Wade Wilson (Pap’s father)
Several months ago I shared an old flyer of Granny’s about her Grandpa W. T. Truett preaching a revival in our area. You can see that post here.
Don Casada used the online resource digitalnc.org to find articles about W. T. Here’s a blurb from the website describing what they do.
“The North Carolina Digital Heritage Center is a statewide digitization and digital publishing organization housed at UNC’s Wilson Special Collections Library. We work with North Carolina cultural heritage organizations* to scan, describe, and publish historical materials online, increasing access to and use of their collections. We are North Carolina’s hub for the Digital Public Library of America. The Center is supported by the State Library of North Carolina with funds from the Institute of Museum and Library Services under the provisions of the Library Services and Technology Act, and by the UNC-Chapel Hill University Library.”
Since Granny’s grandpa was a prominent preacher in our area I found many mentions of him in our local newspaper by searching the website. Some were short little pieces about him holding a revival or marrying a couple others where about special celebrations that were held in his honor.
I searched for Granny’s mother, W. T.’s daughter Gazzie, and only found where land had been transferred to her from her siblings. I did discover other women in the state of NC that were also named Gazzie. It’s a unique name and I’ve never known anyone else to have it.
After that I searched for other family members. Some names turned up something, but many did not since not everyone has cause to be in the newspaper.
The most fascinating things I found other than reading about W. T. were mentions of Pap’s family under various community headings.
Upper Peachtree May 1, 1941
Mr. and Mrs. Wade Wilson and children of Canton spent Saturday night with Mr. and Mrs. J. W. Barker.
(Although I know Pap’s family moved around a lot here in Brasstown, I did not know they lived in Canton during this time. Pap would have been three years old.)
Midway August 12, 1943
Those visiting Mrs. John Parrish, Sunday evening were: Mrs. Wade Wilson and children.
Mr. and Mrs. Ben H. Wilson are moving to their new home on Little Brasstown. Mr. and Mrs. James Elliott and Oscar Elliott of Newport News. Va. are spending a few days with their sister Mrs. Wade Wilson.
Ben H. Brown and son Bud, Mr. and Mrs. Arthur Phillips, Will Swanson, Wells Penland, and son Hugh, Arthur Jones, James Elliott, and Mr. and Mrs. Oscar Elliott were in town on business Saturday evening.
Mr. and Mrs. Oscar Elliott went to Canton Saturday afternoon to visit friends and relatives.
(There was a John Parris Pap remembered from the time they lived on the Harshaw Farm. I wonder if this is the same man and the paper spelled his name wrong? All the Elliotts mentioned in this portion are Pap’s uncles and aunts. Interesting that Oscar and his wife went to Canton to visit. They lived in Canton my entire life, but Pap showed me where they lived here in a little house just down the road. Daffodils still bloom there every spring of the year although the house is long since gone. This was during WWII. I know Oscar served, I’m not sure about James. Papaw Wade was turned down because of a leg injury he suffered as a child. Although he worked in the ship yards in Newport News VA. I’m guessing that’s why James and Oscar were there at this time too.)
Midway October 21, 1943
Mr. and Mrs. Ben Wilson and family of Little Brasstown spent Sunday with their son Mr. and Mrs. Wade Wilson.
(I had to ask Clay Logan to tell me where Midway is. It is between Martins Creek and Murphy. The distance isn’t very far by car today, but I doubt they had a car at that time nor would the roads have been like they are today.)
Little Brasstown February 3, 1944
Mr. and Mrs. W. O Almond, Mrs. B. H. Wilson and daughters and Wade Wilson visited Mr. and Mrs. Johnny Parish at Midway Sunday.
Ben Wilson is visiting his son Blaine who is ill at Asheville.
(Notice the spelling of Parish in this one. I never met Blaine, but there are signs of him having been here in Wilson Holler. He brought princess trees and set them out thinking they were catalpa trees. He was hoping the trees would provide fish bait for him so that when he came to Brasstown to visit he could go fishing.)
Little Brasstown October 5, 1944
Mrs. Wade Wilson visited Mrs. Roscoe Hughes Saturday. Mary Joe Elliott of Canton spent Saturday night at home. Dillard Carringer and J. V. Hogan visited at Pin Hook Friday. Mrs. Wade Wilson and family spent Sunday with her mother Mrs. B. H. Wilson.
(J.V. Hogan was Betty Jean Hogan’s husband. You may remember she taught me to make cucumber relish. Mary Joe was Pap’s great aunt.)
Little Brasstown November 9, 1944
Wade Wilson and family of Pinhook have moved to Midway.
Little Brasstown May 24, 1945
April 29, Frank Elliott, who has been with the U. S. Marines in the South Pacific for almost three years, is spending a leave here with his parents.
Ross Hughes spent Saturday night with Wade Wilson at Midway.
(I remember Uncle Frank well. He is the reason Wilson Holler exists today. He sent money home to his mother to help pay for the land.)
Little Brasstown September 20, 1945
Mr. and Mrs. Wade Wilson of Midway spent the week-end with Mrs. Wilson’s parents. Mr. and Mrs. B. H. Wilson.
Little Brasstown February 27, 1947
Dallas and Arnold Stalcup visited relatives on Pin Hook Sunday. Wade Wilson spent Saturday with Horace Stalcup.
Little Brasstown August 16, 1951
Mrs. Wade Wilson and children of Pine Log spent the week-end with her mother, Mrs. B. H. Wilson.
Little Brasstown December 4, 1952
Wade Wilson was the Sunday guest of W. A. Almond last Sunday.
September 1, 1966
The Rev. Virgil Brown, 69, of Rt. 1, died in a Hiawassee, Ga., hospital Tuesday morning, August 23 after a brief illness. Mr. Brown was a native of Union County, Georgia, and a son of the late Ed Orr and Minnie Worley Brown of Union County. He had been a Baptist minister for more than 40 years, having served churches in north Georgia and Western North Carolina. He was a member of Dry Branch Baptist Church. Surviving are the widow, Mrs. Lula Gibson Brown; three daughters, Mrs. Lester Danner of Twenty-Nine Palms Calif., Mrs. George Lee of Hayesville and Mrs. W.A. Henson of Smyrna, Ga.; three brothers. Claude of Atlanta, and Ben and Howard Brown of Warne; a sister, Mrs. Buck Helton of Warne; and nine grandchildren. Services were held at 10 a.m. Thursday in Many Forks Baptist Church. The Rev. Jimmy Rogers and Rev. Dill Stevens officiated and burial was in the church cemetery. Pallbearers were the Rev. E.O. Phillips, the Rev. Early King, the Rev. John Wade, the Rev. Hoyt Brown, the Rev. Wade Wilson and the Rev. Odie Rogers.
Pine Log July 11, 1968
Mrs. Wade Wilson and Mr. and Mrs. Bill Penland were the Sunday dinner guests of Mr. and Mrs. Keith Miller.
(Mr. and Mrs. Bill Penland were the parents of Mrs. Keith Miller (Katie-Mae). I don’t remember Bill but I dearly loved his wife Ina who was my Mamaw Marie’s sister. I also dearly loved Katie-Mae.)
June 11, 1970
Miss Brenda Taylor and William Earl Cook were married Saturday, at the home of the Rev. Wade Wilson of Brasstown. Only close friends and relatives of the bride and groom attended the double ring ceremony. Mrs. Cook is a 1970 graduate of Murphy High and the daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Charles Taylor of Clermont, Fla. Mr. Cook attended Murphy High School and is the son of Mr. and Mrs. John Robert Cook of Brasstown. They are making their home in Murphy.
(This was a very sweet discovery! Brenda passed from cancer several years ago. Earl and Brenda’s kids were my age. Brenda’s sister Hazel is the mother of one of my best friends. So nice to think about the marriage happening right here in Wilson Holler.)
As I searched and read about the goings on of my Wilson and Elliott family I couldn’t help but think about how the newspaper community articles were very similar to today’s social media posts that share how people went here or there or about their latest family gatherings.
I knew Papaw and Mamaw Wilson moved around our general area quite a bit before they landed here in Wilson Holler. The articles highlight those frequent moves.
Especially heartwarming were the mentions of visiting with one another for a day or a weekend. In those days travel was harder than it is for us to hop in the car and drive 15 or 20 minutes to see friends and family. I’m sure most of the traveling was done by shank’s mare (walking) so it made sense to stay a while.
I hope you enjoyed the old articles and my ramblings. I encourage you to check out the website if you live in NC and if you don’t it might be that your state has something similar.
Last night’s video: Appalachian English Examples.
Tipper
Subscribe for FREE and get a daily dose of Appalachia in your inbox
Tipper aint it wonderful to find family history in old news articles, it’s like Christmas morning to find such treasures.
Most newspapers should have bound (hardcover) copies of past newspapers year by year.
You can also find old papers on line at a site called chronicling america, not sure i spelled that right, but you can do a search for your state and county on the site. It’s addictive i must warn ya, lol
Rev Tom Truett baptized me in Caney Creek in 1975. He was 76 y/o!!
This post was so heartwarming. It brought back my memories of “going visiting” with my relatives during my summers as a child and long bare foot walks on dirt roads with my Paw (Grandpaw McCullock, Mama’s Daddy) to the little country stores a few miles from where they lived in Cracker’s Neck and Mill Creek, TN. We used to spend a lot of time visitin’ and porch sittin’ on Sundays with relatives. It was hard times for the grown-ups but I was blessed to have such sweet childhood memories of the time. I love Y’all.
I forgot to tell you in the other comment, Denise Holman was the lady who took my package. She is a super nice lady and she is a subscriber of yours also.
I heard your name on the radio today. WYCV-AM Gospel 9. The lady was talking about the Little Light Christian Bookstore. Then, lo and behold she’s talking about Tipper Pressley and her new cookbook. “I KNOW HER” I yelled, but she couldn’t hear me.
I don’t have a radio in the house so the only time I get to listen is in my truck when I’m taking off my trash, going to the post office and to the grocery store. Today I took a package to the post office to mail to my dearest friend.
Ed-that is so neat! I did not know they were advertising the event 🙂 Please tell Denise I said hello next time you see her!
Morning Miss Tipper, I really enjoyed today’s post. When I was in high school our local-ish news came from a town 7 miles west of where I lived. I anxiously looked forward to the weekly edition, called the Warrenton Banner. I’m not sure if it’s still published. When living, my dear mother-in- law sent a weekly edition to my husband and I. We traveled a lot, being an Air Force family. As a teenager I had desired to be in the business of reporting newsworthy things. I loved politics, local and national news just everything. Giving information to the public. Sadly that profession never came to fruition. I did work on our school newspaper. I loved doing that. I’m going on too long. So, I’ll say how much you help bring back these wonderful memories to this old woman. Thank you dear Miss Tipper. Have a blessed day. Love to Miss Louzine.
Reading old articles of people and times gone by is like bringing those folk and those times back to life – a way of remembering – and holding on to ‘tradition’ in a way. One of my cousins and my youngest son love doing this with ancestral tree searches – finding connections as to where everyone fits into all the ‘branches’ and where in the world the roots of that tree began. Be it a newspaper article or a family tree search, it is all a form of staying connected to one’s roots. And we need not know the people of ‘then’ to find it interesting, because we ‘know’ some of the people who came ‘after’ – as in ‘knowing’ you, Tipper, and your family in Wilson Holler in our today through this blog and your YT channel.
I still use a lot of those words today. I remember, sometimes when my grandpa talked, I would get lost in the translation. He was a hoot. I haven’t thought about him like this in years, shame on me! I need to start telling my grandboys some stories about that wonderful man. Thank you, Ms. Tipper, you bring out the nostalgia in me.
As always, praying for Granny!
My Grandparents lived in NE MS and when I was a teen the local newspaper read just like yours, Tipper. I thought it was wonderful telling of all the goings and comings of families. When I was tracing my family lines even back in the mid 1800’s and early 1900’s I could find family visiting family in old papers. One time my one Grandfather was delivering mail using a horse carriage and one of those new Ford A-mobiles was on that country road which the noise commotion caused the horse to bolt. He survived.
My Great-grandfather Pipes owned a farm and land on the other side of what they call Pittsburg Landing. I found another article in Savannah, TN., where my Great-grandmother took the ferry at what is now called Pittsburg Landing down to another landing where she could get a ride to my Grandmother’s home when my Grandmother was very sick. This was in 1918 when the flu killed a lot of people.
The city of Clinton, Tennessee has a weekly newspaper the Clinton Courier News. In the early 60’s a correspondent from each community in Anderson county would submit the news of the week from their community. My momma was the correspondent from our small community Fratersville. On Monday’s our telephone rang all day with people calling momma with their news. Here’s an example of a call: Mrs. Stewart is that you, well I have some news for you..we had a birthday party on Saturday for my little Nancy and everybody had a good time!! That was our social media! Momma took her job seriously because she loved the people of our community. In today’s social media, little Nancy’s birthday party would be on face book! Everyone have a great day!
The newspaper from my hometown still adds a few small articles about weddings, graduations, and family reunions, mostly at the request of the family. My paternal grandma was an Elliott. Ancestry shows both sides of my family having ancestors from NC. Who knows, we could be kin. I would be proud of that. Your Appalachian English Examples video kept me glued to the screen until the last word, which was well past my bedtime.
I love how the older newspapers were so much more personal. I have learned a great deal about my great-grandparents from finding old newspaper articles that mention them.
Those are such precious memories captured in print and now available online, how wonderful!
They show throughout that family and faith are what is most important in this life. The people God has placed us with, given us to love, are such gifts. I love seeing how your family has been so close for so many generations and still is. ❤️
I’m intrigued by the hint there may be a national program of digitization with each state running their own program under that umbrella. I have hoped to see that for quite some time. I hope all the deed books in each county can get digitized, though I expect many records have been deemed obsolete and destroyed. Glad you found all those tidbits of family history. I remember our county newspaper growing up. Like your community news, it had “gossip” type items from.all over the county and some correspondents in places like Muncie, Cinncinnati, etc from those who had gone seeking work. There is no paper copy newspaper in that county anymore.
In my youth the town I lived, in WV, had two newspapers. One was delivered in the morning and the other was delivered in the evening. My mom was part of a local sorority and my dad was a member of the Moose Club so they were in the papers whenever special events were held by the clubs. My siblings and I were in them several times for anything related to a club, school events, military or marriage announcements and sadly even obituaries. In my young adult life before moving to NC the papers merged together. I’m not sure they even have hard copies delivered anymore, but they do have an online subscription. Since living in my neck of the woods of NC, we have one local newspaper. My daughter didn’t want her wedding picture in the paper. However, almost two years later when she and our son in-law had our first grandchild on New Years Day in our county, she had no choice to not be in the paper, because the newspaper came to the hospital to report on the county’s first New Year baby. My daughter at that time was a photographer so she preferred to be behind the camera, not the main focus of it. She was so thrilled with her baby, so agreed to be in the picture with her husband and daughter. I think that’s the only time since moving to NC any of my family has been in the local paper, but I’m okay with that. I think social medias have replaced newspapers today. Each person reports their own family news. I get on Facebook or Instagram and see all the news of my friends and family. I even have posted family news myself once in a while, but I’ve learned to be very careful what I post and when I post it. As good as social media is, it’s also as bad as it is. I only accept friend requests from people I actually know and I confirm with them if they actually sent the request, so I’m extremely curious. I miss getting a hard copy newspaper, one never had to worry about being hacked or scammed while reading a hard copy newspaper.
If anyone is researching their family tree, newspaper article can provide allot of information. In Ohio, libraries provide access to newspaperarchives.com (a paid service). My father’s uncle was a professional boxer, and I have found articles in many states across the U.S mentioning him. The website https://fultonhistory.com/Fulton.html (covers NY) provides free access to scanned newspapers. Check libraries in the area your family members lived to see if they have scanned newspapers as many provide free access.
Oh Tipper, how I enjoyed these sweet snippets of a sweet local paper. I grew up in a small town; far from being small today, but our little paper had many of these same type articles. You are correct in your observation of how social media has some of those same type stories. I believe it just shows you how we are all connected and interested in the goings on of others. Thank you for this wonderful piece.
I have some scanty newspaper articles on my third great-grandfather, Franklin Scoville. The areas mentioned are in Litchfield, Connecticut:
September 2, 1897-North Canaan
-Lucius Scoville and his wife went to New Hartford and spent Sunday with Mr. Franklin Scoville, it being his 88th birthday.
I have many more examples of newspaper articles of my third-great-grandfather’s comings and goings. It brings them to life.
I realize what I shared has nothing to do with Appalachia, but I hope you enjoyed it nevertheless.
Janice, I did enjoy! Thank you 🙂
I love reading the newspaper articles and goings on from long ago…for me I do not have to know any of the people to be able to enjoy reading about their comings and goings and meals and weddings. Brings back fond memories of my own ‘hometown’ newspaper and all the things it use to have in it—-nothing like todays papers (so many towns no longer print newspapers and I find that sad)
I remember a small town newspaper printing small articles about people of the community. Unlike with today’s social media you could believe what was wrote. I don’t have much use for today’s social media (Facebook), by the time a lot of it gets told by several people, they will have made a mountain out of a mole hill, sorta like we joked about at the company where I worked- you get a band-aid scratch on your arm in one of the front departments, by the time it gets to the back departments you had cut your arm off. I do none of this social media stuff- unless the Blind Pig is considered social media!
when i lived in Lincolnton GA they had a small newspaper published once a week that would still have all these luttle neighborhood news in it. I had moved there from Gainesville and thought that was very strange! Now that i live in Chattanooga, i truly miss small town life….thanks for sharing and stirring old memories for me.
Kelly, it has been 30 years since I visited Chattanooga, my uncle married a lady born and raised in Chattanooga and lived a big portion of their life right off of East Brainerd Road. They are buried in a cemetery very near the bottom of the Incline Railroad. Lincolnton Ga and Clark Hill Lake are some of my old stomping grounds.