To Enliven Last Day of Year in Boone” told that “(a) group of Cherryville’s New Year shooters arrived in Boone last Tuesday to fire their muskets in their traditional welcome to the New Year.” According to the artcle, “Cherryville is the only known community in the nation which still practices this ancient custom, which is sad to have originated in Germany many centuries ago.”  The newspaper reproduced, in part, the text of the “familiar chant which annually launches this age-old custom,” and noted that the troop of musket-men “fired their muskets in the vicinity of the city hall, on the courthouse lot and at other points and considerable interest was manifested in their visit.”

The Week of January 1, 2012

“Watauga Academy,” the first incarnation of the educational institution which would become Appalachian State University. First founded in 1899 under the Watauga Academy name by brothers B.B. and D.D. Dougherty, the school was originally housed in the building pictured in this photograph of unknown date. Image courtesy of Historic Boone.

January 4, 1940

“City Water Fails As Mercury Drops To Season’s Low,” proclaimed a bold headline on the front page of this week’s edition of the Watauga Democrat, which continued under the caption, “Tuesday Finds Town Without Water, Even For Home Consumption; Appalachian College Comes to Rescue and Water Made Available to Most Residents in Afternoon.” According to the story, “(t)he city water system, drained by thoughtless householders who left spigots running throughout Monday night to prevent frozen pipes, definitely went out of business in the early morning hours Tuesday and the town was definitely and literally dry, except for small amounts of the life-giving fluid carried in buckets from springs or wells of the more fortunate residents.” Apparently the town of Boone’s water supply had been “so weakened at the intake” from a “prolonged drought” that the week’s weather, in which “near-zero temperatures came following several days of intermittent snowstorms,” had caused conditions in which “the system froze in places.” Due to the exacerbation of  the situation by some residents leaving water running, “the town board [was] doing everything possible to persuade the people to conserve the water supply so that no further calamity would occur,” in part by passing an ordinance “setting a $10 fine as the penalty for leaving spigots running during the night.” An infusion of water from the Appalachian College, “pumping hundreds of thousands of gallons into the mains,” had made water available to some town residents, although “on some of the higher eminences in residential sections, water buckets were still bringing in enough of the fluid for cooking purposes” on the afternoon of Tuesday. Early morning temperatures were recorded as hovering between two and four degrees above zero.

January 3, 1957

“Yule Buying Hits New Boone Record: Quiet Holiday; No Crashes, Few Arrests” was a headline on this week’s front page. “Cash registers rang a merry Christmas tune for Boone merchants, as holiday shoppers thronged the streets and stores in an unprecedented wave of gift buying,” reported the feature. Though specific dollar totals were not yet available, it was reported that “local stores reported substantial gains in all gift categories over 1955’s record dollar value,” despite an “unusually warm December [which] caused sales to lag during the first weeks of the normal Christmas shopping season.” Most shopping was done in the last week before Christmas.

There were no traffic fatalities in Watauga County during the holidays, and the county sheriff’s department reported but a few criminal arrests (“four arrests for public drunkenness, one for driving drunk, and two for shooting firecrackers”). “Boone Police Chief Glenn Richardson reported an even quieter week end, with no arrests being made by his department.”

The same front page, however, reported “Bold Burglars Make Front Door Entrance” in a robbery at “Parkway Company, Inc., hardware store” in Boone during the week before the New Year, and the item “Penick Home Bulglarized” reported the removal of “a small amount of cash” from a pocketbook and the theft of about $200 worth of clothing, including a wedding gown, while the Oak Street home’s residents were visiting neighbors.

This narrow column advertisement announced the January 1940 movie selections at Boone’s Appalachian Theatre, “Western Carolina’s Finest Theatre.”

The Week of December 25, 2011

A wintertime view of a snow-clad Appalachian State campus scene (date unknown). Courtesy Historic Boone

December 24, 1914

“Moving Ahead” was the heading of an article reprinted in this week’s Watauga Democrat, reproduced from the Durham Sun. “Business continues to improve. There is no more cheerful theme, and all of us may be pardoned if we seem unduly joyous over the tangible evidence that commerce of all kinds is getting better,” narrated the item. Economic conditions were described as “better last week than at any time since the start of the European war,” according to “(n)o less authority than Dan’s Review.” “That there is improvement in trade is made clear in reports from all parts of the country,” continued the article, “(h)oliday buying is developing very well, and the colder weather has stimulated retail distribution and also helped some wholesale departments.” The feature concluded with the claim, “(i)t looks as if business has already improved to the point where it can ‘sit up and take a little solid food.’”

December 26, 1940

“Theatre Party Is Decided Success,” proclaimed a headline in this week’s newspaper. “The theatre party, arranged by the management of Appalachian Theatre, with the co-operation of the women’s Club and the Lion’s Club organization, and held Sunday afternoon was a decided success, with Santa Claus distributing toys and confections to three hundred of the poorer children of the community and county. An entertaining Christmas program had been arranged for the theatre gift party, and the kiddies assembled started off their holidays with a genuine good time.”

In other news, “Nazis Claim Liverpool ‘Worse than Coventry’” relayed that, “’Worse than Coventry’ was the phrase used last night by several Bomber and observation fliers in describing the damage inflicted on Liverpool last night by the Luftwaffe in a concentrated attack by ‘several hundred planes.’”

December 24, 1964

“Boone Stores Will Observe Christmas Day” was the heading of an article which announced this week that, “(i)t is recommended by the Merchant’s Association that Boone stores remain closed Christmas Day [Friday, that year] and Saturday. However, a good many of the stores have indicated they will reopen Saturday as usual.” The item indicated that local banks would be closed on both Christmas Day and the Saturday following, and that all “county offices will be closed starting Thursday at noon, for the remainder of the week. Town of Boone offices will be closed Friday and Saturday as will the postoffice (sic).” The conclusion of the article noted that “it is recommended that stores be closed both Friday and Saturday next week due to New Year’s falling on a Friday.”

“Ski Activities at Blowing Rock” was an item containing this calendar of events, from the Blowing Rock Ski Lodge: “Dec. 25 – Santa Claus will visit the lodge at 3 p.m., en route back to the North Pole. A torch light parade will be given by the ski professionals at 8 p.m. Dec 26 – Dancing. Dec. 27 – Races among skiers. Dec. 29 and 30 – Entertainment by the Cherokee Sweethearts. New Year’s Eve, Dancing and torch light parade.  Jan. 1 – Live entertainment. Jan. 2 – Ski racing and dancing.”

 A 1964 advertisement from the Watauga Democrat newspaper of Boone, North Carolina.

The Week of December 18th, 2011

A portrait with the simple inscription “W.B. Greer” shows a Watauga area resident, perhaps from the early decades of the Twentieth Century. Courtesy Historic Boone

December 19, 1912

“Dirty air is far more deadly than dirty water or dirty food,” asserted a brief item in this week’s edition of the Watauga Democrat newspaper. “Dirty air killed at least 6,000 North Carolinians last year. It will probably kill about the same number this year. Will you be one? It is largely a case of take your chances or ventilate.” The item did not mention either a source of statistics for the statewide fatalities reported and predicted, nor more precise details about the action urged by the term “ventilate.”

An advertisement under the heading, “Drives Off a Terror” read, “(t)he chief executioner of death in the winter and spring months is pneumonia. Its advance agents are cold and grip (sic). In any attack by one of these maladies no time should be lost in taking the best medicine available to drive it off. Countless thousands have found this to be Dr. King’s New Discovery. ‘My husband believes it has kept him from having pneumonia three or four times,’ writes Mrs. George Place, Rawsonville, Vt., ‘and for coughs, colds, and croap (sic) we have never found its equal.’ Price 50 cts. And $1.00.” Concludes the ad, “trial bottles free at all druggists.”

December 21, 1939

“Burley House to be Built for Season of 1940,” announced a banner headline on the front page of this week’s newspaper. According to the article, “(s)tockholders in the Mountain Burley Warehouse and other interested persons met Monday evening and laid concrete plans for the building of a second burley warehouse in Boone, and definite assurance is given that the new floor will be open for the opening of the burley season in December, 1940.” Said the write-up, “(t)he new warehouse will be a distinctly separate corporation from the Mountain Burley, it is pointed out, and land for the construction of the second house has already been secured adjoining the present structure. Financing reported by the new company indicated that “sufficient stock  having already been subscribed to take care of the transaction,” the new warehouse’s “papers of incorporation [had been] applied for,” with the chance to purchase stock certificates to be available to “interested persons in this region” in the future.

In related news, it was noted that the already-existing Mountain Burley Warehouse had “sold more than a million pounds of leaf for an average price of around $18.00 per hundred (pounds)” already in the 1939 tobacco auctioning season.

December 17, 1964

“Technical Job of Planning New Hospital Is Going On,” read a headline in this week’s paper, accompanying a photograph captioned “What goes here? Wataugans passed the joint school- hospital bond issue in the fall of 1963. The construction site, formerly the Greer property which is located on Deerfield road, seemed vacant, except for this sign [the photo shows a vacant field with a sign reading, ‘Future Site of Watauga County Hospital’]. The accompanying news article by Rachel Rivers detailed how, “(w)hen the staff of Watauga County Hospital moves into the hospital to be constructed on Deerfield Road, even the food and linen supplies will be there,” thanks to a “great deal of work [which] has been put into planning the new hospital during the last several months.”

The Week of December 11th, 2011

“Dairy Barn” reads the caption to this photograph from a collection of scenes of the school which is now Appalachian State University, as it appeared during the decade of the 1920s. Courtesy Historic Boone

December 12, 1912

“The public drinking cup is missing from the Southern train, and it will not be replaced,” began an item in this week’s edition of the Watauga Democrat, reproduced from the Salisbury Post. “The traveler must carry his individual drinking cup, for health and cleanliness have decreed that the public cup must go. The law prohibiting the cup on trains went into effect the 16th and no cup adorns the old ice box at the end of the day coach where the masses of folks drank from the same broken glass cup.  The roads may later provide individual paper cups for the traveler, but the better way is for the public to provide its own cup.” Although the shared “broken glass cup” may have been more metaphorical than literal, the language of this announcement captures, perhaps, a recognition of the threat of disease transmission in public venues which was of heightened concern at this time in U.S. history.

December 11, 1941

“U.S. Is At War With Japan,” was a prominent headline in this week’s paper, following the attack on Pearl Harbor. “Washington, Dec. 8. – America declared war on Japan today after that nation’s air bombers had dealt the navy the severest blow in its history and inflicted losses which raised the harsh possibility that the Japanese fleet may now enjoy temporary superiority in the Pacific,” read the text of the report.  Continued the article, “(s)ome details of the savage Japanese attack – which admittedly cost the navy a battleship, a destroyer, a number of smaller craft, and killed or  wounded 3,000 – was given to the nation last night by President Roosevelt.” The Presidential address was said to have “supplemented the brief message with which he asked Congress for a declaration of war Monday – a request which both houses followed up with action that was breath-takingly swift and, save for one vote, unanimous.” The one abstaining vote-caster, not mentioned by name in this article, was Montana Republican and longtime pacifist Jeanette Rankin, the first woman elected to the U.S. Congress.

In a related story, it was reported that the “bitter resentment felt in this locality over the assault by Japan on United States territory, is strikingly reflected by a conversation between some merchants on the street Tuesday. They agreed to sort out all toys and trinkets from their stocks labeled ‘made in Japan’ and burn them in a demonstration on the square.” The same article related that another “rather large retailer stated that his firm had quit buying Nipponese goods many months ago, regardless of price consideration, not waiting for a major demonstration of Japanese infamy.”

December 10, 1964

“Jaycees Sell Yule Trees on King Street,” announced an article in this week’s Watauga Democrat. “The Boone Jaycees will sell Christmas trees again this year on the Wheeler’s Produce lot on King Street in Boone. They hope to have the trees available to start sales this Saturday, Dec. 12.”  This sale was called “the most rewarding for club members,” as the “proceeds of the tree sales will be used to help the needy children of the county have a Merry Christmas. Last year some 40 children shared this experience with the Jaycees and received clothes, toys and other needed items.”

A 1907 advertisement from the Watauga Democrat newspaper

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The Week of December 4, 2011

This view of the campus of the Appalachian Training School for Teachers (A.T.S.) from the 1920s shows a bucolic central area with the main buildings of the institution in the background. Courtesy Historic Boone.

December 5, 1912

“Horrors of a Cholera Camp” was a lengthy feature on the front page of this week’s edition of the Watauga Democrat, which bore a byline crediting the item to the Constantinople Dispatch. “Heartrending scenes of suffering, distress and misery are enacted daily at the Turkish cholera camp at San Stefano. The correspondent of the Associated Press, accompanied by the secretary of a foreign embassy and by Major Clyde S. Ford, United States army, who is here on leave of absence, paid a visit there.” The descriptive passage include the details, “a group of tents stood in the center, where four of five Turkish soldiers, wearing the armpiece of the Red Crescent, stood on guard. Inside the sick and dead lay in groups. The doctor on duty counted 22 patients in one tent, while double that number lay just outside… a water tank drawn by a donkey passed along the road. Those of the victims who were able to raise to their feet went unassisted toward it and struggled feebly for a drink.” The news item concluded that the place described was “not the worst cholera camp,” as another “at Hademkeni, near the Tehatalja lines, is still more extensive,” noting that of the disease-stricken there “it is certain that there are many thousands, and most of these Anatolians came from Asia Minor to fight for the defense of the Ottoman capital.”

December 2, 1943

“Crop and Feed Loans Available to Farmers” was a headline in this week’s paper. “Emergency crop and feed loans are now available to the farmers of Watauga county, according to C. Gordon Taylor, field supervisor of FCA,” told the story, “and applications are now being received at his office in the courthouse. Due to war conditions, the farmers are being urged by the manufacturers, says, Mr. Taylor, to buy their fertilizer early this year in order that delivery may be assured.”

An article entitled “New Bus Service Boone to Zionville” told that, “(t)hrough the efforts of the Chamber of Commerce, an improved bus service was started between Boone and Zionville as of November 30.” The report noted that “(t)his new service permits people living between Boone and Zionville to arrive in town at 9:45 a.m., and return on the afternoon schedule,” with the return trip leaving Boone at 5:05 and reaching the western Watauga stop at 5:37. “The service is provided by the Greyhound Lines,” ended the piece, “and local plans are to later have connections at Zionville for Mountain City and Elizabethton.”

December 1, 1960

“Maximum Store Hours For Christmas Cited By Official,” proclaimed a bold heading this week. With a byline of Raleigh, the news item conveyed that “State Labor Commissioner Frank Crance today reminded Tar Heel employers of the maximum working hours permitted for women and minors under the State Labor Laws during the pre-Christmas rush of business.” Under the then-existing laws, women over age 18 “employed in mercantile establishments employing nine or more persons, may work a maximum of ten hours a day but not more than six of the seven consecutive days from Dec. 18 through Dec. 24.” Minors were limited to nine-hour work days for 16- and 17-year-old boys with work permits; girls of the same age were permitted “the same maximum hours and days of work but may be employed only between 6 a.m. and 9 p.m.,” the notice reported.

The Week of November 27, 2011

“Nell Linney home on Appalachian St., now Baptist Student Union,” reads the caption affixed to this photograph of a snowy scene from an unknown year. Courtesy Historic Boone.

November 28, 1907

“Health in the Canal Zone” was the header of a small item on the front page of this week’s edition of the Watauga Democrat newspaper. “The high wages paid make it a mighty temptation to our young artisans to join the force of skilled workmen needed to construct the Panama Canal,” reads the notice. “Many are restrained however, by the fear of fevers and malaria. It is the knowing ones – those who have used Electric Bitters, who go there without this fear, well knowing they are safe from malarious influence with Electric Bitters on hand. Cures blood poison too, biliousness, weakness and all stomach, liver and kidney troubles. Guaranteed by all druggists. 50 c.”

November 24, 1932

“Election Board Reveals Heavy State Majorities” was an article in this week’s newspaper, which reported that, “(c)omplete returns from the November 8th general elections tabulated late last week by the State Board of Elections, revealed unprecedented majorities, ranging from a quarter of a million votes, for Democratic candidates in North Carolina.” Noted particularly was the race for U.S. President, in which “of a record breaking vote of more than 712,000, Franklin Roosevelt, the Democratic presidential candidate, received 498,006 to 208,334 for President Hoover on the Republican ticket,” in addition to “5,599 for Norman Thomas, Socialist, and 89 for William D. Upshaw, prohibitionist.”

In other political news, dateline Spartanburg, S.C., an article reported that, “Senator Jas. J. Byrnes of South Carolina, has launched an offensive which if successful will deprive President Hoover of his appointive powers immediately.” The details relate that Senator Byrnes “announced here he would ask the first Democratic caucus after the Senate convened next week to refuse confirmation of any recess appointments made by the President… in order that Franklin D. Roosevelt may, as far as possible, fill every office, even down to the postmasterships, according to his own liking.”

November 29, 1956

“Passes Given Driver of Week” told in this edition that, “Jay Beach, manager of the Appalachian Theatre, has announced that the theatre will award two complimentary passes to the person selected by the Boone Police Department as ‘Courteous Driver of the Week’.” Continues the story, “The citation, originally suggested by the Business and Professional Women’s Club, is being made each week by Chief Glenn Richardson from the observations of the Police Department throughout the week. The name of the person so designated will be on file at the ticket office of the theatre each week, and two passes will be issued upon presentation of the recipient’s driver’s license for identification.”

“Singing of Handel’s Messiah Is Traditional Rite In Boone” was a headline introducing an article which asserted that, “(t)he singing of Handel’s Messiah by the College Choir has become a traditional part of the Christmas music for the college and for the Town of Boone. It has been sung annually since the Christmas of 1940.” During the year of 1956, on  “Sunday, December 9th at 7:30 o’clock the performance will be presented at the First Baptist Church in Boone,” with the college choir also scheduled to present the performance in North Wilkesboro’s First Methodist Church one week prior.