TownTalk: Hispanic Heritage Festival Postponed To Oct. 8

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Add the second annual Hispanic Heritage Festival to the growing list of event postponements created by the threat of Hurricane Ian. But fear not, organizers have arranged for the festival to take place on Saturday, Oct. 8 from 4 p.m. to 8 p.m. in the area near the police department and library on Breckenridge Street. Melissa Elliott, Henderson City Council member and president of Gang Free, Inc. said the stage is set to provide the community with the sights, sounds and flavors of different Hispanic/Latino cultures – just a week later than planned.

“We’re grateful that everyone has agreed to participate” even though the date had to change to accommodate the predicted rainy weather.

The local Arts Council is sponsoring some of the entertainment scheduled, Elliott told John C. Rose Wednesday. There will be dancers performing traditional dances from Colombia and Mexico, she said, and numerous area restaurants will be providing food.

The event is free to the public. “We’re going to go out and have some fun,” she said, adding that it’s important to continue the momentum from last year’s festival and “celebrate everyone that lives, works and plays in our community.”

The popular electric bull will be back for anyone adventurous enough to climb aboard and then try to hang on, and there will be face-painting and other tamer activities to participate in, she added.

Mayor Eddie Ellington is scheduled to issue a city proclamation observing Sept. 15 – Oct. 15 as Hispanic Heritage Month. The festival falls right in the middle of this national observance, which satisfies Elliott’s quest for diversity and educating and empowering everyone in the community.

 

 

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TownTalk: Carolyn Thompson NC Court Of Appeals Candidate

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-The following is part of WIZS’s continuing coverage of candidates on the Nov. 8 ballot.

As a candidate for a seat on the NC Court of Appeals, Carolyn Thompson said it is her considerable experience as a trial attorney and as a district court judge that will serve her well if she is elected in the November 8 elections.

Thompson has 26 years’ experience as an attorney and judge, and she has advocated for victims of domestic violence and abuse during that time. She began practicing law in Vance County in 1996 and was a district court judge serving Vance, Granville, Warren and Franklin counties from 2009 to 2018. In 2018, Gov. Roy Cooper appointed Thompson to fill the unexpired term of a retiring Superior Court judge. She was defeated in her bid for the judgeship later in 2018, and now has set her sights on a statewide race.

Thompson is running for Seat 8 on the 15-member court of appeals. Judges sit in panels of three judges each, she told John C. Rose on Tuesday’s TownTalk. “If you’re not getting a fair trial or feel like the court didn’t apply the law correctly,” she explained, the case would get sent to the court of appeals for a ruling.

The appeals court sets precedents for lower courts, “courts I’ve already presided over,” Thompson noted.

She said she is the only candidate with prior judicial and trial experience.

Judges are charged with being impartial, and although Thompson is running on the Democratic ticket, she said party affiliation has no bearing on her role as a judge. “I am on the ballot with a party affiliation because that’s the current law,” she said.

“At no point have I ever asked a crying mother…grieving the loss of a child…or families who are broken because of a marital dispute…so – what’s your party affiliation?” she said.

“When you come before me,” Thompson added, “I will deal with you straight up.”

Thompson, a licensed and ordained minister, said she is committed to running a clean campaign, focusing on what she can bring to the job with “no disparaging remarks because we are all officers of the court.”

She is involved with Families Living Violence Free and shares her knowledge and experiences working with domestic violence victims and survivors of sexual assault and abuse. She said it is important for the community to understand “what domestic violence is, what it looks like and…what the law says about it,” Thompson said.

She said in the thousands of clients she has represented or had in her courtroom as a judge, there have been many heart-wrenching stories that stay with her today. But not all the memories are bad, Thompson said. She recalled the note she received from a young person now in military service who says “thank you” for caring all those years ago when life had been unkind. Or the victim of domestic violence who said Thompson “gave me a second look when no one else did.”

It’s good memories like those that balance out the bad, Thompson said.

Early voting begins Oct. 20. The general election is Tuesday, Nov. 8.

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Oxford’s CultureFEST Postponed; New Date Set For May 2023

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This Saturday’s CultureFEST in downtown Oxford has been rescheduled, thanks to the likelihood that the area will be dealing with the remnants of Hurricane Ian, now poised to hit Florida’s Gulf Coast tomorrow.

Two of the event organizers  – Oxford Mayor Jackie Sergent and Ajulo Othow – were on TownTalk Monday to spread the word about the event, which was going to mark its second year of being held in the parking lot at Littlejohn Street.

Sergent contacted WIZS News Tuesday morning to share the news of the postponement.

“We have made the difficult decision to cancel and postpone until next May,” Sergent said.

With weather forecasts predicting that North Carolina will be hit with heavy rains from the storm, it was a case of better safe than sorry.

TownTalk: Tyler Fleming’s Junior Shadowing Project

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Whether you know Tyler Fleming from school, swim meets, or First United Methodist Church, one thing’s for certain: The 17-year-old certainly is a wonderful ambassador for an age group that sometimes gets a bad rap.

Tyler, a junior at Kerr-Vance Academy, is smack in the middle of a three-day program called “junior shadowing,” which pairs students with different businesses in the community so they can learn a little bit of what goes on behind the scenes.

Wednesday was Tyler’s first day right here at WIZS, and today, on Day 2, he found himself in front of the microphone on TownTalk. He and John C. Rose talked about high schoolers’ busy schedules, his sports interests and the perks of attending a small school and living in a small community.

Whether it was watching car races and imitating the commentators as a 6-year-old or helping his church create videos during the COVID-19 pandemic, media and communications have held Tyler’s interest for much of his life. And when it came time for him to choose where he wanted to do his junior shadowing, he chose WIZS because “it’s a place where I could explore the world of radio and communications through digital media.”

There are just more than a dozen students in KVA’s junior class, and Tyler said “the goal is that each and every person in the class will do the shadowing.” The community agencies that partner with the junior shadowing project have been very receptive to having high school students come and see how their businesses operate.

“You can get out in the community (in a spot) where you have an interest and you can try things,” he said. “Being able to get somewhere (that) you can at least try it out – that directs us toward our future.”

The junior shadowing program gives students a chance to learn about something new, but it also can help them discern whether their interest in a particular field is something they wish to pursue.

As for Tyler’s experience, he said being a part of a small station has given him a chance for some hands-on learning from seasoned staff. He said time “to learn the small things” that keep a radio station like WIZS on the air – “like planning ahead and thinking about what you’ll be doing over the next few days…planning and dedication -it’s been really nice to have those insights,” Tyler noted.

Planning ahead and dedication are valuable commodities in everyday life as well, he observed. And he no doubt has to call both into play as he balances his academics with extracurriculars. He recently joined the KV cross country team as a way to cross-train for swimming, which he said he took up when he was about 7.

“It’s been a great sport not only to stay physically active, but leading me to other things like lifeguarding,” Tyler said. Swimming competitively keeps him aware of the other swimmers’ capabilities and keeps him hungry to be his best.

Listen to the complete interview at wizs.com

 

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Perry Memorial Library

TownTalk: Green Book Series Coming To Perry Memorial Library

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— courtesy of Perry Memorial Library

Click to Listen — TownTalk: Green Book Series Coming To Perry Memorial Library

The Perry Memorial Library will host a Community series that includes authors, Calvin Ramsey, Candacy Taylor, and Gretchen Sorin. The series will focus on the Green Book. The Negro Motorist Green Book was a guidebook for African American travelers that provided a list of hotels, boarding houses, taverns, restaurants, service stations and other establishments throughout the country that served African Americans. It was an annual guidebook that originated and was published by African-American New York City mailman, Victor Hugo Green from 1936 to 1966, during the era of Jim Crow laws.

On Monday, September 26th at 4 PM and 7 PM, author Calvin Ramsey will join us in person for a book discussion of his 2010 children’s book, Ruth and the Green Book. The story follows a young girl named Ruth who travels with her family from Chicago to Alabama to visit her grandmother. She learns of the Green Book which with its guidance and the kindness of strangers helps her family safely navigate travel during the Jim Crow era. Ramsey was born in Baltimore, Maryland and grew up in Roxboro, North Carolina. He is a playwright, photographer, and folk art painter. He is a former Advisory Board Member of the Robert Woodruff Library Special Collections at Emory University in Atlanta. He is also a recipient of the Martin Luther King, Jr. Drum Major for Justice Award.

Candacy Taylor will join us virtually on Tuesday, September 27th at 4 PM in the library board room to discuss her book, Overground Railroad: The Green Book and the Roots of Black Travel in America. The library has the adult version as well as the Young Adult adaptation available to readers to sign out. This book is a historical exploration of the Green Book and black travel with Jim Crow America across four decades. Taylor is an award-winning author, photographer and cultural documentarian working on a multidisciplinary project based on the Green Book. She is also the curator and content specialist for an exhibition that is currently touring by the Smithsonian Institution Traveling Exhibition Service (SITES). Taylor was a fellow at the Hutchins Center at Harvard University under the direction of Dr. Henry Louis Gates Jr. and her projects have been commissioned and funded by numerous organizations including, The Library of Congress, National Geographic, The American Council of Learned Societies, The National Endowment for the Humanities, The National Park Service, and The Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture.

To conclude, our community read series, we will be joined virtually by Gretchen Sorin on Monday, October 3rd at 6 PM in the library board room. Sorin will discuss her book, Driving While Black: African American Travel and the Road to Civil Rights. Driving While Black charts how the automobile fundamentally reshaped African American life, and opens up an entirely new view onto one of the most important issues of our time. Sorin also co-created the PBS documentary, Driving While Black with Emmy-winning director, Ric Burns.

Gretchen Sorin is distinguished professor and director of the Cooperstown Graduate Program of the State University of New York. She has curated innumerable exhibits―including with the Smithsonian, the Jewish Museum and the New York State Historical Association―and lives in upstate New York.

This community read series is funded by the American Rescue Plan: Humanities Grants for Libraries; an initiative of the American Library Association (ALA) made possible with funding from the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) through the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021.

The library has 25 copies of each author’s book to sign out at the circulation desk. “We are thrilled to be working with these three distinguished authors to discuss the significance of the green book” said Assistant Director, Christy Bondy. Henderson has three green book locations that have been identified. A zoom link will be provided prior to the virtual programs for those who cannot come to the library.

The library is located at 205 Breckenridge Street. For more information, call the library at 252-438-3316 or visit the website at www.perrylibrary.org.

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Community Partners of Hope

TownTalk: Community Partners Of Hope Helps Homeless Men

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Delthine Watson’s got the math memorized: 365 times 365 equals 133,225. But when you apply that simple calculation to the plan for the Community Partners of Hope men’s emergency shelter, the result can have life-altering consequences.

Watson, community network specialist for Community Partners of Hope, has complete faith that the community will help bring to fruition the dream to have the shelter open all year long. That plan is inching toward reality now – the shelter is opening a full month early this year, beginning Oct. 1. It previously had been open November through March.

“This year, with the support of the community, and listening to the community, we are opening up Oct. 1,” she told WIZS’s Bill Harris on Tuesday’s Town Talk. “We’re excited about that. But she is equally excited about the 365 Dream Team Campaign that calls for 365 entities -individuals, groups, clubs – to give $365 toward the goal of having the shelter and the services it offers open all year long.

Theirs is the only men’s shelter in the area, and Watson said they have clients who come from nearby counties, including Mecklenburg County, VA, for a warm, dry place to sleep. But the services end early in the morning and, as Watson points out, “during the daytime, they’re still homeless.”

The shelter is a place where men can get a hot meal, charge their phones, have a hot shower and a clean change of clothes, she said.

But once the shelter has its own space and can stay open all year, there could be opportunities for additional services and training to further help clients improve their life situations.

“Just imagine,” Watson said, “we could be able to operate all year, we could get a building…our dreams would come true.”

The $365 – she certainly welcomes more and understands if donors need to give less – would “help us do the things that we need to do – that we want to do.”

Bringing men from homelessness to some type of self-sufficiency is the goal, but Watson acknowledged that each client may have different needs.

Shelter Manager Darryl Jones helps clients a great deal, Watson said, and encourages the ones as they make life choices that take them from homelessness toward self-sufficiency.

Hearing updates from clients who have gotten their lives back on track definitely make for “feel-good moments,” Watson said. “But we don’t have enough of those.” Through additional programming, some life-skills programming and other services, she said the shelter could give the men what they need and what they are looking for.

Visit www.cp-hope.org or call 919.339.1426 to learn more about the 365 Dream Team Campaign.

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TownTalk: Infinite Possibilities Brings Awareness To Domestic Violence

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October is Domestic Violence Awareness Month and two upcoming events in the community are being organized as a way to boost visibility about the prevalence – and the local services that are available for those who may need help to get out of an abusive situation.

Bratanya Simmons and Vanessa Henderson work with Infinite Possibilities, Inc. and they spoke with Bill Harris on Monday’s Town Talk about a walk that will take place at Aycock Rec Center on Saturday, Oct. 1 and a candlelight vigil planned in Warrenton on Tuesday, Oct. 4.

Simmons and Henderson invite walkers to take place in the second annual awareness walk, which will be from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. on the track at the recreational complex, 307 Carey Chapel Rd., Henderson.

“Bring your walking shoes and take laps,” Simmons said. “There will be a t-shirt this year for all participants for coming out and supporting and honoring domestic violence victims.”

The candlelight vigil will take place at the Warren County courthouse square from 5:30 p.m. to 6:30 p.m.

Speakers for the event will include representatives from the Warrenton Police Department and the department of social services. “We’re asking everyone to come out…and light a candle for those who have lost their lives to domestic violence,” Simmons said.

Henderson added that domestic violence cuts across all socio-economic categories, and both men and women can be perpetrators as well as victims of domestic violence and sexual abuse.

As with so many other aspects of our lives, the COVID-19 pandemic created additional challenges for victims, as well as for those agencies like Infinite Possibilities which try to find helpful resources.

Simmons said she has seen an uptick in the number of people who contact Infinite Possibilities for help. “Victims were home 24/7 with their abusers and perpetrators” during the COVID lockdown. But the pandemic also created additional hurdles as far as finding resources for victims, too, Henderson said.

“Not only was the pandemic bad on the victims but on the support systems for those victims were eliminated due to the lockdowns and not being able to access family and friends,” she said. The COVID lockdown affected the mental health of domestic violence survivors as well, she added.

It was also difficult to find shelters to accept victims who lived outside the county where the shelter was located.

Neither Vance County nor Warren County has an emergency shelter, and although the women have heard rumblings about the need for a shelter in the area, they said they were unaware of further plans.

Currently, they use shelters in Franklin, Durham and Wake counties.

“A shelter is needed in the area for domestic violence victims,” Simmons said.

Some basic needs are met through different organizations and referral services, but Henderson said there is a need for more.

So often, victims of domestic violence reach out to organizations like Infinite Possibilities without having a clear idea of what it is they want or need, so Simmons said it’s important to ask them specifically what they would like to have happen: is it going to an emergency shelter or is it having a restraining order in place?

They may not know how to ask for a protection order, or what kind of order they need. It takes, on average, “ seven times for victims to decide they are ready to move on and go through the court process,” Simmons explained. Organizations like Infinite Possibilities walk victims through the process.

But, Henderson added, they adhere to a strict confidentiality policy to provide safety for the victims, “ so their information is not released to anyone who could possibly put them in danger.”

The crisis line is available 24 hours a day and accepts calls and text messages. That number is 252.425.2492. The phone number for the office, located at Gateway Center, is 252.431.1926.

The number for Simmons is 252.257.1044.

Learn more at https://infinitepossibilitiesinc.net/

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TownTalk: The Story Of Drewry

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ACC basketball fans may know it as the hometown of the 1980’s Duke player David Henderson.  History buffs may know it by its earlier name of Enterprise. But anyone who remembers Ripley’s Believe It Or Not! may be able to recall that it is the teeny community of Drewry that, in the 1940’s had an old-fashioned well. Right in the middle of town.

“There was a town well in the middle of the crossroads,” Pace said, which caught Mr. Ripley’s attention. The well remained there until about 1947. “When the state paved the road, they took it up,” he said.

Leave it to local historians Mark Pace and Bill Harris to discuss in detail a community that straddles the present-day Vance/Warren county line.

“Before Kerr Lake came along, you could drive from Townsville to Drewry in seven minutes,” Pace said. Its first name was Cedar Fork, according to Pace, North Carolina Room specialist at Oxford’s Richard Thornton Library. In the 1840’s and 50’s, it was known as Enterprise. But when the Roanoke Valley Railroad came through, it was renamed because it was Drewry Marrow who took care of the railroad there.

By 1881, Drewry held the distinction for being the smallest township in Vance County in terms of size and population, Pace said. It later melded with the Middleburg township.

“There was a time when Drewry was actually a thriving little community,” he noted. “It wasn’t a bustling metropolis,” but there was a café, two barber shops – one for Blacks and one for Whites – a school, butcher shop, school, dry cleaners, fire department and railroad station. It was the halfway point for the railroad, which went back and forth between Manson and Townsville.

In 1940, Drewry was the very first precinct to report results in the Nov. 6 Presidential election. All votes were cast and counted by 8:53. In the morning. The 24 registered voters “all got together and agreed to cast their votes at the same time,” Pace said. “FDR won 100 percent of the votes” cast at Walston’s store in the Drewry precinct.

But folks in and around the Drewry community were interested in politics well before 1940.

A schoolteacher from Virginia named George Sims moved to the area in the 1750’s. He wrote the Nutbush Address, a treatise that pointed out how politicians of the day were abusing their rank and privilege at the expense of the common man. Later, when Samuel Benton (a founding father of Oxford) wrote the Halifax Resolves, there were echoes of Sims’s address. “And the Halifax Resolves was one of the documents that Thomas Jefferson used for a template for the Declaration of Independence,” Pace explained.

“For such a small place, it has an interesting history,” he mused.

Hear the full Around Old Granville segment at wizs.com.

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TownTalk: Freedom Life Church Of God’s Camp Meeting Returns

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According to Pastor Jeff Prewer, the upcoming camp meeting at Freedom Life Church of God will have all the markings of a traditional revival – there will be guest speakers and lots of special musical entertainment over the four-day event.

But when you add technology – from video screens to social media platforms and podcasts – the traditional revival setting gets taken up a notch or two.

And that’s just fine with Prewer, because he has David Cole, who is the church’s technology specialist and A/V team director, to make sure everything’s running smoothly for those who attend the revival in person and for those who may watch via livestream or later on the church’s YouTube channel.

As with so many other things, the COVID-19 pandemic threw a monkey wrench into how the church conducted services, Prewer told WIZS’s Bill Harris on Wednesday’s TownTalk.

Prewer said he found it different, but not difficult, to preach in an empty sanctuary which pre-pandemic could be filled with hundreds of people.

“Though the pews were empty, I knew that people were hearing the Word,” Prewer said.

As recorded sermons evolved to parking lot services, Prewer led the church as it made its way back to in-person services.

“We refuse to sit back any longer,” Prewer said. “We decided we’re going forward.
The camp meeting kicks of Sunday, Sept. 25 with services at 9 a.m. and 11 a.m. and 6 p.m. and continues through Wednesday with services at 7 p.m.

Special guest speakers include Craig Stone from Braselton, GA, Steve Edmondson of Wilson, NC, Tracy Stone, a pastor in Lawrenceville, GA and Steve Hargrove, of Oxford’s White Rock Missionary Baptist Church.

Planning a camp meeting can take months, Prewer said. It’s important to select speakers and musical entertainment that “fit” the church, he added.

“God has blessed us to break barriers and build bridges,” he said, and to “lift up Jesus…I’m looking for men that share that heartbeat.”

Cole said he and his team have to do a lot of preparation as well in advance of each service. “I have a wonderful team behind me,” he said, to make sure that all the equipment and lighting is ready each week.

The COVID-19 pandemic may have caused some headaches at the outset, but from that came creativity and innovation that allowed Prewer’s message to continue to be delivered.

So whether he’s preaching in front of one person who is operating a camera, or 500 people inside a church building, for Prewer, it’s all the same.
“I just preach out of my heart…to please God (and) to bring the word of God to people.”

Just a couple of months ago, the church reached 5,000 people across the different social media platforms. That number has surged to 9,000 since then, with 20 percent of the views from Henderson and the rest from across the nation and globally.

“It’s just awesome to see how God moves,” Cole said.

Visit www.freedomlifecog.org/campmeeting to see a schedule of speakers and musical guests. The church is located at 1001 Martin Creek Rd. in Henderson.

 

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TownTalk: National Cemeteries

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Military veterans and their families may know about particular benefits that are available to them because of their service to the country, and those benefits extend to burial in a national cemetery.

Through perseverance, carefully documented research and the help of a genealogist, Phyllis Maynard is planning a springtime memorial service at Salisbury National Cemetery for her grandfather, who served during World War I.

The cemetery is the only one of its kind in the state that is currently open for burials and memorial services, according to Phillip Smyre, cemetery director. And, in fact, Maynard’s grandfather is taking the very last spot in the memorial section of the historic cemetery. Plans for an expansion are underway and that project could begin next year, Smyre told guest host Maynard and John C. Rose during the monthly installment of “Former Active Duty, Still Boots on the Ground segment of TownTalk.

Genealogist Kim Knight helped Maynard, herself a military veteran, locate information regarding her grandfather, Willie Maynard. He died under tragic circumstances when Maynard’s father was only 4 years old. And his service to his country was not acknowledged. Until now. Maynard said she and Smyre are planning a service to officially recognize her grandfather’s military service during warmer weather to accommodate elderly family members who want to attend.

Usually, cemetery officials can confirm a veteran’s service through social security numbers, army ID numbers or the discharge DD-214. But Maynard’s grandfather was not issued a social security number when he was born, so the process took a bit longer. Knight, the genealogist, first found a death certificate and then had to work back from that point to find information about his military service.

“He deserved to be memorialized with honors,” Knight said.

Smyre said it was a group effort, with Knight’s and Maynard’s input, along with the scheduling office in St. Louis, MO “to confirm that Mr. Maynard was indeed a member of the Armed Forces during WWI.”

No matter the need, Smyre said he and his outreach staff are ready to help family members who have questions or need assistance. Phone 704.636.2661 to learn more. Staff conduct ongoing outreach programs with local churches, community centers and veterans’ groups to get the word out about the services that are available to military veterans.

On land that once housed a prison during the Civil War, the Salisbury National Cemetery originally interred both Union and Confederate veterans; it had to continue to evolve, however, at the conclusion of World War I, then World War II, then Vietnam.

About two years ago, pre-placed crypts were placed to give more room for burials, Smyre said.

National cemeteries are held to slightly stricter “standards of upkeep” than state cemeteries, he said. “Headstones are set at a certain height, the grass, depending on the type is cut to a certain height,” he said, adding that there’s “a little bit more of a microscope on the national cemetery.”

State cemeteries do a great job, he said, but often don’t have the funding that a national cemetery has, which affects resources and staffing.

Sonya Leazer, administrative specialist at the cemetery, said a national cemetery will accept any eligible veteran, regardless of where they lived. State cemeteries require that a person live in the state for at least 10 years to be eligible for interment. National cemeteries accept interment of a spouse of the veteran at no cost to the family.

“They can be interred as long as they’re eligible,” Leazer said, and if the veteran is eligible, the spouse also is eligible. There are certain additional requirements for a child to be interred in the cemetery with parents.

 

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