The State News. . . A Digest of Things Worth Knowing About Old North State Folks and Things
--G.B. Royster, prominent planter near Oxford, died in the Murphey Hospital at Baltimore. Mr. Royster was 68 years old and had been in bad health for some time.
--The North Carolina Baraca-Philathea convention will be held in Kinston, June 14-17, with a pageant “Spirit of Christ,” directed by Mrs. Walter Denmark of Goldsboro.
--Mrs. Henry Groves Connor Sr. of Wilson, who was reported critically ill, is much improved. Judge Connor, who was absent from the city, drove through the country to her bedside.
--The 100th anniversary of the consecration of the first Bishop of North Carolina, Right Rev. John Stark Ravenscroft, S.T.D., of Raleigh Episcopal dioceses was observed at Christ Church in Raleigh, Sunday.
--The Grand Lodge of the Independent Order of Odd Fellows, in annual session at Goldsboro last week elected officers and selected Raleigh as the next meeting place, Sam B. Currin of Greenville was elected Grand Master.
--The fire loss in North Carolina for April this year was a quarter of a million dollars, less than for April last year but for the country at large the April 1923 loss is $32,638,150. This exceeds the April 1922 loss by nearly $2 million.
--John Roberts of Reddies River in Wilkes County is in a hospital in Winston-Salem in an unconscious condition as the result of a jump from a third story window at his boarding house. The young man has been given to walking in his sleep for some years.
--“Jack” Laws, a young white woman whose home is said to have been near Gastonia, died in a hospital at Hickory of injuries to her head caused when she fell or jumped from an automobile, according to a story told Chief of Police Lentz by Ruth Ennis, a Caldwell county girl.
--Mrs. W.A. Terry of Zebulon, N.C., was killed and Mrs. W.F. Lawrence of Atlanta, Ga., slightly injured when an automobile driven by the former went over a 10-foot ditch embankment at a curve on the Maxton road, about four miles from Red Springs.
--Shuford Bentley of Dallas identified the body of the young white woman who was fatally injured in an automobile accident near Hickory early Sunday as that of Alice Odom, his sister. She was the eighth wife, he said of Cleveland Odom of Wilkes County, and she, too, had been deserted by him.
--Only a freak of circumstances prevented the gaiety of the Shrine Ceremonial held in Washington, M.C., from being blighted by a terrible catastrophe when two spans of the great bridge across the Pamlico River collapsed beneath the weight of 3,000 spectators and sagged to within two feet of the water.
--Harbor front property valued at ?? has been tendered by the city of Wilmington to the State in the event that the State ship and water transportation commission recommends and the legislature approves the ship and ocean terminal enterprise embraced by Governor Morrison’s “Progress Program” for North Carolina.
--Defective flues and shingle roofs continue to be the primary cause of fire in North Carolina, according to the monthly report of the State Department of Insurance, giving this as the cause of 67 of the 180 fires reported in the month and entailing a loss of $587,946, which is considerably lower than the losses of the same month a year ago. (Wooden shingles used on homes were quite flammable.)
--North Carolina’s $40 million investment in modern school houses during the past 20 years make such a disaster as befell the school commencement near Camden, S.C., Thursday night almost impossible in this State, in the opinion of State Superintendent E.C. Brooks who was discussing the tragedy that cost 75 lives in a thinly settled rural community.
--Declaring that the inland waterways of eastern North Carolina are in many ways the most valuable in the world, Senator F.M. Simmons, speaking before the legislative ship commission in New Bern on the importance of developing these waterways, declared this generation would not discharge its obligation to the State and to the future if it failed to utilize them.
--The Civic Summer School of Music in Winston-Salem, N.C., probably the only one of the kind to be conducted in the entire country, will be opened on June 25th and will continue until August 4th. Th board of education of Winston-Salem recently voted $1,000 for the purchase of orchestral and band instruments which are used by the children free of charge.
--William Taylor was shot and killed at his farm house near Washington, N.C., and Garland Wynn was arrested and held on suspicion pending an inquest. Taylor had chastised his 13-year-old daughter, it was said, because she went riding Sunday afternoon with Wynn and another man, both of whom he said forbidden to come to the house, and it was said that the men had words.
--L. Rockwell Deal, well known farmer near Statesville, was instantly killed by the discharge of his own gun, while near his home. Although there were no actual eye-witnesses, the circumstances did not warrant an inquest as the gun was discharged while Mr. Deal was alone, in what manner it has not been determined. Mr. Deal had been in ill health for some time, suffering with pellagra.
--Jack Graham, negro of Fayetteville, was shot and killed almost instantly by Irwin Graham, his stepson, aged 12 years. The boy is being held in the county jail for investigation of the case by the grand jury. It developed from the evidence that the shooting grew out of trouble between the dead man and his stepdaughter, Sarah Graham, who testified that Graham had repeatedly made improper advances to her.
--Dr. W.A. Withers, director of the State College Summer School, which opens June 12 and continues through July 25, announces that an entirely new course in the textile industry will be offered this year for those working in mill communities. The course is intended primarily to familiarize those who are now teaching or expect to teach in mill centers with the fundamental principles of cotton manufacture.
--Dr. W.F. Drewry says that North Carolina has one insane person in a state hospital for every 527 of population; South Carolina one for every 608; and Virginia one for every 367. Insanity is not on the increase but more cures are affected that formerly and the institutions now care for people who were formerly cared for at home. Dr. Drewery figures that 25 per cent who are treated are discharged as cured or improved.
--North Carolina State College at Raleigh is on the verge of the biggest expansion in its history has determined that the growth shall take place along orderly lines and that neither beauty nor utility shall be sacrificed by haphazard location of buildings that are to be added to the college’s plant. The last legislature appropriated improvements at the college and from this fund six buildings will be added to the 34 now on the campus.
--Under the inspiring influence of the happy children and the splendid buildings and grounds of the Odd Fellows’ Orphan Home at Goldsboro, together with the elevation of Sam R. Currin of Greenville to the office of Grand Master, the North Carolina Grand Lodge of the Independent Order of Odd Fellows’ at its annual meeting last week, enlarged its vision and rededicated itself to the care of the fatherless of its membership and other features of the mission of Odd Fellowship.
--Alumni home-coming day at State College promises to be one of the big features of commencement, according to ?? Stafford, alumni secretary, who stated that in addition to a large percentage of the members of the seven classes due this year for reunions, quite a number of other Tech alumni would journey back to West Raleigh for the finals. The first graduating class, that of 1893, will hold a reunion this year just 30 years after graduating.
--Following the reading of a prepared statement in which he reviewed the history of the State Sanatorium and declaring that Dr. L.B. McBrayer is the only man in the State who could have administered the institution so successfully, Dr. W.S. Rankin, Secretary of the State Board of Health told the legislative committee investigating the conduct of the Sanatorium that Dr. Reuben McBrayer and Lewis McBrayer, sons of the Superintendent, should not longer be continued in the service office of the institution.
--Frances McCurdy, 76-year-old daughter of Mr. and Mrs. McCurdy of Murphy, N.C., pleased guilty in United States District Court to robbing the Murphy post office. She told the court how she dressed in overalls, slipped into the room of Osborne Cope, postal clerk, and removed the keys to the office from his pocket while he was asleep. She testified that she had copied the combination to the safe several days previously and the securing of eight registered letters containing $15 and $150.91 in cash was therefore easy.
From page 3 of The Independent, Elizabeth City, N.C., May 25, 1923
