Day 75/365 Our Town

Spent this afternoon with DD at the local historical society and picked up these nifty postcards of Rocky Mount, taken in the 1900-1920's. While the postcards don't document it, this would be during Prohibition, when our county was the "wettest county in the world" with an estimated 9 out of 10 citizens were either manufacturing, transporting or consuming homemade illicit liquor. More about that in another post, but meanwhile, let these bucolic scenes set the stage.

The postcard above was a promotional flyer sent out, tolling the virtues of Rocky Mount, including "Paved streets and Sidewalks" (but ot roads), "Ample Banking Facilities" and "Adequate Fire Protection" (it wasn't until the 1950's and 1960's that historic buildings starting burning down), and "Five Religious Denominations".

This is Main Street, looking north in 1912. Note the dirt street, with the big stepping stones as a cross walk. If you notice on the right-hand side, about half way up the street, there is a bright white sliver visible. This is the obligatory Courthouse statue of a Confederate soldier, facing south as installed by the United Daughters of the Confederacy.

Many newbie residents think it's a statue of General Jubal Early (most famous Franklin County Confederate son), but it isn't - it's one of several stock composite Confederate soldiers created in the early 1900s to commemorate the Civil War veterans in the South. ***Another interesting historical note: supposedly Booker T. Washington, another Franklin County native actually contributed and raised funds for the Confederate statue. That's a whole 'nother post in itself -one I need to research -since I cannot help wondering why any Black American, never mind Booker T. Washington, would raise funds to honor soldiers that fought to maintain the status quo for himself and his family, i.e. slavery. I'll get back to you on that one.***

If you go up the street to the statue and turn right, our house sits about two blocks down on the left, and in 1912 it was already 54 years old. The fireplaces were still its only source of heat, there was no indoor plumbing, the kitchen was still a separate building in the backyard, and in the back corner of the yard, there was still a barn with wagons, horses and livestock.

Now we're looking south on the same street, but from the Courthouse corner. The Confederate statue is just out of sight on our left. The first telephone company sits to the right (and is responsible for that spiffy new telephone pole). Another stepping-stone crosswalk is laid here (these must have played havoc with wagon wheels). Most of these buildings are still here in 2009, albeit with bricked over facades, or missing balconies, but the trees are all long-gone.

This street has changed the most. In the early 1900s, Rocky Mount had not one, but two railroad depots. This one is the Franklin & Pittsylvania RR Station on the left. The Norfolk & Western is about a quarter mile further away, also on the left. Those little hoodlums hanging around at the right are outside the Soda Fountain shop.

In 2009, all of it is gone:

The railroad right-of-way lies behind the brick storefronts on the left, but it's now a walking greenway. The depot is long gone (and the N&W Depot is now a visitors center). On the right
is another block of brick commercial buildings, formerly banks and stores, but within the last four years made into a brand-new library.

Oh - and the Confederate Soldier at the Courthouse is gone too - run over and demolished a couple years ago by an out-of-control truck. It is due to be replaced, although it's a matter of discussion among the local citizens.

However, it'll still be a composite Confederate soldier, not General Jubal Early.

Day 33/365 Getting Through The First Great Depression

On this day of rollercoaster stock market rides and financial Twilight Zones, I thought we could look back at the Last Great Depression (my new name for it, since it appears we might be having a Great Depression Sequel).

This lovely house belonged to Nathaniel P. Angle, who was born here in Rocky Mount on September 10, 1861, during the first year of the Civil War. He was married in 1891, and died in 1936, having spent his whole life here in Franklin County.

Nathaniel Angle built an industrial empire and became Rocky Mount's most prominent businessman, almost all due to his work to bring the railroad to town in 1895, opening up markets for tobacco and furniture in then-faraway Lynchburg and Danville. By 1898, Rocky Mount had 600 inhabitants, 100 buildings on lots, two hotels, two factories, a machine shop and 14 stores. Two years later, in 1900, Nathaniel Angle dominated Rocky Mount's manufacturing and commercial economy by developing a variety of businesses, a trend that continued through World War I, and until his death in 1936.

During the Great Depression, Angle's business endeavors were able to keep most of Rocky Mount employed making fertilizer, sewing overalls, processing tobacco and building furniture. Angle approached President Roosevelt directly, and secured major benefits from the Progressive New Deal programs, including the Works Progress Administration and the construction of the Rocky Mount Post Office, as well as the Federal Emergency Administration with improvements to the water and sewer system, plus a research article conducted by the Federal Writer's Project.

Following his death, Nathaniel Angle's businesses continued to grow and profit long after World War II. Today, downtown Rocky Mount still has a business district that bears the Angle name.

I shop regularly at Angle Hardware, famous for having anything you need, and a lot you didn't know you need. It puts Lowes's to shame. This block of Angle buildings are actually circa 1951 - the original buildings that housed the overall factory were destroyed in a huge fire during the winter of 1950.

Nathaniel Angle died in 1936, leaving Rocky Mount much better than he found it, a concept that appears to escape most people these days, whether they be on Wall Street or Main Street, or walking the halls of Congress.

Day 12/365 Our New Deal Post Office

This is where I end up when I close off an email with "leaving to go ship".
This is the Rocky Mount Post Office, built by FDR's New Deal WPA
program in the 1930s. Inside there is a beautiful old mural that has been restored and cleaned to the original colors (yes I will get a photo one of these days). ***Addendum -7-26-08 - No, I won't get a photo of the inside and the mural. Turns out trying to do that upsets Homeland Security. ***

Just inside the front door is the old style dark wooden original architecture, with the newer glass doors added into that. Within the last year, I've switched to online postage, and it is more efficient, saves me time, uses barcoded labels that speed up shipping time, etc etc. But I miss standing in line at the post office and hearing all the local gossip, talking to my postal clerks (who are the best in the entire postal system), and seeing some of the local characters around Rocky Mount, who all seem to congregate at the post office.

Ebay has literally kept this post office alive - I once heard an estimate that maybe half of the business passing though here is due to ebay sellers.

I sometimes wonder if ebay realizes the extent to which they have become incorporated into people's livelihoods, not just on a individual level, but even to the USPS or office supply stores.

Tomorrow is another book sale day and it's box day on top of that, meaning I can buy as many books as I can stuff into a box, for $1-2.00 per box. Yes, we are taking the van and yes, we have added air to the tires. Wish us luck.

Day 6/365 Taking The Trash

Threw the DD in the car today to take pics around town while I drove.
Found out everything looks smaller in a photo: smaller mountains, smaller curves, smaller hills (whether looking up or down them), smaller strip malls (that's the silver lining right there).

So here's a small segment of our drive today entitled "Taking the Trash".
The reason we "take the trash" is not because someone is waiting for it on the other end and neither is it someone else's good trash that we are rummaging through on trash day. Our little town refuses to enact a leash law, mostly because of the "good ol boys" that run the town that grew up here with their packs of hunting dogs, and in the process developed a love for "dogs gone wild".

As a result, on Tuesday around noon, the town looks like a garbage truck exploded - the roaming dogs have gotten into everyone's trash and spread it far and wide.

So we haul the trash every few days out to the green boxes. It's a picturesque drive with switchbacks, narrow bridges, chickens, huge dogs that sleep on the shoulder of the road, and, at Christmas, The Christmas House (they fill their yard with *every* Christmas lawn ornament Walmart has ever sold). I especially like the big blow-up snow globes.

The top photo is the switchback curve, where you can meet yourself coming if you're not careful. If you pay attention, you can dodge the box turtles and black snakes on this section. To the left, the trees are scrub - they are growing out of rock, which goes straight up and forms Bald Knob. I've never been up there. One, I'd have to walk, and two, that's where the timber rattlers live. I know this because around Halloween time they crawl across our yard trying to get home to the rock mountain for winter.

This is the artificial dam, topped with a huge log jam. The town managers have gotten a federal grant to build a water park/tubing park along this river , but first they have to figure out how to blow up this dam.

They've been thinking on it for two years now.

Here's the interesting part: this dam is the view on the right side of the bridge. But if you look to the left side of the bridge, downstream, you see the water treatment plant.

I know I can't wait to go tubing there.

Further down the curvy road, braving the chances of bolting deer and waddling groundhogs, not to mention the occasional bear or coyote.

Still on the way to drop the trash off. Really.

Our green boxes, looking better than usual, since they've just been emptied. This is the hot spot for abandoning animals: a box of kittens or litter of pups. One of our upstairs kitties -Luna - was found here (the locals have a particular dislike for black animals -most of the abandoned and abused ones are black). Other things are left sitting outside the green boxes in the spirit of recycling: sinks, entertainment centers, recliners, and once, in a clean white bag, I found a white sweater, with a fur collar, and a $300 price tag still attached. Took it home and sold it on ebay.

This is the metal gate to the right of the trash boxes. It leads to the Live Ammunition Firing Range for our local police dept. That's why sometimes you see people dropping off their trash, and then they'll duck real sudden-like. It's the sound of the Glock's firing -we're still not sure which way that firing range is pointed. That gunfire is not to be confused with the gunfire from local hunters, or from locals in general taking potshots at silly women driving around taking pictures.

Day 2/365 The Bright House on Court Street

Today's photo is of our house - we've lived here 11+ years and this is the first picture I've taken of the front of it. The trees have gotten out of hand, so it's starting to look like Boo Radley lives here.

This is our third historic house (the first one was an 1875 Victorian gable that started out as a log house with a loft, then was built around that, the second was a 1900 Arts and Crafts that was hands-down our favorite house). This one - well, it's an experience.

It was built in 1858, by a man named Samuel Bright, on land that was originally an apple orchard in the 1700s. Samuel was the village tanner/saddler, and built our house for his daughter and her new husband. The couple lived here for two years before the Civil War exploded, and the husband went off to war, while his bride moved back in with her parents next door. Poor Samuel had just that year (1860) started another house (across the street from us) for his other daughter, and her new husband. He was a doctor, and left immediately with the local company to serve as medic in the war. He and his wife were still living with Samuel while their house was being built, so that daughter remained with her parents, and the house, with its one wall, just waited four years till the war was over. So Samuel ended up with one empty house (ours), a one-wall house (across the street) and both of his daughters back home with him and his wife and remaining 7 children.

One hundred and forty three years later, there are no more Bright's in town, and the three houses have gone through several owners, but otherwise they look pretty much as they did at the end of 1865. Our house still has the original window panes (and the original drafty windows), the five fireplaces, the American chesnut tree trunks that were used to built the main supports and walls, the solid worn plank oak flooring, and the wide woodwork and 8 foot tall pocket doors. Samuel's daughter would have no trouble recognizing her bedrooms, or her sitting parlor, but would miss the outdoor separate kitchen that stood where our garage stands now, as well as the barn that took up most of the backyard, and the lane that ran along the back to allow access for the horses. The last cherry tree from their orchard died 10 years ago, the apple trees are long gone, but the walnut tree is still there, and bearing bumper crops every year.

Samuel's house still stands next door (built in 1798), and the second house he built stands across the street, listed in the historic registry for being the home of Dr. Thomas Greer, the son-in-law medic who came home from the Civil War, to his one-wall house and his patient father-in-law.