** ?* wSffiSK U,MRY
I 3.' '
Published each Thursday since January 18, 1973
?B. 8 (ft U J
: P*H C -.? (i -Mat <?>/*
I I> 0 fv . ::|ft ' . . ; ;'S : ' ' !
SI J at* n tVK.f/ r,~ r.fA ?r,vr/rtv,x " yv?L>l?<IJLEi
I ni * : X
ro: x
I 1 ' H
^ *mbroke, NC Robeson County
"Building communicative bridges in a tri-racial setting"
Dr. Nancy Sampson Named
Chief of Child Day Care
Section for State
Dr. Nancy Sampson ~ -
mm m - -? i-M' - -
Dr. T?ncy Sampson, professor of education who has
been a member of the Pembroke State University faculty
for the past five years, has been named chief of the Child
Day Care Section of the Division of Facility Services for
the N.C. Department of Human Resources. Her
appointment was effective August 1.
She will serve under David T. Flaherty, Secretary of the
N.C. Department of Human Resources, and will supervise
a staff of 90.
"Hiis is a policy-making position for a regulatory
agency within state government that deals with child care
programs through the state of North Carolina." she said.
Dr. Sampson says she is "very excited about the
position primarily because of my interests during the past
20 years in child care and pre school programs and the
quality of education for young children.
"With the increasing concerns about developmentally
appropriate curricula for young children and the quality of
care givers as far as their training is concerned, this
seems like a very exciting challenge."
Her responsiblities place her over the entire child care
program throughout the state outside the realm of the
public schools. This means day cares, family day care
homes, church supported centers, etc. Her staff members
will be going out and working in these areas which must
he licensed by her organization.
"We will be seeing that the centers follow the
regulations and procedures which they should to be in
compliance with the law," said Dr. Sampson.
"I am very excited and thrilled about the challenge,"
added Dr. Sampson.
She earned her B.S. in elementary education at PSU in
'67, her M.Ed, in elementary education with a minor in
child development at the University of Arkansas in '69,
and her Ph.D. in early childhood education at New York
University in 1980.
Prior to her coming to PSU, she was a member of
faculty at Fayetteville State University for 13 years.
'Tve enjoyed years at PSU," she says. "It has
been good to be back at my alma mater and to make a
eonttiUtfiOirto the aiv&rol the-slate which i? my heme.
Dr. Sampson, who Is a member of governing boar
for the N.C. Association for the Education of Young
Children, is married to Dr. Gilbert Sampson, professor
and chairman of the PSU Department of Mathematics and
Computer Science. They are parents of five children.
In taking her new position. Dr. Nancy Sampson and the
Sampsons' 15-year-old daughter, Juliana, will reside in
Raleigh during the week, but return home to Pembroke on
weekends. Juliana will attend Athens Drive Senior High
in Raleigh. The remainder of the Sampsons' family is:
Gregoiy, 21, who lives in Asheville; Christopher. 20, a
rising senior at PSU majoring in biology; Glenn, 12, a
seventh grader at Pembroke Middle School; and Daniel.
10. a fifth grader at Pembroke Elementary School.
This it the 1907 08 clatt that attended New Hope
School, which wat located adjacent to the Indian Normal
School near Hem broke that wat began in 1887 and uat the
forerunner of Pembroke State University Four of these 38
studentt are knoum to be living. Some have moved, and
information on them it incomplete. Left to right are:
FRONT ROW KNEELING?Claude Dowry (uAo protided
thit identification), Elmore Lloyd, Otcar Thompson,
Fotter Thompson, Joe Franklin Oxendine, Carton
Graham, Mtnena Brown, Jet tie Uoyd, Etta Bea
JaC0b$- FuU*r [stand,ng at
right); IMMEDIATELY BEHIND FRONT ROW - "Boss"
Thompson. Clifton Oxendine dean of Pembroke
State I. Adeline Locklear, Sally Dee sr. Elizabeth Oxen
dine; THIRD ROW STANDING- Tom Oxendine [father of
PSi' Chancellor Joseph Oxendine |, Grover Chairs, OUie
Broun, James Deese, Will Thompson, Roscoe locklear.
Maggie Oxendine, Adlena LocUear, C-orelia Tyler, Mary
Ijee ljnu<ry; FOURTH ROW-Bruce Thompson, Ulysses
Chairs, Bob Glenn Oxendine, AnabeUe Oxendine [u<Ao
utu assistant to the teacherl Orenda Lovry, Annie
Oxendine, Beatrice Oxendine. Loftin McMillan, TOP
BOW -Horace Jacobs, Bill Thompson, Charlie Chairs,
Mobret Jacobs, and at the far right, Dewey Oxendine;
TEACHEAR AT THE TOP-Anderson Locklear, for whom
PSlfs locklear Hall [the art building) was named in 1950.
THE CARIURA iMN VOICE
i X
Born and Reared on What
is Now PSU Campus, This
91- Year-Old Tells of
Early Schooling
by Gene Warren
If you are 91 years old and have lived under 17
American Presidents, beginning with William McKinley,
your memory is expected to be a little fuzzy.
But not that of Claude Lowry, a widower who lives
about a miles from Pembroke on a farm he purchased in
25.
Lowry was born and reared where the present
Pembroke State University baseball diamond is located.
As a boy, he helped to plant the oak trees which grace the
front of the PSU campus. (
Sitting in the living room of his home, which is shaded
by huge pecan trees, Lowry talked proudly about his 14
children, 39 grandchildren and 29 great- grandchildren
and demonstrated his remarkable memory by identifying
his 37 classmates in a picture of his class of 1907-08 at
New Hope School, which was located approximately one
mile from Pembroke.
This elementary school was adjacent to famed
Croatan Normal (teacher graining) School, founded in
1887 and the forerunner of what is now Pembroke State
University. When the Indian Normal School was moved
from its New Hope location to the Town of Pembroke in
1909, Lowry was in the first class there.
Lowry says a number of neighborhood elementary
schools like the one at New Hope sprang up in different
localities in those early days and that he was eight years
old when the school photograph of his New Hoke class of
1907-08 was snapped.
The N^w Hope School helped to launch him toward a
teaching career that spanned 15 years. From elementary
schools lifcq it- students went U> the Croatan Normal
School, 46431111% to Dr. Adolph Dial, Lumbee Indian
d historian.
"ty. New Hope, we had a class in AIJCs, arithmetic
and geography, and you could go to the blackboard if you
were higher up (the better students)," Lowry said. "We
used a blue-back speller, but a lot of students didn't have
books. Those whose relatives 'had books were the
fortunate ones."
Lowry said classes were "ungraded" in those days,
meaning one worked at his own level.
"Regardless of how much schooling a student had,
when one wanted to become a teacher, he went before the
Board of Education to take an exam. If he passed, he was
given a certificate. I took my exam in the summer of '22
when I was 23 years old and started teaching the third
grade at Union Chapel School where I taught for two
years. I alsd taught at Pembroke Graded School for two
years, then later in South Carolina. In all, I taught for 15
years and had other occupations."
He also did carpentry work, brick work, and "took
blueprinting" at the Normal School. "I put in the door in
the old Normal School gym in '39," Lowry said. "I also
built five garages for faculty members." (Note: PSU used
to have a faculty row of houses on campus.)
Lowry now owns 150 acres of crops, mostly beans and
corn.
Hie New Hope School photograph, in which Lowry is
kneeling as the first person on the left, also includes three
persons who figured prominently in PSU history- One was
the teacher, Anderson Locklear, a leading educator of
Robeson County in whose honor Locklear Hall, completed
on the PSU campus in 1950, was named. Another was
Clifton Oxendine, who became the first dean of what was
then the Indian Normal School of Robeson County in
1939-40. Oxendine was awarded an honorary doctorate by
PSU in 1986, and the lecture hall in Classroom North was
named in his honor in 1988. Clifton Oxendine, now
deceased, was the uncle of present PSU Chancellor
Joseph Oxendine.
But even more significant, the picture of the Newflope
School class of 1907-08 included Tom Oxendine, the
father of the present chancellor. He also became a
teacher as did six of his eight children, including
Chancellor Oxendine.
Of Tom Oxendine, who also became a principal, lowry
said: "He was the kind who enjoyed life, loved to fish and
was good at athletics. He always hollered out so people
could hear him at the ball games."
Speaking of the chancellor, Lowry said, "He's pretty
smart and is doing a good job. He's trying to treat all
people alike."
Looking at the picture of the New Hope School class of
1907-08, Lowry commented: "At least 40 percent of those
in this picture became teachers. Only about four in the
picture are still living. A couple of them left town, and I
don't know whether they are living or dead. A lot of them
died young because they lived in bad houses and got
winter colds."
Lowry pointed to the clothes the students wore in the
picture. "Most people could not afford sewing machines
then, and people had to make clothes with their fingers,"
he said.
Lowry was born March 11, 1889. His wife, the former
Sarah Hunt, was born Sept. 10, 1905 and died Sept. 27,
1988, of Alzheimer's Disease. Of their 14 children, the
first was Inez, born in 1923, and the youngest is William,
born in 1952.
Lowry, who owns many historical books, spoke of how
much churches in those early years played such an
important role in educating students in this vicinity. "The
churches helped the children leam to read and write in
Sunday school." he said.
Chancellor Oxendine and his brother, Hughes, who
were visiting Lowry during this interview, make some
observations in talking to lowry. Chancellor Oxendine
noted, in speaking of history, that his great grandfather.
John, "was one of the petitioners of what became
Pembroke State University." The chancellor added that
most of his relatives went to school and became school
teachers.
Hughes, former director of all federal programs for the
Hoke County Board of Education and now retired, said of
Lowry. "When I learned (from Joe Oxendine) that Joe
was going to be the new chancellor of PSU (in 1989), I
passed Mr. Claude LowTy going to his mailbox in front of
his house and said to myself,, 'This man deserves to
know.' And I told him."
Lowny enjoyed this first-hand knowledge about the new
chancellor, and his spunk at 91 years old showed through
as he concluded. "I stopped teaching in '54. but I've
never considered myself retired," referring to his 150
acres of farm land and other interests. "I ride my own
lawn mower, cook my own meals and do my own washing
and laundry."
And as a person who knows the histoiy of the area, he
proves to be a valuable resource.
Claude Lowry has many stories to share.
PHOTOS AND
TEXT COLRTESY OF
PSl' rt HUC INFORM A TTON
DIRECTOR GENE WARREN
Shown below is Claude Lowry
Iriijhtl uho lit>es on a iarm just
outside Pembroke, identifying the
classmates of the 1907-08 class of
New Hope S hoot uhich uas located
adjacent to the Normal School
which became Pembroke State
Uminrrsity. Shown with Lowry is
PSU Chancellor Joseph Oiendine
whose father, Tbm Orrndinc, wo*
m the picture.