New Bern lost oqe of its moeit
remarkable citizens, when Kathryn
Pifer Kafer went to her reward.
She was still young, with a zest for
living, at the age of 94.
Yes, a grand little lady she was—^
a grand little lady indeed Up until
a couple of years before her death,
shje attended movies at the Masonic
theatre every afternoon ,and loved
them all.
One of her sons, Oscar, managed
there, and if everybody had been as
enthusiastic about the flickers as
Grandma Kafer, the show house
wouldn’t have been big enough to
ludd them.
Love stories, tragedies, musical,
shpot-em-up western and comedies
all appealed to her. Even when
she saw the same film several
times, she still relished it and left
the theatre in a happy frame of
mind.
Kathryn Kafer took them as they
came, just as she accepted the
events in a life that had a great
many ups and downs. Her father
died when she was a little girl of
, 8, and while neighborhood children
i.: played with their dolls, she went to
. woric in a Pittsburgh factory.
She did enough work for the
average lifetime before she reach
ed womanhood, but, bless her
”-heiart, she kept on working as long
as she liv^. She didn’t have to, in
i:j, later life, but nobody could stop
her from doing it.
^ ^hen one of her sisters passed
iway, and left seven motherless
il^ds, Grandma Kafer looked o^r
the' Atuafion. She ' shrugged her
titiy shoulders, and proceeded to
rear them—or raise them as we say
down here in Dixie.
She raised a family of her own
too. They were enterprising and
energetic children who grew up to
make their mark in the world, yet
all of them readily admitted that
they never saw the day they could
turn out the work that their mother
could.
Every kid who grew up In the
area of upper Pollock street, where
she lived for years with a daughter,
Mrs. Bertha Duffy, retains pleasant
recollections of this friendly little
old lady. She beamed at youngsters
as they passed, and pausing for a
chat with her was a wonderful ex
perience. —
K^hryn Kafer didn’t have trou-
keepin
ble keeping up with the times. As
a matter of fact, the times had an
awful lot of trouble keeping up
with her. For example, when she
was well past 90 she took a bus
trip to Pittsburgh, right by herself.
‘ New Bern had no water mains
when she and her husband moved
to this city in the long long ago,
and opened their bakery. They got
their water in buckets from a
pump at the Elks Temple corner.
Kathryn would hang a yoke on her
shoulders, with two buckets sus
pended from it, and carry two
more buckets—one with each hand.
All of her children, as- soon as
they were able to walk by them
selves, were taught the necessity
of work. One by one they became
identified with the bakery, and the
rigors of their early, training stood
them in good stead in later life.
During the War Between The
States, while she was in her early
teens, she experienced the heart
break of seeing her brothers fight
ing in Yankee uniform, while she,
like all residents of the Southland,
was a supporter of the Confedercy.
Her husband was a native of
Germany. He came to America as
a stowaway, to escape the military
regimentation that was required of
a boy when he reached the age of
11. He became a naturalized citizen
here, but died in Germany many
years later when he returned
there to visit relatives. Germany is
still his resting place.
Grandma Kafer’s marvelous
philosophy, and wise counsel for
those who sought it, was mellowed
The NEW BERN
-
1
WEEKLY
OF
'v I
'I 'if
■!
VOLUME I
NEW BERN, N. C„ FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 14, 1950
NUMBER
y mt^ing fijc i gWrtete m m
workmen at their chores. Visitors gladly sidestepped a
%%BeeU>an^w.to. meh-their de'aUnal|«ft,. PkMfM
wtth \ii^t th^ saw.—Kioto by Biny Behh^. : '
New Bernians Find Preview
Of Palace a Real Revelation
Father ’Time turned back the
clock this week for those New
Bernians who saw fit'to get a pre
view of the Tryon Palace restora
tion.
What the old gent with the hour
glass and the scythe had to offer
was a sight to behold, and even
skeptics went their way impressed.
With or without a hankering for
history, the beauty is there for
anyone who appreciates fine things.
And when we speak of fine
things, we mean not only the gen
uine Mid-Eighteenth century an
tiques with which the rooms are
furnished, but the harmony of col
or that characterizes walls and
ceilings, and the breath-taking
architecture from cellar to attic.
Each visitor, in his or her own
way, found something particularly
appealing. To this vzriter nothing
in the Palacc surpasses the 27 fire
places; The mantels alone, brought
from England, are enough to justi
fy a trip to the first State Capital.
As we passed from room to room
and viewed these fireplaces, we
couldn’t help thinking of Gover
nor Tryon’s little daughter, Marga
ret, and wondering how she could
decide just where to hang her
Christmas stocking.
H perchance you’ve had the no
tion that Venetian blinds are a
product of the modem era, you’ve
got another think coming. Tryon
Palace has Venetian blinds Uat
date back to the Eighteenth centu
ry, and they look very much like
the ones you’ll buy today at your
favorite furniture store.
Draperies and rugs are rare mu
seum pieces, but for that matter
there are hundreds of items that
any museum would be happy tn
latch onto. Like the kid at the
three-ring circus, you just can’t
take it all in.
Frankly, the beds—even the Gov
ernor’s—don’t look like they would
sleep very well, and we didn’t come
across any chairs that would be
recommended as comfortable
enough for your television sessions.
You’ll find them interesting and
charming nonetheless.
Least comfortable looking of all
the rooms, to our way of thinking,
is the parlor. That’s no reflection
on the Palace, since there’s prob
ably never been a parlor since
Adam and Eve set up housekeeping
that wasn’t as stiff and unyielding
as an over-starched collar.
This is a restoration that hasn’t
overlooked anything, not even the
antique silver chamber pot repos-
Lawyers Just Don't Fancy
Having Witnesses Fenced In
Remodeling and renovation of trivial advantage that a witness
the Craven county courtroom,
along with the rest the court
house, brought joy to the hearts
of New Bern’s lawyers.
Some of them have, found at least
one fly in the ointment, however.
Though it hasn’t been publicly
harped on, they don’t care too
much for this business of having
the witness stand enclosed.
In the past the witness climbed
into an elevated chair, and had no
visible barrier separating him from
a hard-pressing attorney who saw
fit to subject him to vigorous cross-
examination.
Boxing witnesses in, so to speak,
as was done in remodeling the
courtroom, gives the party testify
ing a psychological feeling of semi
security. With such a feeling, slight
though it may be, the witness is
harder to befuddle, intimidate, or
whatever it is an attorney is striv
ing to achieve.
Cases are won and lost on testi
mony—some of it true and some of
it fabricated. That’s why the legal
profession overlooks no bet, and
may have.
As far as the fair sex is concern
ed, lawyers have an extra special
reason to want an unobstructed
view of' the feminine witnesses.
They learn early that the quickest
way to make a woman on the wit
ness stand feel ill at ease, and
weaken the effectiveness of her
testimony, is to stare at her feet.
She usually becomes tense and
uncertain, and an easy target for
clever cross-examination. The same
applies to a lesser extent when a
man is on the witness stand. A
witness wh^ has a cramped posi
tion oh the'stand is apt to think
in a cramped manner too.
Attorneys usually have fairly
tough going, when' the witness
slouches loosely in the witness
chair and flops his arms in re
laxed fashion. It’s a bad sign, un
less of course it’s • the lawyer’s
own well-coached witness.
is keenly aware of even the mostmill affair.
So you see, there’s more than
meets the eye, whether the trial be
a major one or a minor, run of the
ing in one of the bedrooms, and
the little dog house in the scullery
—^just beyond the kitchen.
The kitchen is a revelatimi in
itself, with utensils and faculties
to prepare and serve good food in
considerable quantity. As we un
derstand it. Governor Tryon im
ported a French cook to satisfy his
gastronomical wants. Meals must
have been a little bit of all right.
Fresh vegetables were no prob
lem. A garden flourished justiout-
side the kitchen door, and r dupli
cate of the garden is already part
of the nearly completed restora
tion. ^
Aside from the fiumiture^ paint
ings, rugs, silver, pewter and porce
lain, other imports from Bn^and
include brass locks for th.o mahog
any doors in the main bidlding:
woodwork in the parlor, lUarary and
dressing room; doorways iq. the
dining room and upstairs draSriag
room; inside shutters in the Cons-
cil'Chamber; and the wrought-iron
gate and ra^ng at the PiUace ap
proach. -w.
The original PMace required an
outlay of $75,000, and three years
were devoted to its erection. The
restoration, covering a six-yeSr
span, has called for an expenditure
running into millions of dollars.
But for the generosity of the late
Maude Moore Latham, a native oP
New Bern, who provided the bulk
of the money for the project and
labored long to make it a reality,
it is doubtful that there ever would
have been such a restoration.
Although the Palace is chiefly
associated with Governor ’Tryon in
the public’s mind, its significance
extends far beyond that. Here, on
August 25, 1774, was held the first
Provincial Convention of North
(Continued on back pego)
I
.)
. >