Education, Newspaper Articles, Other Documents, Vocation

Where we worked: educators.

Henry W. McNeely, Mount Ulla NC — schoolteacher, circa 1870.

Joseph C. Carroll, Wayne County NC — second grade teacher, circa 1880.

John W. Aldridge, Wayne County NC — second grade teacher, circa 1880.

George W. Aldridge, Wayne County NC — first grade teacher, circa 1880.

Matthew W. Aldridge, Wayne County NC — second grade teacher, circa 1880.

Henry E. Hagans, Goldsboro NC — principal, State Colored Normal School, circa 1892-1920.

The State Colored Normal School opened in this city yesterday, of which Prof. H.E. Hagans, son of Napoleon Hagans, one of the most respected and prosperous colored men in the State, from the Fremont section, has recently been elected principal. The ARGUS is glad to note his election. He merited the preferment, and we wish the school all success under his administration. [– Goldsboro Weekly Argus, Thursday, 15 Sep 1892]

Clarissa Williams, Wilson NC — teacher, Eureka; Wilson Colored Graded School, circa 1890-1922.

2 Feb 1901. Called meeting of the Board, all present. Secretary stated that he had received the resignation of Mrs. Hunt as teacher of 5th grade, Col. school. Resignation accepted to take effect at once. Motion made that Clarrissy Williams be elected to fill the unexpired term of Mrs. Hunt. Carried. There being no further business Board adjourned, by order of Geo. Hackney, Chairman E.P. Mangum, Rec. Sec’y

27 May 1901. Miss Clarissa Williams re-elected a teacher.

9 June 1902. Teachers elected for Colored School: J.D. Reid, principal; Miss Clarissa Williams; Mrs. Annie Vick; Miss Geneva Battle; Miss Sallie Dortch (Goldsboro, N.C.) [from Minutes of the Wilson Graded Schools, bound volume, Wilson County Public Library]

Tabitha Pace Brunson, Garland AR – teacher, circa 1920.

Louise Colvert Renwick, Statesville NC — teacher, 1920s.

Golar Colvert Bradshaw, Iredell County NC — teacher, 1920s-30s.

Lillie Colvert Stockton, Statesville NC — teacher, Iredell County Schools, 1920s.

Mamie Aldridge Abrams Rochelle, Goldsboro NC, Union SC — teacher, circa 1930-1960s.

Arnetta L. Randall, Washington DC — teacher, Knoxville TN, circa 1930; Washington DC, circa 1940.

Fannie Randall Dorsey, Washington DC — teacher, circa 1930.

Vivian Manley Smith, Wayne County NC — teacher, circa 1930.

Margaret Colvert Allen, Statesville NC — teacher, circa 1930.

Marion Allen Lomans, Newport News VA — teacher, John Marshall School, 1935-1942.

Daisy Aldridge Williams, Asheville NC — teacher, circa 1940.

Mable Williams McCaine, Asheville NC — teacher, circa 1940.

Price B. Brown, Salisbury NC — teacher, circa 1940.

Sallie Bullock Brown, Salisbury NC — wife of Price Brown, “library work at school,” circa 1940.

Oscar Randall, Chicago IL — mathematics teacher, DuSable High School, circa 1940.

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The eighth in an occasional series exploring the ways in which my kinfolk made their livings in the 19th and early 20th centuries.

Births Deaths Marriages, Free People of Color, Migration, North Carolina, Other Documents, Paternal Kin, Photographs

The Randalls of Washington DC.

On 18 Dec 1890, Fannie Aldridge married Robert Locust in the presence of her sister Lizzie Aldridge, brother M.W. Aldridge, and Robert’s neighbor George W. Reid. Robert’s first wife, Emma Artis, had died the previous year, and it is likely that he met Fannie, who lived at the other end of Wayne County, through her family. Fannie’s sister Amanda was married to Emma’s father Adam T. Artis, and her brother John was married to Emma’s sister Louvicey Artis.

Fannie and Robert’s first two children, William Hardy and Fred Robert, were born in Wayne County. Circa 1895, the family left North Carolina for Washington DC after– it is said — Robert and a couple of Fannie’s relatives were involved in the murder of a white man. By time Robert, Fannie, his older daughters, and their boys arrived in DC, they were no longer Locusts. Robert, in fact, assumed a whole new name, and was George R. Randall ever after. According to their grandson, in order to collect Fannie’s inheritance when her father’s estate settled in 1902, the couple had to cross over into Alexandria, Virginia, where they were not known and could safely sign documents as Robert and Fannie Locust.

The 1900 and 1910 censuses recorded the family at 1238 Madison, then 138 B Street (no quadrant designated.) On 20 March 1917, Fannie “Randell” of 412 South Capitol Street was dead of heart disease. She was 44.

Washington Post, 24 March 1917.

In their 20 years in DC, she and Robert/George had been able to usher their children along the path to the middle class. Hardy Randall (1891-1967) went to work for the United States Postal Service. Fred R. Randall (1894-1996), a high school football standout, was a parks director. We met decorated officer Oscar Randall (1896-1985) here. Fannie Randall Dorsey (1900-1994) taught school, as did her sister Arnetta Randall (1904-1993). Edna Randall Breedlove (1909-1990) did not work after her marriage to Jesse Breedlove. George Randall died in infancy, as did two unnamed brothers.

Births Deaths Marriages, Land, Migration, Paternal Kin, Photographs

Where we lived: gentrified DC.

When she died in 1993 in Washington DC, the estate of Arnetta L. Randall, seventh of George and Fannie Aldridge Randall‘s nine children, included her home at 1377 Florida Avenue NE.

As has much of DC, Cousin Arnetta’s section of Near Northeast has undergone considerable change in the last decade. Her estate sold the house on 18 January 2001 for $12,000. Fourteen months later, it went for $135,000. Three and a half years later, the property again changed hands, this time for $191,000. Its owner held on during the real estate collapse of 2008, then sallied forth into a resurgent market in 2011. On January 25 of that year, he sold for $315,000. The climb continued: two years later, in February 2013, the house sold for $485,000.

There is surely no part of this Arnetta Randall would have recognized. Neither the astounding amounts that have changed hands over her small two-bedroom rowhouse nor the house itself, renovated in its every nook and cranny and painted a bright yellow on its way to a half-million dollars.

Newspaper Articles, Paternal Kin

Kappa legacy.

Col. Joseph H. Ward, M.D.

In recognition of the 102nd anniversary of the founding of Kappa Alpha Psi Fraternity, a 1934 Pittsburgh Courier article reporting a Kappa event at Tuskegee Institute. Dr. Joseph H. Ward, son of Napoleon Hagans and Mittie Ward, was director of the Veterans Hospital at Tuskegee at the time.

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Photo courtesy of W.M. Moseley, copy in collection of Lisa Y. Henderson.

Births Deaths Marriages, Free People of Color, Land, North Carolina, Paternal Kin, Photographs

Where we lived: Adam Artis’ Eureka.

Adam Artis bought and sold hundreds of acres in northeast Wayne County in the last half of the 19th century. Almost 160 years after he filed his first deed, his descendants remain on pockets of his land strung along Highway 222. More enduringly, their family cemeteries cluster east of Eureka toward Stantonsburg — at the heart of his erstwhile empire.

#1 marks the location of Adam Artis’ grave. His many wives and children notwithstanding, until the mid-1980s, his was the only readily identifiable grave in the plot.

#2 is the self-proclaimed “Historic John I. Exum” cemetery. Adam’s kin intermarried considerably with Exums, including his granddaughter Cora Artis, who married John Ed Exum, and his sister Delilah Williams, who married Simon Exum. Delilah and Simon, however, are buried at #3, along with several of their descendants.

Red Hill Road debouches into 222 across from #3. Not a half-mile back up the road, at least two and possibly four of Adam’s sons rest. Noah and June Scott Artis are buried in #4 with several of June’s offspring, as well as their brother Robert‘s wife and their brother Henry J.B.‘s wife and children.

About a half-mile, as the crow flies, south of #3 is #5, which contains the graves of Adam’s son William M. Artis and his descendants, as well a daughter of Adam’s brother Jesse Artis.

The road snaking northwest out of Eureka becomes Turner Swamp Road past the city limits. Just off the edge of this map, perhaps a mile up the road, stands Turner Swamp Baptist Church, once led by Jonah Williams, brother of Adam Artis, Jesse Artis and Delilah Williams Exum. A sizeable cemetery lies behind the church, and it contains the graves of Magnolia Artis Reid, daughter of Loumiza Artis Artis, who was another Artis sibling, as well as descendants of Zilpha Artis Reid and Richard Artis, yet more siblings. Turner Swamp itself appears as a dark green curve bracketing the upper left corner of the photo. It is likely that the original location of the church was north along the banks of the waterway, at the site where the overgrown graves of Jonah Williams and his family lie.

Back in the other direction, east on 222 toward Stantonsburg, lies Watery Branch Road. (The branch itself is the dark green sword piercing more than halfway into the frame from the right.) Perhaps a quarter-mile, if that far, down the road on the right lies the Diggs cemetery, another small family graveyard. Celia Artis, born about 1800, the wealthiest free woman of color in Wayne County, was the Diggs’ matriarch. She and Adam Artis’ kinship, if any, was unknown even to them. Two of Celia’s great-granddaughters married a son and a grandson of Adam Artis. Leslie Artis, his wife Minnie Diggs Artis, and some of their descendants are buried here.

Newspaper Articles, Paternal Kin

A garden party.

New York Age, 31 August 1905.

In 1905, Caswell Henderson was still married to the former Emma Bentley and still, perhaps, “one of the best known Republicans in the County of New York.”

Newspaper Articles, North Carolina, Paternal Kin

Tax delinquents.

Goldsboro Headlight, 27 December 1894.

Throughout December, local newspapers published lists of delinquent taxpayers. The list above was compiled by the tax collector for Brogden township, Wayne County.

Kinfolk in arrears included George W. Aldridge (son of Robert and Eliza Balkcum Aldridge); possibly James W. Artis (if this one is the son of Daniel and Eliza Faircloth Artis); Richard Boseman (husband of Lillie Mae Aldridge Boseman); Joshua L. Brewington (husband of Amelia Aldridge Brewington); Alexander Henderson (son of James and Louisa Armwood Henderson); Solomon Jacobs (brother-in-law of Sarah Henderson Jacobs); Abraham Martin (son of Waitman G. and Eliza Lewis Martin); Sidney Smith (brother-in-law of J. Buckner Martin); Hillary B. Simmons (husband of Ann Elizabeth Henderson Simmons); and Bryant Simmons (brother-in-law of John H. Henderson, or possibly father-in-law).

Births Deaths Marriages, North Carolina, Paternal Kin, Photographs

Family cemeteries, no. 6: another Artis brother.

Just south of Eureka, I crunch slowly up a gravel driveway toward a large, modern house. Three dirty-blond boys, alike enough to be brothers, stop their play in the garage to stare. I halt and ask permission to cross a small field to a cemetery marooned on a little island in its midst. They nod assent and return to their pastime, hip-hop blaring behind them. A lounging Rottweiler pays me no attention; a beagle mix wags greetings and accepts a head pat. I traverse perhaps 75 feet of damp soil to reach the hammock that holds the remains of William M. Artis and his family.

William and Etta Diggs Artis and children Doris, Tom and Elmer, mid-1930s.

William, son of Adam T. Artis and Frances Seaberry Artis, was in his 30s when he married Etta Diggs (1888-1988), daughter of Margaret Diggs and an unknown white man. Margaret Diggs was the daughter of Frances Artis, born free around 1842, and William Diggs. Frances Artis’ parents were Celia Artis, a wealthy free colored woman, and, reportedly, James Yelverton, a white man. Celia Artis was not related, at least in an immediate way, to William’s father, Adam.

It’s hard to tell below, but the William Artis graveyard is completely encircled by plowed land.

It’s in tolerable condition. Weedy, but it’s clear that it is periodically mowed.

Up close, one finds William and Etta,

and several of their ten children, including:

Others buried here include Frances Artis Edmundson‘s husband John H. Edmundson; Beulah Artis Best‘s husbands Leslie E. Exum and George Best; Leslie Exum’s mother, Ada Artis Exum Rowe, who, as the daughter of Jesse Artis and Lucinda Hobbs, was William Artis’ first cousin; and William and Etta’s daughter Margaret Artis Thompson (1910-1981) and her husband, J. Leslie Thompson.

This house stands in front the graveyard, facing the road. Was it William Artis’?

Beulah and Margaret Artis on either side of their cousin, Helen Carter, probably 1930s. Helen’s mother, Beulah Aldridge Carter, was their first cousin.

Copies of old photos courtesy of the late Dorothy Carter Blackman; others taken by Lisa Y. Henderson, December 2013.

Maternal Kin, Newspaper Articles, Photographs, Virginia

John C. Allen and Whittaker Memorial.

Sixty years today, the same day it ran his obituary, the Norfolk Journal and Guide published a photograph of my great-grandfather John C. Allen Sr., chairman of the Board of Trustees, accepting a charitable donation on behalf of Whittaker Memorial Hospital.

A few years earlier, the Journal of the National Medical Association printed this history of the hospital:

Enslaved People

January 1, 1863.

In honor of my enslaved ancestors, freed this day 151 years ago.

Color lithograph broadside, Chicago, Rufus Blanchard, circa 1864.

Scuffalong: Genealogy.

Monthly Archives: January 2014