Remembering Eddie Hicks

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Henderson native Eddie Hicks died Monday, Oct. 31.

Hicks gave back to his hometown in many ways, and he was a long-time employee with the Henderson-Vance Recreation and Parks Department. He also partnered with local programs, including Gang Free, Inc., to help young people in the community.

Hicks had said his own life had been influenced by coaches and teachers, as well as his parents. “I couldn’t have been successful (without them). I wouldn’t be who I am right now if it were for (those) folks,” he said in a December 2021 interview with WIZS to talk about having a shelter named in his honor at Fox Pond Park.

The Edward James Hicks Shelter was dedicated in a ceremony on July 29 of this year. “It really means everything to me – it really does,” Hicks said in that 2021 interview. “It brought tears to my eyes,” he said, when he learned that Shelter #1 would be renamed in his honor.

Kendrick Vann, director of the recreation and parks department, spoke with WIZS News Monday and said Hicks was so much more than a parks and rec employee – he was Vann’s godfather.

“He touched so many lives,” Vann said. “He took me on as a godson – that’s how I became a New York Giants fan,” he added, referring to Hicks’s stint with the NFL team.

Hicks was successful, by all accounts. His prowess on the football field as a Vance Senior High Viking got him noticed by college scouts and he earned a scholarship to play at East Carolina University.

He still holds the ECU record for longest rushing yard play – 95 yards. Hicks went on to play professional ball with the New York Giants and he was inducted into the ECU Hall of Fame in 2014.

When his pro career ended, Hicks returned home and picked up at parks and rec, where he had worked as a teenager and as a college student during the summer. His love of community and the desire to give back continued throughout the rest of his life, fueled by the memories of the mentors who had helped him as a youngster.

“Eddie loved the entire community,” said Gang Free, Inc. founder Melissa Elliott. She told WIZS News Monday that Hicks worked “tirelessly to make sure everyone was OK. Eddie was a true hero, leader and the epitome of a servant. Eddie loved God and it showed through his actions,” she said.

Mary Davis Royster Funeral Home is in charge of arrangements, Vann noted. Hicks is survived by his wife, Jackie, daughters Jennifer and Karen, and five grandchildren.

“There were so many people who loved Eddie Hicks back then, Hicks said in that December 2021 interview as he reflected on his early years growing up in Henderson. “And I appreciate it.”

The community will feel the loss and remember the compassion Hicks showed to everyone he interacted with.

The Local Skinny! COVID-19 Update

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There aren’t as many people routinely wearing face masks as there were this time last year, which is one indication that things are improving on the COVID-19 front. Or, perhaps people are just plain tired of wearing masks.

But public health professionals study and analyze the public’s health from a variety of perspectives to make sure people stay as safe as possible from disease. It’s important to know the why’s and wherefore’s, but the bottom line is that fewer cases of COVID-19 places both Vance and Granville counties are in the low community level.

Granville Vance Public Health Director Lisa Harrison and her staff continue to monitor both counties and stay updated on the latest information available.

Both counties, like much of the rest of the state, experienced a real spike in cases in January 2022, but the numbers had begun inching upward by November of 2021. By March 2022, the number of cases had dropped again to about the same levels that were being recorded before the winter surge.

As winter approaches, staying up-to-date on COVID-19 boosters is important, as is getting a flu shot.

Harrison spelled out in her regular COVID-19 update that health professionals must look at indicators other than just numbers of cases.

“Case numbers are not as reliable an indicator as they once were – people can use at-home testing kits and do not report those test results to public health,” she said.

Vaccinations and the all-important boosters also lower the risk of severe illness and death, she said, so looking at trends over time offers a more complete view.

Data indicators that health professionals look at include:

  • Virus particles found in wastewater
  • Emergency room visits for COVID symptoms
  • Health system strain and hospitalizations from COVID-19
  • Vaccines and boosters
  • Surveillance of new Variants
  • CDC COVID-19 community levels by county

And while it’s good news that both counties are in the low community level, Harrison included the following sobering statistics:

Vance County has had 14,655 COVID-19 cases and Granville County has reported 18,006. As for deaths from COVID -19, Vance County reports 130 and Granville County reports 124.

Vaccinations by the numbers:

 

Vance County

  • 68 percent of those over the age of 5 have received at least one dose of a COVID-19 vaccine
  • 63 percent are vaccinated with initial series complete
  •  5 percent have received the new booster
  • 24 percent of those ages 5-11 have gotten at least one dose of a COVID-19 vaccine
  • 18 percent are vaccinated with initial series complete
  • 52 percent of those ages 12-17 have had at least one dose of a COVID-19 vaccine
  • 45 percent are vaccinated with initial series complete

Granville County

  • 71 percent of those over 5 years have had at least one dose of a COVID-19 vaccine
  • 67 percent are vaccinated with initial series complete
  • 6 percent have had the new booster
  • 26 percent of those 5-11 years have had have received at least one dose of a COVID-19 vaccine
  • 22 percent are vaccinated with initial series complete
  • 45 percent of those 12-17 years have had at least one dose of a COVID-19 vaccine
  • 42 percent are vaccinated with initial series complete

Visit the CDC Data Tracker by County and the NCDHHS COVID-19 Dashboard. Relevant graphs from these dashboards are available on our website at https://gvph.org/covid-19_dashboard/.

Threat of School Shooting Cancelled Vance vs Webb; Vipers In Playoffs Now

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Vance County High School’s rival, senior night football game against conference opponent J.F. Webb High School from Oxford was canceled last Friday night.

A social media post Friday threatened a school shooting, according to Vance County Sheriff Curtis Brame.

Brame told WIZS News on Saturday that his office had identified the person responsible. He said, “Due to the responsible party’s age, we can’t release his/her name.”

This week’s game will feature the Vipers in the first round of the state playoffs.

Vance County will compete as a 25 seed and will face eighth seeded West Carteret, which is located in Morehead City.

A total of 64 teams make the state playoffs. Conference champions from each conference are seeded first by their RPI, then any second place automatic qualifiers and all at-large teams are seeded.

Isolated Shooting in Henderson; Intended Target and Innocent Bystander Shot

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UDATE 8:10 P.M. —

HPD Press Release:

A short time after 3:00PM this afternoon, Officers heard multiple gunshots in the area of Raleigh Road and S. Garnett Street and rushed to the area as 911 calls came in. Individuals parked in the parking lot of Hayes Brothers Muffler, 1002 S. Garnett Street, were approached and shot at.

The first of two victims were seated in their car when struck by gunfire at close range. We are certain this individual was targeted by the shooter. The victim drove away and was intercepted by emergency personnel a short time later and transported for medical treatment.

The second victim, an elderly female, was struck by a single round in the lower leg while seated in her car a short distance north of the incident scene. She was transported to a local medical facility and is currently in stable condition.

The assailant(s) fled the scene on foot and are believed to have gotten into a vehicle according to information and evidence located at the scene. An unoccupied vehicle and two structures were also struck.

We are diligently working to identify the suspect(s) at this time. The public has been extremely helpful and we hope the information continues to come in. Anyone with information is urged to call the Henderson Police Department at (252) 438-4141, our Crime Stoppers line at (252) 492-1925, or the P3 App on your mobile phone.

The Henderson Police Department is grateful for the assistance of Sheriff Curtis Brame and his Office and all the other responding First Responders. Acts of violence have plagued our Nation, and State and our perseverance will hopefully see us all through this.

•••••••••••••••••••••••••

UPDATE 6:20 P.M. —

Friday afternoon about 3:05, a man was shot just west of downtown Henderson and a female was hit by a stray bullet near the post office.

Henderson Police Chief Marcus Barrow told WIZS News it was an “isolated incident.” He said he didn’t know what may stem from it but that at the present time there was no public safety problem.

The suspect or suspects remain at large at this time.

Barrow indicated a male in his twenties was the intended target. He was “shot at point-blank range by the suspect,” Barrow said, in the Hayes Brothers Muffler Shop parking lot.

Chief Barrow continued and said a stray bullet “went up the street and struck an older female in the leg as she was going to the post office.”

The injuries sustained by the female were not believed to be life threatening.

The male shooting victim attempted to drive himself to Maria Parham Health but only made it as far as a fast food restaurant at the corner of Dabney Drive and Graham Avenue. From there, he was transported by ambulance to the hospital about two miles away. Barrow said the victim was “alert and talking upon arrival.”

WIZS News spoke with Vance County Sheriff Curtis Brame. He said the Vance County Courthouse was locked down but only as a precaution.

Vance County Schools postponed the Vance County High School football game. Athletic Director Ray Noel told WIZS.

Whether related or just a coincidence, other sounds believed to be gunshots were heard just north of downtown about 10 to 15 minutes after the original shooting. A person close to WIZS heard the and described it as gun fire. It’s believed to have occurred near the old bus station near the corner of Chestnut Street and West Andrews Avenue.

TownTalk: Hauntings Of Old Granville

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One of the reasons the stately old home known as Cedar Walk in Williamsboro fell into disrepair was because of the ghost that inhabited the premises.

And the Neal House in Epsom rode the poltergeist wave right in the early ‘80s, about the time the movie of the same name was popular – you know, objects flying around, dishes flung from their shelves.

And then there’s the legend of “Hatchet Man,” who wanders the general area of Oxford Road near the local country club.

Mark Pace and Bill Harris talked about these phenomena – and more – during Thursday’s tri-weekly history show on TownTalk.

Did prominent physician Hutchins Burton really haunt Cedar Walk? Who knows. But according to the writings of local historian S.T. Peace, Burton was hanged in the house, Pace said. And members of families who later lived in the house reported hearing all kinds of strange noise over the years, and seeing a ghost in the hallway downstairs.

“It got to the point,” Pace said, “that nobody wanted to rent the house.” And, unoccupied, it fell into ruin.

Whether you’re one who believes in the supernatural or chooses to find logical explanations for the seemingly inexplicable, the stories you hear – especially around Halloween – are interesting, to say the least.

The house known as Pleasant Hill in Middleburg, later called Rivenoak, was purchased by a young couple who moved in and set about restoration work, which including wiring it for electricity for the first time.

Joel Holloman Carroll was born in that home and lived his entire life there. He was a real creature of habit, and was known to strike a match against the same door frame near the kitchen each evening to light a lamp before before bedtime.

Carroll died there, and during the restoration, passersby would swear they saw a light shining through his bedroom window. The young couple’s ebullient Golden Retriever refused to cross the area that led to that same bedroom. And the couple’s young child would remark about a man standing nearby when there was nobody there.

  1. You could possibly explain those away – the light was a reflection from something, the dog was just being, well, a dog. And a child can have a vivid imagination.

And Hatchet Man?  The story goes that if you go over to the country club section of town into a particular area that once had been a dead end, dirt road, and cut off your car, Hatchet Man would show up, Pace said.

  1. Maybe that’s someone’s overactive imagination or maybe that was a story created to keep pesky teenagers off manicured greens.

But what about the poltergeist of Neal House?

“Dishes move, things fly off the table – literally fly-through-the-air kind of stuff,” Pace said. He was a student at ECU when he read a story in the student paper about the home.

“It was really active stuff,” he said, recalling some of the stories being told about that house.

 

Hear more stories in the full interview at wizs.com

 

CLICK PLAY!

TownTalk: Ghost Hunting With Michael La Chiana

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About this time each year, TVs in living rooms everywhere are filled with scary movies and TV shows about spooky things to entertain viewers. But there’s a big difference in the shows that are designed for entertainment and the shows that Michael La Chiana is producing.

La Chiana, a paranormal investigator and researcher, is dedicated documenting the “real” stuff.

His first show, “The Heritage Hunters: Journey Through the Past” was released last year and he told WIZS’s Bill Harris on Wednesday’s TownTalk that it’s already gotten 900,000 views.

His second show is due out next month, he said. The show can be found on Prime Video he said.

There’s nothing wrong with those scary movies and shows about ghosts, but La Chiana said he reminds folks that there IS a difference: “what you see on TV – unless it’s a true documentary,  is not real.”

When he investigates paranormal phenomena, he said he looks at every angle to prove – or disprove – what’s going on.

“I love to debunk everything that I can so I can find real evidence that’s there,” he said. That unexplained creak or pop could be a loose floorboard or clanging water pipe inside a wall.

He is pretty much a one-man production company – he investigates, films, writes, edits, produces – so his second episode has taken a couple of years to complete.

“I’m very thorough and I dig deep,” he said.

The second episode delves into the history of Tom Dooley, who was a real person hanged for a murder in North Carolina back in the 1860’s.

Yes, that Tom Dooley, that the Kingston Trio sang about in their hit song of the same name. La Chiana found Laura Reed, a Nashville recording artist who covered a rock version of the song, and she said he could include it in his show.

“To have original music is great,” he added.

The upcoming episode investigates the jail where Dooley was held for a long time, and La Chiana said he’s “captured so many things over the years.” He uses sophisticated recording equipment during his research and investigation, and said he especially enjoys hearing what he can capture on the audio recordings.

“What we’ve captured is insane,” he said of the upcoming episode featuring the legend of Tom Dooley. “We’ve asked several times ‘Who killed Laura Foster?'” La Chiana said. “We got a male voice telling us the name,” he added.

There’s VP – voice phenomena – that you can hear with your ear – and then there’s EVP – electronic voice phenomena – those sounds that are best heard on audio recordings.

La Chiana said he prefers to investigate alone or with as few people as possible, to be able to stay focused on the presence or disturbances in a particular place.

Future episodes of the show will feature real places, La Chiana said. “Places you can actually go…and check out yourself,” he said.

When he went to investigation the mysterious Brown Mountain Lights in the western part of the state, he said he was intrigued.

Could those lights be a natural phenomenon – an energy that comes up out of the ground?

“It’s very fascinating,” La Chiana said, adding that such phenomena are “not so ghosty and more of a mystery – I like those types of things, too.”