Local historians Mark Pace and WIZS’s Bill Harris are “of an age” now that things they remember when they were youngsters are now being considered as parts of local history that, with the benefit of hindsight, are proving to be noteworthy and important to the area.

The two history buffs usually discuss people, places and events from the very beginnings of the formation of what they refer to as Old Granville County, but this week they talked about several events that have found their way into the headlines since 1960.

Depending on your perspective, some of these events functioned much like the proverbial double-edged sword.

Henderson was where Paul H. Rose founded Rose’s, which at its peak, had something like 175 stores across the region. But Henderson had the first one, and it was located on Garnett Street, right in the heart of downtown.

That was back in 1915, when downtowns were where shopping happened. Needed shoes? Downtown. Wanted a piece of jewelry for a special gift? Downtown. Groceries? A&P on one end of Garnett, Colonial on the other. Clothing, sporting goods and more all were found downtown.

Rose’s stood its ground when Kmart and Mammoth Mart came to town, Pace said. But it had difficulty competing with Walmart, and Rose’s emerged from two years of bankruptcy in 1995 and then sold to Variety Wholesalers in 1997.

But Rose’s took a chance back in the late 1960’s when developers constructed the Henderson Mall.

The mall, all 185,000 square feet of it, opened in July 1969. Pace remembers that he and his brother pestered their mother until she took them there for the first time.

Harris said the mall drew patrons from nearby counties, too. People could park their cars, go inside the mall and get all their shopping done.

“It was a big deal,” Harris said, adding that the mall had “a huge impact on the entire region.”

With those benefits, however, came consequences – especially for the downtown area. The mall “changed the focus of the entire community,” Pace said.

Of course, what happened in Henderson was happening all over the place with malls and suburban retail spaces luring business away from downtowns

People still went downtown for staples like the post office, the library and the courthouse, but the mall was where folks went to shop, eat and where young people could hang out with friends.

Just as malls shaped people’s shopping habits, so did the nation’s growing interstate system shape how people got from one place to another way back in the 20^th century.

It was in 1960 that the first stretch of I-85 in the area was completed – 18 miles from Henderson to about Wise in Warren County.

And finally, in 1972, the final bit – dubbed “the Missing Link” connected Oxford and Butner. Pace said John K. Nelms was instrumental in completion of the Granville County section.

The original plans had the interstate going around Henderson to the east, hitting Gillburg and Kittrell before heading to Wilson and ultimately linking with Durham.

“The powers that be lobbied long and hard (and it was) with quite a great deal of effort that Oxford got included in the 85 path,” Pace said.

In close proximity to I-85 in Warren County was where Floyd McKissick planted the seed for Soul City, a planned city that, had it taken hold, was supposed to have 55,000 inhabitants by the year 2000.

The idea never really took off, but McKissick is someone locals point to as the person who helped bring a regional water system to the area.

McKissick, a Republican, was very influential in the political arena and he knew Richard Nixon.

After Nixon was elected president, Pace said McKissick “called in a marker” with his pal and said he wanted a regional water system.

Those efforts resulted in the creation of the Kerr Lake Regional Water System in 1976.

Listen back to the complete story at wizs.com to learn about other events that helped shape local history around Old Granville.

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In 1748, when North Carolina was just a colony and had to follow England’s rules, the first “ordinary” was opened in Granville County. The proprietor had to pay $30 in “proclamation” money for a license and he had to promise to provide food and lodging for travelers and their horses.

As local historian Mark Pace explained it on Thursday’s Around Old Granville segment of TownTalk, ordinaries provided food and drinks for a fixed price as compared to inns – which provided rooms and meals and maybe drinks. And taverns were places where alcohol was first on the menu, accompanied possibly by food.

But anyone who wanted to open one of these establishments had to go to court and get a bond – pay money.

Prior to the Revolution, for the price of one shilling (about $35 in today’s economy), you and your horses would get room and board. But for drinks stronger than water, you probably had to pay extra.

Choices for alcohol were probably quite limited back then, with port, stout and rum figuring highest on the list, Pace said.

Nowadays, we have a multitude of craft beers, wine and spirits to tickle our taste buds. But whether you enjoy the occasional adult beverage or you’re a teetotaler, the stories about the history of alcohol in North Carolina are nothing short of entertaining.

After the Revolution, George Washington’s federal style of government put an excise tax on alcohol.

“This did not go over well with everybody, particularly with Pennsylvania,” Pace said, and the tax led to the Whiskey Rebellion in 1794.

“It was the first time the federal government had issued a tax and the first time the people had risen up in arms against that tax,” he said. After all, they’d just fought a Revolution to get out from under British rule, and here they were, getting taxed again.

Washington sent 13,000 troops to quash the rebellion, and they made quick work of it.

When Thomas Jefferson took the Presidential oath in 1801, he abolished the tax.

And liquor was not taxed again until 1862, when it was reinstituted to raise money for the Civil War.

During that period leading up to the Civil War, it was perfectly legal to make your own alcohol, with no taxes imposed. And that’s what a lot of farmers in and around Granville County did, Pace explained.

One particular area in the vicinity where present-day southern Granville County meets Franklin County, achieved local notoriety for being rife with moonshine stills.

The dense orange-red  clay in the area known as the “Harracan” wouldn’t grow tobacco, but it would grow corn.

So resourceful farmers and others took the opportunity to turn that crop into something they could make money with – and that was alcohol, Pace said. You may even be able to find the remains of stills along creeks or other water sources in the Haracan, “just down the road a little ways,” as old-timers recall.

After the Civil War, the feds started allowing people to have large-scale distilleries, and many towns had them, including Henderson, Oxford and Warrenton.

These distilleries were licensed and there were hefty federal taxes involved. Back then, a  gallon of alcohol cost about $2.50 – and $1 of that was tax.

That was a bitter pill to swallow for some, Pace said. And that’s what led to bootlegging.

From 1870 to 1908 or so, bootleggers were running up, down, across and through the state with their untaxed spirits.

People figured out they could get their alcohol cheaper from their neighbor than they could from a licensed distillery, so business was booming for a good while.

In 1908, North Carolina passed a law stating that distilleries could be located in incorporated towns only.

Layer on that the 18^th Amendment to the Constitution that enacted Prohibition and the black market for alcohol became even more important and intriguing.

The bootleggers needed to be able to outrun the revenuers, Pace said, and they created souped-up vehicles that paved the way for NASCAR racing, a perennial favorite for many.

One bootlegger from Wake County has a road named after him in the southern part of Granville County. Bruce Garner was arrested a bunch of times, paid his fines and kept on making liquor.  He found religion, however, and turned from the liquor business. After World War II he moved to Raleigh and opened up a couple of restaurants. The burger joint he started in 1960? Yep. It’s called Char-Grill.

The 13 years or so that made up the Prohibition era was anything but dry, however. And when the 21^st Amendment repealed Prohibition in 1933, North Carolina was one of the states that, in essence, got into the liquor business when the Alcohol Beverage Control board was established a couple of years later.

Vance, Warren and Franklin counties set up ABC stores in 1935. It took Granville County until 1963 to join the party.

Pace said at one time there was a bus route that ran from Oxford to the train station in Henderson – which was conveniently located across from the town’s ABC store on William Street.

Locals felt like having a liquor store right across from the station was a blemish on Henderson’s reputation, Pace said. But apparently that didn’t bother the folks who made the round trip from Oxford one little bit.

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