CABARRUS GENEALOGY SOCIETY

The Great Cabarrus Turkey Scam Buying Thanksgiving Turkey, c.1910-1915.  Library of Congress,   http://www.loc.gov/pictures/item/ggb2005011259/ In late November of 1915, a slick-tongued stranger came to No. 10 Township (Midland area) and Bost Mill. He represented himself to be the agent of a large poultry concern in Danville, Virginia and was looking to buy all the turkeys the farmers would sell: and so began the great Cabarrus turkey scam. The stranger identified himself as E. S. Bowen. After securing lodging, he began making the rounds with a wagon and driver to the area farmers. Bowen hired one of the farmers to make crates to hold turkeys. The going rate for turkeys was 15 cents a pound, and many of the farmers had already committed their birds to area sellers for the holiday season. Bowen said he wanted the birds for his Danville connection and would make it worth their while. He said they had provided him with a big checkbook and he would be able to pay much more

Cabarrus Halloween Matchmaking Party In the second half of the nineteenth century, America was flooded with new immigrants. These new immigrants, especially the millions of Irish fleeing Ireland’s potato famine of 1846, helped to popularize the celebration of Halloween nationally. Its origins date back to the ancient Celtic festival of Samhain and the All Saints Day celebration called All-hallows or All-hallowmas. By the late nineteenth century, there was a move to mold Halloween into a holiday more about community and neighborly get-togethers than about ghosts, pranks and witchcraft. Halloween parties for both children and adults became the most common way to celebrate the day. Parties focused on games, foods of the season and festive costumes. Hostesses enjoyed creating unique and elaborate celebrations. Of course Jack O'Lanterns glowed from every nook and corner. Refreshments were often mulled cider, grapes, apples, and nuts while a "dutch lunch" was serv

"Black Tongue" Takes a Toll in  Cabarrus County and Across the South The following contains excerpts from Gail Jarrow's book  Red Madness:How a Medical Mystery Changed What We Eat  and her website http://www.gailjarrow.com/pellagra.html. Pellagra struck all age groups. Photo:  http://www.gailjarrow.com/pellagra.html Between 1900 and 1940, at least 100,000 individuals in the South died of pellagra, or "black tongue," a dietary deficiency disease. The accelerated rise of pellagra was especially difficult in farming and mill communities. Its effects were felt in Cabarrus County as workers struggled to feed their families during times of economic hardship.  The July 6, 1911  Charlotte Observer  reported that "Mr. J. D. Bost, a well-known and popular young man of the city [Concord], was taken to the Charlotte sanatorium this morning to be treated for pellagra. Mr. Bost's health failed several months ago and and it became necessary for him to

Pioneering Cabarrus Dentist, Dr. W. C. Houston Dr. William Cyrus Houston. Photo courtesy of D. Rudge, www.ancestry.com. It's fascinating to see how far we have progressed over the past 125 years or so when it comes to the field of dentistry. When Dr. William Cyrus Houston set up his practice as the third dentist in Cabarrus County history on April 8, 1890, it was a crude and painful business by today's standards. Located in Concord, Dr. Houston rented the rooms on the second floor over what was then Misses Benson & Fisher's millinery store at 14-1/2 South Union Street (now Angela's Gift Boutique), and spent all of his 54 years of practice in the same office. The only other dentist practicing in Concord when Dr. Houston arrived was H. C. Herring. In a 1964 newspaper article, Dr. Houston recalled that those were the days before local anesthesia. In fact, at that time, general anesthetics were almost never used by dentists. He described his patients as &q

Emma Hudson Eagle: First Matron of Cabarrus' Stonewall Jackson Training School Emma Hudson Eagle, 1939. At an age when most are considering retirement, Emma Hudson Eagle took her first job outside her home. She was 53 when she became the first matron of the King's Daughters Cottage at the Stonewall Jackson Training School in 1911. A native of the Rocky River community, Emma J. Hudson was born the fourth of six children to farmer Seth Hall Hudson and Frances Alvira "Fannie" White  on 8 Dec 1858 . Her father was a Confederate soldier, and although he survived the war, he died shortly after his return. After his death, the family moved to Concord. In a 1939 interview, The Concord Tribune described Emma's childhood schooling in the years after the war: "She went to an old log school house with an immense log fireplace at one end. One long desk was nailed to one side of the room and there the older students sat to do their writing. The others sat on cru

Cabarrus Troops Called to the  Mexican Border  on June 24, 1916 Headline of The Concord Times , June 19, 1916. During the early 1900s, the United States found herself with a very uncomfortable neighbor to the south. The violence of Mexican revolution frequently spilled across the border into Texas and New Mexico. After Mexican bandit and general Pancho Villa deliberately killed over 30 Americans and burned Columbus, New Mexico, President Woodrow Wilson called the nation's militia to arms. In June 1916, Company L of Cabarrus County assembled for the trip to the Mexican border. The 65-man National Guard unit quickly recruited the additional manpower needed to meet war strength of 142 men. On Saturday, June 24, Company L departed by train for Camp Glenn, Morehead City, NC, to be placed under the 1st North Carolina Infantry, Colonel J. T. Gardner commanding. By September, Company L was camped at El Paso, Texas for border patrol. Luckily, Company L was able to return h

Take Me Out to the Ball Game:  Cabarrus Doctor J. W. Moose Patents Early Baseball Bat Patent No.377,656 baseball bat drawing by Dr. John W. Moose, filed 9 Sep 1887. "To all whom it may concern: Be it known that I, John W. Moose, a citizen of the United States, and a resident of Mount Pleasant, in the county of Cabarrus and State of North Carolina, have invented certain new and useful Improvements in Base-Ball Bats; and I do hereby declare that the following is a full, clear and exact description of the invention, which will enable others skilled in the art to which it appertains to make and use the same..." Dr. John Wesley Moose of Mount Pleasant had an idea to improve upon the wood baseball bat. In the 1860s, there were almost as many types of baseball bats as there were baseballs. And like early pitchers, who made their own balls, early batters were known to sometimes whittle bats to suit their own hitting style. For many years there was room for experimentat

Cabarrus Man, Bill Allman, Was an Alaska Pioneer and Larger Than Life Adventurer Bill Allman, c. 1983 If you lived in Concord in the 1970s and early 1980s, you may remember Bill Allman. Each year, he headed south like a snowbird from Alaska to Concord. Here he would rent a small room at the Hotel Concord and spend the winter months visiting family and old friends, sharing stories of his great adventures in the frozen north. Then each spring, the old gold miner and prospector would return to the life he loved in rural Alaska.  The spring of 1984 was no different. As he had done for half a century, he headed out on May 30, 1984 to prospect for gold in the rough tundra near Marshall, Alaska, about 550 roadless miles north of Anchorage. He was taken by float plane to his claim on Tom Gray Creek, near the Yukon Territory and was to be picked up at a prearranged spot on July 18 for a return trip. But unlike previous excursions, this time he didn't show up. Bill Allman had disapp

"Aunt Dill" was a Mother Figure to Many in Eastern Cabarrus Idelah Misenheimer Heilig. This weekend we celebrated Mother's Day. It is not only a special day to honor women who have children, but also the women who have given of themselves for the betterment of the life of a child. Although Idelah Misenheimer Heilig of Mount Pleasant had ten children of her own, she is said to have helped bring into the world many more.  Idelah (depending on the source it may be spelled Idella) also went by the name of Dilly and later Aunt Dill. She was born in Stanly County on March 25, 1848 to slaves Abner Misenheimer and Edith (last name unknown). She was initially the property of Rev. Levi Shankle of Albemarle and moved to the Mount Pleasant area when she was age seven. In In 1860 she was willed to Shankle's daughter Martha along with another slave named Elmira. Martha Shankle married Jacob J. Misenheimer in 1855 in Cabarrus County and settled in Mount Pleasant. It is repor

Cabarrus Coal and Ice Man A. B. Pounds Concord coal and ice distributor A. B. Pounds. On October 26, 1933, well known businessman A. B. Pounds, age 53, was found shot three times in the office of his former ice plant in downtown Concord. O ne of Concord's outstanding businessmen for more than twenty years, his name was  synonymous with coal and ice distribution. Arthur Bundy (A. B.) Pounds was born in Cabarrus County in 1879 to John Taylor Pounds and Laura Katherine Dove and had lived most of his life in Concord. He was married on Christmas eve 1901 to Annie Misenheimer and had two sons, Frank and Carl, and a daughter Emily. One of his earliest business successes was as an oil distributor, and then later as a coal and wood dealer. For many years Pounds served on the directorate of Cabarrus Bank & Trust Company and was also affiliated with the Imperial Cotton Mills of Edenton, Georgia. He and his family lived on West Corbin, but also had a  stock raising farm near Salisbu

Harris Documents Early Farm Life in Cabarrus County "American Farm Yard - Evening," Currier and Ives, 1857. Library of Congress. Previous blog articles have discussed William Shakespeare Harris' twelve-page, hand written essay titled "Essay on Agriculture" ( 9 Apr 2014 and 30 May 2014 ). The essay details early life in Cabarrus County, including crops, farming and building techniques, clothing and lifestyle. Presumably, Harris learned much through his own experiences and those of elder Harris family members. Unfortunately, the date and circumstances of the essay are unknown. However, William Shakespeare Harris seems to have written the essay in response to a request from another party, most likely between 1850 and 1875 after Harris had farmed for a number of years. After the passing of his first wife Elizabeth Torrence Powe in 1849, William Shakespeare Harris married Jane Witherspoon Ervin about 1851. They had at least four children, listed in the 1870

Dear Brother: A Cabarrus Soldier Writes Home Library of Congress : "News from home". (Soldier at Culpeper, Va., Sept. 30, 1863). Pencil drawing by Edwin Forbes, 1863. Today marks the sesquicentennial of the The Battle of Appomattox Court House, fought on the morning of April 9, 1865, and the subsequent surrender of Confederate Army general Robert E. Lee's Army of Northern Virginia to the Union Army under Lt. Gen. Ulysses S. Grant. The signing of the surrender documents occurred in the parlor of the house owned by Wilmer McLean on the afternoon of April 9. On April 12, a formal ceremony marked the disbandment of the Army of Northern Virginia and the parole of its officers and men, effectively ending the war in Virginia. This event triggered a series of surrenders across the south, signaling the end of the war. The author of the letter reprinted below was Richard Martin Patterson (1830-1909), a farmer and carpenter from northwestern Cabarrus County. He was married

Cabarrus Businessman Bascom Umberger  Financed Education Through Music Bascom Umberger in his office instructing a salesman. The office was upstairs on the corner of Union Street, S. and Barbrick Avenue. The following article contains excerpts from the June 1974 issue of Progress Magazine, produced by the Concord Telephone Company.  About 1905, an enterprising and ambitious young man by the name of Bascom Leonard Umberger established a new business in Concord called The Home Educational Company. He was vitally interested in education, and his new enterprise sold and distributed books and other educational materials in North Carolina and several adjacent states. Included in the activities of this new establishment was the promotion and sale of a stringed musical instrument known as the "Mandolin-Guitar Harp." The Mandolin-Guitar Harp has strings arranged so that the notes of chords occur in groups. The Mandolin-Guitar Harp, a type of modern chord zither, w