Around the turn of the 20th century, the Nutbush area – known today as the Drewry community – had just shy of 400 households. And of those households, said local historian Mark Pace, there were only eight that did not derive their income from agriculture.
But in those eight households surely lived people engaged in support services for all those farmers, Pace noted on Thursday’s tri-weekly history segment of TownTalk. There were merchants, bankers, household help and physicians – all the things necessary for a community back in 1900.
Today’s landscape is quite different, to which anyone who drives along most any county road will attest: Subdivisions are popping up where row crops once stood and solar fields are replacing pastures and hayfields all across the state.
But Vance County is a little bit of an anomaly from other counties in the state, Pace said, as he and WIZS’s Bill Harris discussed a condensed history of agriculture in the county. About one-third of the roughly 178,000 acres of land that comprises the county is allotted for agriculture, which includes, pastureland, forestry and crops.
Some counties have virtually no farmland left, Pace said, thanks to urban sprawl and the proliferation of suburbs.
“That’s a trend that will probably continue,” he said.
Vance County – and Old Granville County before it – has a long history with agriculture in general, and as Pace said, “You can’t talk about Vance County and not talk about tobacco.”
From the mid-1700’s, this was always a good place to grow tobacco, he explained.
“Red” tobacco was prevalent then, and used more for plug or chewing tobacco, snuff and cigars.
Fast-forward to the 1890’s when James B. Duke was cornering the market in the cigarette-making industry in Durham, Henderson also was well-known as a tobacco market. According to Pace, Henderson once was the third-largest tobacco market in the world, behind Winston-Salem and Durham.
Henderson was perfectly placed between Richmond and Raleigh, and the railroad meant that the tobacco that was sold and bought each season could hop a freight bound for destinations across the world.
And although tobacco certainly was agriculture’s “king” crop around these parts, there were other agricultural ventures, too, Pace said.
Like silk. And sugarcane.
Huh?
In the 1830’s and ‘40’s, Pace said, parts of Vance County had a fascination with silkworms, who spin their pricey filaments in the branches of mulberry trees. At that time, cotton was selling for between 6 cents and 8 cents a pound, but silk fetched a whopping $4 a pound.
“It was worth your while to mess with silk,” Pace said.
And there was a sugar processing plant in Townsville, Pace said, that processed locally grown sugar cane.
Neither sugar cane nor silk really took hold, but there were other niche producers that had a bigger impact on the local agriculture scene.
Blacknall Strawberry Nursery in Kittrell, for example, shipped thousands upon thousands of plants each year. It was located about where the Dollar General is there along U.S. 1, Pace said. And long-time residents that remember the clothing store Davis’s on Garnett Street may not be aware that Mr. E.G. Davis earlier ventures included a food superette and more in his downtown location before settling on clothing alone.
And he also created the area’s first large-scale ag industry, Pace explained, back in the 1930’s when he established a chicken farm out in the county on what many old-timers still refer to as Chicken Farm Road.
“People are still making a living off the land,” Pace said, but farming and agriculture certainly have evolved over the years as tobacco subsidies and allotments have given way to alternate crops, niche markets and farms became destinations for recreational activities.
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Cooperative Extension With Wayne Rowland: Fruit & Nut Trees
/by Bill HarrisWayne Rowland of the Vance County Extension Service discusses how correct selection and placement of Fruit and Nut Trees will enhance your home landscape.
Listen live at 100.1 FM / 1450 AM / or on the live stream at WIZS.com at 11:50 a.m. Mon, Tues & Thurs.
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Granville County Implements “Property Check” To Guard Against Property, Mortgage Fraud
/by WIZS StaffGranville County Register of Deeds Kathy Taylor has announced the implementation of Cott System’s “PropertyCheck” that will help protect residents from property and mortgage fraud. This service, free to Granville County residents, will send a notification when an official document is recorded on their property. Residents can activate alerts based on their name, property address or parcel number by visiting https://recordhub.cottsystems.com
Property fraud can occur if someone forges your identity, transfers your property in their name, and records the document. This fraudulent activity can make it appear as if that person owns your property – and you may not have any idea that this happened.
The program works in the background of the Granville County Register of Deeds records management software, automatically alerting subscribers if a document with matching name or address is recorded. Property owners will need to create an account, create alerts for their name and/or property address and choose alert preferences – email or text message.
“I also recommend setting up multiple alerts based on first, middle and last name variations and your spouse’s name, to be sure that an alert will be triggered in case a recording happens with some kind of slight variation,” Taylor said. “We hope that this service will give our residents peace of mind to monitor any activity that occurs relating to their name or property at the Granville County Register of Deeds.”
For more information, visit the Granville County Register of Deeds office located within the Granville County Courthouse at 101 Main St., Oxford or visit
https://www.granvillecounty.org/192/Register-of-Deeds.
Feb. 7 Deadline For Warren Residents To Ask For Help Removing Old Mobile Homes From Property
/by WIZS StaffTime is winding down for Warren County residents to take advantage of a program that provides financial assistance to remove dilapidated mobile homes from their property.
The deadline to request assistance is Friday, Feb. 7 to ensure demolition can take place before the grant ends at the end of February, according to Warren County officials.
The N.C. Department of Environmental Quality, through the State Solid Waste Trust Fund, awarded Warren County a series of grants under this program, beginning in 2010, to assist in the deconstruction of abandoned manufactured homes. The grants have helped the county enforce its abandoned manufactured home ordinance that was first adopted in 2008. During past grant cycles from 2010 to 2017, Warren County used grant funds totaling $89,500 to aid eligible property owners in the legal deconstruction and disposal of abandoned units, resulting in the removal of approximately 50 units across the county.
Eligible property owners will owe costs that are not covered by grant funds. For a singlewide unit, costs are $35.00 for the demolition permit plus $270.00 landfill tipping fees; for a doublewide unit, $35.00 demolition permit plus $540.00 landfill tipping fees. In addition, homeowners will be responsible for any demolition costs that exceed the grant maximum of $1,485.00.
Property owners seeking more information or to apply to the county program may contact Planning and Zoning Administrator Mark Bloomer at 252.257.7027 or markbloomer@warrencountync.gov. Forms can be found online at https://www.warrencountync.com/789/Forms-Applications or picked up at the Planning/Zoning and Code Enforcement Department, 542 West Ridgeway Street, Warrenton, NC 27589.
Michael Easley, Jr. Stepping Down From U.S. Attorney Eastern District Office
/by WIZS StaffU.S. Attorney Michael F. Easley, Jr., will step down as attorney for the Eastern District of North Carolina on Monday, Feb. 3.
Easley was nominated for the post in 2021 by President Joe Biden and, following Senate confirmation, he was sworn in on Nov. 26, 2021.
In a press release issued Wednesday afternoon, Easley said, “It has been the highest honor to serve as the top federal law enforcement official for Eastern North Carolina – a place I was born, raised, and am proud to call home.” The press release did not contain details of Easley’s future plans.
Easley focused on driving down violent crime, white-collar prosecutions, protection of civil rights, and stemming the tide of narcotics into communities across the Eastern District. “We did it through partnering, shoulder to shoulder, with local law enforcement and community leaders to solve our region’s most challenging problems,” he stated, adding that he appreciates prosecutors, judges, law enforcement and staff “who give so much to see justice done every day.”
As the top-ranking federal law enforcement official in the 44-county Eastern District that includes Vance, Granville, Franklin and Warren counties, Easley has overseen a staff of 119 employees, including 58 attorneys and 61 non-attorney support personnel. The office is responsible for prosecuting federal crimes in the district, including crimes related to terrorism, public corruption, child exploitation, firearms and narcotics. The office also defends the United States in civil cases and collects debts owed to the United States.
Throughout his term, Easley and his office have provided information to WIZS News about local cases, and he has even spoken with us as well. Over the years, he has praised the efforts of local law enforcement agencies and said they follow up and do what they say they are going to do.
In a January 2024 TownTalk program on human trafficking, Easley said Henderson Police Chief Marcus Barrow and Vance County Sheriff Curtis Brame are “reliable partners” and said they both are in his speed dial. He called District Attorney Mike Waters “one of the most forward-leaning prosecutors” he knows. “He’s an incredible partner and somebody I count on to help unravel these cases.”
In an interview Wednesday afternoon with WIZS, Barrow was equally complimentary of Easley, calling him and his office a “great partner” with local law enforcement. “He was easy to talk to…to communicate with. He had our back here (and) has helped us rid Henderson of a lot of violent offenders.”
In an August 2023 interview with WIZS, Barrow said some members of the local police department serve on different federal task forces of the DEA, ATF and the FBI, which provides a path for some cases to be tried in federal court.
“We truly did a big investment into the federal program,” Barrow explained. With input from local district attorneys to decide which cases – usually involving guns and drugs – should go to federal court, Barrow said the trials and sentencing can happen in a “pretty swift” manner.
The main thing, he said, is that “they are removed from our community – they are the worst of the worst.”
Eddie Caldwell, executive vice president and general counsel of the N.C. Sheriff’s Association, said “U.S. Attorney Easley is the kind of partner every sheriff hopes for – sharp, decisive, and committed to results. He didn’t just talk about law enforcement partnerships; he made them real, partnering with sheriffs for solutions and backing them up with action. Under his leadership, we made real progress— violent crime down, overdose deaths falling, and tighter collaboration. Easley set a new gold standard for what it means to lead in federal law enforcement.”
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(The story text above was originally posted to WIZS.com on 1-29-25 at 7 p.m.)
TownTalk: Around Old Granville: Agriculture’s Roots In Vance County
/by WIZS StaffAround the turn of the 20th century, the Nutbush area – known today as the Drewry community – had just shy of 400 households. And of those households, said local historian Mark Pace, there were only eight that did not derive their income from agriculture.
But in those eight households surely lived people engaged in support services for all those farmers, Pace noted on Thursday’s tri-weekly history segment of TownTalk. There were merchants, bankers, household help and physicians – all the things necessary for a community back in 1900.
Today’s landscape is quite different, to which anyone who drives along most any county road will attest: Subdivisions are popping up where row crops once stood and solar fields are replacing pastures and hayfields all across the state.
But Vance County is a little bit of an anomaly from other counties in the state, Pace said, as he and WIZS’s Bill Harris discussed a condensed history of agriculture in the county. About one-third of the roughly 178,000 acres of land that comprises the county is allotted for agriculture, which includes, pastureland, forestry and crops.
Some counties have virtually no farmland left, Pace said, thanks to urban sprawl and the proliferation of suburbs.
“That’s a trend that will probably continue,” he said.
Vance County – and Old Granville County before it – has a long history with agriculture in general, and as Pace said, “You can’t talk about Vance County and not talk about tobacco.”
From the mid-1700’s, this was always a good place to grow tobacco, he explained.
“Red” tobacco was prevalent then, and used more for plug or chewing tobacco, snuff and cigars.
Fast-forward to the 1890’s when James B. Duke was cornering the market in the cigarette-making industry in Durham, Henderson also was well-known as a tobacco market. According to Pace, Henderson once was the third-largest tobacco market in the world, behind Winston-Salem and Durham.
Henderson was perfectly placed between Richmond and Raleigh, and the railroad meant that the tobacco that was sold and bought each season could hop a freight bound for destinations across the world.
And although tobacco certainly was agriculture’s “king” crop around these parts, there were other agricultural ventures, too, Pace said.
Like silk. And sugarcane.
Huh?
In the 1830’s and ‘40’s, Pace said, parts of Vance County had a fascination with silkworms, who spin their pricey filaments in the branches of mulberry trees. At that time, cotton was selling for between 6 cents and 8 cents a pound, but silk fetched a whopping $4 a pound.
“It was worth your while to mess with silk,” Pace said.
And there was a sugar processing plant in Townsville, Pace said, that processed locally grown sugar cane.
Neither sugar cane nor silk really took hold, but there were other niche producers that had a bigger impact on the local agriculture scene.
Blacknall Strawberry Nursery in Kittrell, for example, shipped thousands upon thousands of plants each year. It was located about where the Dollar General is there along U.S. 1, Pace said. And long-time residents that remember the clothing store Davis’s on Garnett Street may not be aware that Mr. E.G. Davis earlier ventures included a food superette and more in his downtown location before settling on clothing alone.
And he also created the area’s first large-scale ag industry, Pace explained, back in the 1930’s when he established a chicken farm out in the county on what many old-timers still refer to as Chicken Farm Road.
“People are still making a living off the land,” Pace said, but farming and agriculture certainly have evolved over the years as tobacco subsidies and allotments have given way to alternate crops, niche markets and farms became destinations for recreational activities.
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WIZS Radio Henderson Local News 01-30-25 Noon
/by Bill HarrisClick Play to Listen. On Air at 8am, 12pm, 5pm M-F
WIZS Radio ~ 100.1FM/1450AM
Cooperative Extension with Jamon Glover: Role of the Protector
/by Bill HarrisJamon Glover of the Vance County Extension Service’s Parenting Task Force discusses parenting strategies.
Listen live at 100.1 FM / 1450 AM / or on the live stream at WIZS.com at 11:50 a.m. Mon, Tues & Thurs.
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Home and Garden Show
/by WIZS StaffOn the Home and Garden Show with Vance Co. Cooperative Ext.
The Vance County Cooperative Extension is located at 305 Young St, Henderson, NC 27536
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TownTalk: Love is in the Air with Granville Tourism
/by WIZS StaffFebruary. It’s the shortest month, but that’s not stopping Tourism Director Angela Allen and Granville County from packing in a wealth of events and activities into 28 days.
From Cedar Creek Gallery’s ‘Cupful’ exhibit to the popular murder mystery dinner theatre, check out all that Granville County has to offer at www.visitgranvillenc.com.
Allen said she’s constantly updating the website and blog posts to keep the area in tune with all the goings-on.
Whether you appreciate the beauty of handcrafted pottery or enjoy the hunt for a vintage vinyl record, Allen said Granville County offers “a little bit of everything” for people to do – there’s plenty of activities for people to do and things for people to love, she said on Wednesday’s TownTalk.
And she said the collaboration that’s going on among downtown businesses – retail and restaurants – is something to behold.
Take Tobacco Wood Brewing Co., for example. It’s now offering a Saturday brunch from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. But invited to join in the fun during that time is Ox4d Music, which offers a pop-up shop on Saturdays while the finishing touches are being put on its stand-alone Main Street location.
Previously located in the lower level of The Hub on Main, the record shop will open soon at its new location.
“We are so proud of them,” Allen said. “They’re definitely a staple in downtown Oxford.”
And Angel Wings Bookstore recently opened in the space that previously had housed Harvest Restaurant, Allen noted. But they don’t just sell books – there’s a bistro located inside that is being operated by the folks that run Bigfoot BBQ.
Allen said her webpage has a whole tab of listings dedicated to Valentine’s Day. Check out the latest – “Love is in the Air”at https://visitgranvillenc.com/blog/#!/2097-Love-Is-In-The-Air-In-Granville-County-This-Valentines-Season to view all the options for singles, couples, friends and families.
Here are a few highlights of upcoming events across Granville County in February:
With all this talk about love being in the air, Allen just had to mention the annual spring Granville Wedding and Event Expo, scheduled for Sunday, Mar. 2 at the Creedmoor Community Center from 12 noon to 3 p.m.
Admission is free for all who bring a donation to Families Living Violence Free, the nonprofit agency that helps families in domestic violence situations. “If you bring a donation with you that day or go to the payment link and pay, you can get in free,” Allen said.
Come check out all the different vendors who can provide services for weddings, reunions and other big celebrations, all under one roof.
Tasting tickets are $10 and a limited number of VIP packages, which includes a tasting ticket and a swag bag, are available for $20.
https://visitgranvillenc.com/whats-happening/weddings-events/
Find out all the details at www.visitgranvillenc.com.
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WIZS Radio Henderson Local News 01-29-25 Noon
/by WIZS StaffListen On Air at 8am, 12pm, 5pm M-F
WIZS Radio ~ 100.1FM/1450AM
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