News Briefs From Watauga, August 26, 1920

 From The Watauga Democrat, August 26, 1920

Local Affairs

The Appalachian Training School opened its fall term last Tuesday, with flattering prospects for a successful session.

Miss Arkie Ragan returned from the hospital at Gastonia last Saturday and is rapidly recovering from an operation for appendicitis.

B.A. Foster of Sands has sold his farm to Nathan Green of Meat Camp for $4,400, and will, we are told invest his money in Ohio property.

Rev. John Norris, residing one mile west of the village, has sold his farm to Mr. Chas. Greer of Cove Creek, the consideration being $6,500. A few years ago the same farm sold for $1,000.

Mr. Melvin Holler, who for a few months has been living in Avery county, died there on last Friday morning and the remains were brought back to Watauga for interment Saturday evening. Milk sick, we are told, was the cause of his death.

Mr. Thomas Elrod, son of the late John Elrod, died at the home of his nephew, Mr. Lloyd Cottrell, on Route 1, early Monday morning. Mr. Elrod was a quiet, unassuming citizen; was never married, and was more than 65 years of age. Interment Tuesday evening in the Critcher burying ground in the Mt. Vernon section.

It seems that the road work in Watauga is over, for the present, however, the matter will be taken up by the board of county commissioners, at its September meeting, at which time it is hoped that money sufficient for the completion of the eight mile kink of the Boone Trail Highway, will be provided. Should this fail, better it would have been if we had never begun road construction in the county.

At the meeting of the Boone Commercial Club on last Monday night funds were raised with which to buy ice cream, oranges and other dainties for the children who come here for the clinic on Aug. 31 to Sept. 3 inclusive.

George H. Hayes of Sands raised 176 bushels of rye on 9 1/2 acres of land, and in other field his son raised something over 100 bushels, and the grain was threshed and housed before the wet weather began.

Our representative in the lower house of the General Assembly, Dr. McD. Little, has been a very sick man in a Raleigh hospital for the past few days, but the latest advices from his physician to the family are that the Doctor is very much better.

Atty. E.S. Coffey left last Friday for Elizabethton, Tenn., where he joined his uncle, Mr. F.P. Curtis, and son Fred, on a motor trip to Spencer, Indiana, to visit his aged uncle, Mr. Judson Curtis. Mr. Coffey expected to be absent for 10 days or two weeks.

Dr. McG. Anders is at his former home in Gastonia this week, having his house put in order for his family, who will follow him in the next few days, where they will remain during the winter. The doctor was loath to leave his practice here, but important business matters in his home town made it imperative that he be in Gastonia this fall and winter. He expects to return to his home and practice in Boone in the early spring.

Prohibition Agent D.W. Wooten, Deputy Sheriff N.C. Green, N.N. Colvard and W.R. Greene went into the Potter Town section of the counbty in quest of a moonshine distillery. the search proved futile, although they found different furnaces which, to all appearances, had been recently used. Giving up the search and leaving the woods, they went into an old house near a home and snugly hidden away 'neath the floor, was a cask, containing 20 gallons of as good "mountain dew," so far as the boys could tell by smelling (?) it, as ever ran from a still. The barrel was cut down and the fluid was soon absorbed by the thirsty earth.

Mr. Lawrence of Statesville is in the county putting up silos for the farmers. Just now he is in town waiting for material with which to erect one on the farm of F.A. Linney near the village.

Mrs. J.W. McGhee, whose illness we have mentioned from time to time, died of perontinitis in a Johnson City hospital last Friday. The body was brought home the following evening and intermnet wa smade in the Brown cemetery, near her girlhood home on Sunday in hte presence of a large concourse of sorrowing relatives and friends. A tribute to the memory of the good lady, whose death has brought sadness to so many hearts will appear next week.