Tlie Scmthemi Berkshire Congress, SHow and ISale and tHe SandHill Fair—October 28
VOLUME
to 31
THE
PILOT
NUMBER
4S
Is a Paper Devoted to the Upbuilding of the Sandhill Territory of North Carolina
Address all communications to
the pilot printing company, VASS, N. C.
FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 26, 1924
SUBSCRIPTION $2.00
HARRISON STUTTS
One of the successful young
chaps of the Sandhills country is
Harrison Stutts, manager of the
Pinehurst Warehouses at Pine-
hurst, one of the biggest mercan
tile establishments in Central
North Carolina. Mr. Stutts was a
boy around Cameron, where his
father was engaged in the man
ufacture of corn mills, using the
famous Moore county mil! stones.
The boy drifted into store work,
and after an experience at dif
ferent rural points in the vicini
ty he landed in Pinehurst and
there was a factor in developing
Ihe Pinehurst Warehouses. Inci
dentally the Warehouses were
established for the purpose of
providing Pinehurst with the
things it needed in carrying on
its building operations, but a de
mand arose from outside sources
for the supplies the warehouses
carried, and before the projec
tors realized what was going on
Harrison Stutts had blossomed
forth with a big supply depot for
a wide range of country and with
a stock of a wide assortment of
things.
An incorporated company was
the result, and with a field before
him and enthusiasm to tackle that
field Mr. Stutts has continued to
broaden out until he has become
one of the leading factors in this
part of the state in mercantile
lines, and he has no idea himself
where he is heading. From year
to year the business of the Pine
hurst Warehouses surpasses that
of previous years, and their field
embraces a country that extends
for miles out from Pinehurst in
all directions.
Besides being an active busi
ness man of the Sandhills Mr.
Stutts is a developer in many
ways. He has been at the back
of a number of ventures, having
his share of financial success in
most things until he is a right
solid member of the financial cir
cles of the county. He is also as
sociated with public and social af
fairs, a cordial neighbor, a whole
some citizen, and one of the grow-
ing-up young men of the county
that the people feel an honest in
terest and pride in.
LOCAL BUYERS GET FRANK SHANBERGER
R. & C. RAILROAD AT KIWANIS LDNCH
Talk of Plan to Extend it to
North Side of Deep
River
The Randolph and Cumberland rail
road, running out from Cameron to
Carthage and McConnell, w'as last
week sold to a group of local men from
the Deep river section. These are J.
M. Brown and W. C. Brown, of Hemp,
and J. M. Garner and W. C. Brewer, of
Bennett. The price was $28,000. It
is intimated that J, H. Dunlap and
Charles Ross, of the Bonlee road, are
interested, but this has not been veri
fied by The Pilot. It is mentioned only
in connection with some talk that the
road may be built across the river to
High Falls, and from there extended
to connect with the Dunlap road,
which runs from Bonlee on the Atlan
tic and Yadkin out into the interior of
Randolph county north of High Falls.
A few miles of construction would
make the connection.
No direct inforntation as to the
plans of the new owners has been
gathered but it is talk around Car
thage that the intention is to put the
road into better condition from Cam
eron to Hallison and encourage any
traffic that may be offered along the
entire route. The buyers have capital
(Continued on page 8)
Enlisted at Start of War and
Came Out Captain of
Regulars
J.D. STEWART HONE
FRON THE SOUTH
Tells of Turpentine Work in
Georgia Where He Is Now
Located
NEW MEMBERS
An average of ten new members
for every day is the record made by
the North Carolina Cotton Growers'
Co-operative Association, said T. W.
Chamblis, Director of Information,
last night. Contracts are coming to
the Raleigh head quarters by every
mail and many of these are from farm
ers who are landlords.
The association has now over 35,-
500 members and the spirit of loyalty
shown by these men, according to their
letters, is stronger than at any time
during the life of the association. The
cotton crop is considerably later this
season than it was last year but the
deliveries of the new crop by the mem
bership indicates that the receipts of
the association will be exceedingly
satisfactory. Warehouses are report-
steadily ferowteg t^iptd iifed
inembers t)f the a»^c*ikt4t)li ilre ekfWSfl*
sing their satisfaction with the asso-
A visitor in Vass at the present is
an old time resident, J. D. Stewart,
now of Cadwell, Georgia, where he is
following the turpentine industry as
he did in this section years ago before
he went South with the fleeing tur
pentine business. Mr. Stewart gives
some pointers on turpentine that
might interest the people of the Sand
hills if they care to profit by a bit of
forestry wisdom.
Georgia, like North Carolina, has
about exhausted the original long leaf
pine, but is coming on with second
growth stuff, and to make sure of the
future is encouraging that small stuff,
and getting a good return from at lot
of it. Careful handling of the young
crop of pine trees is giving a source
of turpentine, and by working with
cups instead of boxes the trees are
yielding a continuous supply of crude
turpentine year after year and give
signs of growing in the production
rather than of falling off.
Mr. Stewart says that if the farm
ers of this section will study the sub
ject of caring for their young pine
trees this part of the country can in
a few years be again a v/onderfully
productive turpentine center, and he
tells some of the methods followed in
France where an associate of his has
been studying forestry and turpen
tine production under the encourage
ment of the United States government.
In France they work trees for an in
definite period, and a turpentine plant
is as permanent a thing as a steel mill
or a cotton mill, as the forests are
continuous and the supply of crude
turpentine as probable a hundred
years from now as at the present.
Mr. Stewart sees no reason why the
North Carolina Sandhills should not
reforest the land that is not now used,
and from it make a big crop of tur
pentine and resin every year with the
attendant profit that is certain to come
as naval stores are more widely call
ed for with the continued expansion
of shipping throughout the world. In
working the young trees in Georgia a
small space not over three inches wide
is cut on the face of the tree and the
turpentine secured with cups. After
a few years the cut is moved a little
at one Cidgd, and the first one begins
to heai artfet* t*rom time to time the
ctit i§ ai6¥§(l farther around, and as
it gtts pretty well to the point of be-
fCcntnnwi -
At the Kiwanis meet on Wednesday
in Lakeside Inn at Lakeview Captain
Frank Shamberger told some of the
story of his experience. But in order
to get things working right R. N.
Page said that the speaker had gone
into the war among the first American
volunteers, stayed through it to the
finish and ended after two years ex
perience as a captain in the regular
army, and one of the most active
hands all the way through.
Captain Shamberger said he was
born in 1885, and that early in life he
came to Biscoe, a good town at the
time, but which had lost a lot of its
prominent residents. (He lives down
in the Sandhills now). After some
acquaintance with an ancient mule,
earning money for various needs, he
found himself in the University, and
he is authority for the statement that
by joining the officers’ reserve corps
he graduated by a short cut, and then
went to training camps and finally
when a chance to volunteer for service
in France he signed up, and went over.
He happened along about the right
time to be among the first in a num
ber of interesting affairs, and he says
that any man who tells you about not
being scared by some of the things
that happened in France the first year
he was over there is either a—or—.
The Captain stayed until the jig was
up, and as his command was then up
at the front, it was natural that it
moved over the Rhine, and that kept
I him away from home nearly a year
after peace was signed. But he man-
I aged to endure the peace conditions
iand liked them belter than war.
i He came back to America in 1919,
and eventually landed in Moore coun-
I ty where cotton was selling at 40 cents
and concluded to make a fortune in
, the cotton fields. It is not yet all ac
cumulated, but he is young yet. He
married a girl he had been figuring on
since he was eight or ten years old,
and might have married sooner if her
father had shown more real encour
agement. He is now in business in
the Sandhills, and glad he has complet
ed his task of confessing to the Ki
wanis Club.
Young Bob Page made a name for
the whole Page family by some funny
songs he sung for the club after he
found a guitar that would keep the
tune with him. He has a standing in
vitation to come back and pull the
stunt again.
Frank Buchan called attention to
the special train for the State Fair,
and urged as many as possible to join
in making a crowd from the Sand
hills on that occasion.
COTTON NOSr STAY
IN MODEST BOUNDS
Mills Cannot Sell Goods Miade of
Staple that is Too
High
A visitor in Vass this week was W.
W. Forest, of the firm of Forest
Brothers of Philadelphia. The firm is
the selling representatives for the
Vass cotton mill, and Mr. Forest was
down on a business mission. He says
cotton is slowly coming out of a de
pression, and that if it stays low
enough next year will see a good run,
but that if it goes too high conditions
will not stay satisfactory. The high
cost of wages and of other manufac
turing expenses makes American tex
tiles too high to go into the European
markets, and Mr. Forest thinks that
wages and other costs must be adjust
ed to a more nearly normal condition
if we are to expect a market in the
old world again. Europe and China
buy some of our raw cotton and make
goods for their own us6, and send
some of their surplus to us, and they
get along with less cotton products
than if cotton sold at a lower price.
But another difficulty is that the im
itation silk that is made of wood pulp
to a big extent in the last two or three
years is displacing a lot of cotton
goods in this market and in Europe as
(Continued on page 8)
OLD BELT CO-OPS
OPEN OCTOBER 1
Over Four Million in Payments
on 1923 Deliveries From
Sept. 15 to Nov. 15
SANDAHX COnON
CROPGOOD AS ANY
A. Cameron Says This Section
Has a Good Yield of Fair
Quality
A. Cameron, of the Vass Cotton
Mill, a cotton manufacturer and a cot
ton grower, says the crop this year in
this section is as good as any place
he has knowledge of, and Detter than
in many places, and that it is not so
far below the averag-e of previous
years as to be very un^satlsfactory.
The staple is not as long as he would
like to see, and he has known better
yields to the acre, but taking one year
with another the country around Vass
has littte to complain of.
“Pi*ices are not what it seems to me
they should be,” Mr. Cameron said,
**foi with cotton goods so closely sold
out as is evidently the case, and the
crop of the whole belt short as it ap-
(Contiiuifid on pass
The third season of co-operative
marketing for Virginia and North
Carolina bright tobacco farmers will
be in full swing on Wednesday, Octo
ber 1, when thirty more warehouses
of the Tobacco Growers Co-operative
Association will open in Virginia and
Western North Carolina.
Members of the association in the
old belt are waiting eagerly for the
arrival of the grade cards at their
warehouses on the opening day. These
show the Eastern Carolina and South
Carolina co-ops that their organization
is paying the highest cash advances in
its history this season.
The association has been obliged to
turn away hundreds of ^obacco farm
ers who were too late in seeking ad
mission for their preseent crop, since
the directors ru’ed that no 1924 to-
bncco wonld be accented from new
members who signed after the open
ing dates. Many contracts to deliver
the crops of 19‘^.’> and 1926 have now
reached association headquarters from
farmers who were too late to sign up
their present crop after the co-opera
tive floors had opened.
The tobacco farmers of the Eastern
and Southern belts are finding that the
increased cash advances and the pri
vilege of every member to obtain an
immediate loan of one-half the amount
of his cash advance on every load is
greatly to their advantage. Money
was offered an association warehouse
manager by a farmer outside of the
association last week for the pri
vilege of marketing his present
crop through the association but
the directors and officials o f
the association continue to rigidly en
force their ruling that no more con
tracts for delivery of the present crop
will be accepted after the opening day.
Membership books for the 1924 de
livery season vnll close at all Old Belt
warehouses of the association on Oc
tober 1st.
.The association is now pajring out
millions of dollars to its members in
various. belts. Last week it was $2,-
300,000 to Virginia and Western co
ops, on their last season’s deliveries:
thiis week it is $600/KK) to the mem
bers in Eastern Carolina on the 1923
crop and according to the latest an
nouncement the dark-fired tobaccd
growers of Virginia within th€ asso
ciation will divide approximately $1,-
(ContilNMd Otk |MI0B ^
NEILL CALVIN BLUE
Seldom do we have the privi
lege of spending a little time with
a fellow-being who can connt his
years as nearing the centnry
mark; and who can look back with
a clear, alert memory over the
passing events of three-quarters
of a century. Such was the pri
vilege of the writer, a few days
ago, when he spent a pleasant
Sunday afternoon with Mr. Neill
C. Blue, of Eureka community.
Mr. Blue’s grandfather came
over from Argyleshire, Scotland,
aboul the year 1795, and located
in Moore county on the farm now
owned by John and Danny Blue.
His father, who was bom in 18-
04, lived on this same farm dur
ing his entire life. Here Neill
Calvin Blue was born on Janu
ary 18th, 1839, within two miles
of his present home.
He states that his impression
is that he was born about break
fast time, as the first sensation
which he can recall was an acute
hunger, which has stuck with him
in the form of a healthy appetite
to this day.
This latter statement is rather
remarkable, considering the fact
that a few more., months ..will
round out his 86th year.
Mr. Blue is proud of the fact
that he is a Scotchman, a Pres
byterian and a democrat, and con
fesses that one of his most seri
ous mistakes in life was a de
parture from his principles to
such an extent as to once vote
the r^ublican ticket. This error
was committed when he cast his
first and only republican ballot
for Horace Greely for President.
In 1862, the second year of the
war between the States, Mr. Blue
volunteered for service in Com
pany D., 49th Regiment of Moore
County volunteers. The regi
ment was commanded by “Bob”
Ransom, and Company D was un
der Captain Black, more gener
ally known as Sheriff Black. Mr.
Blue’s record is unique in that
from the time he entered the ser
vice, he did not miss a day’s ser
vice, nor a single duty, until he
was rent home two and a half
years later on a sixty-day fur
lough; this furlough had not ex
pired on the date of the surrend
er... He enlisted as a private, be
came orderly sergeant, and at
the close of the war held the of
fice of third lieutenant. He saw
service at Malvern Hill, Antietam
and in the Peninsular Campaign,
and didn’t receive a scratch until
during the siege around Peters
burg a short while before the sur
render; he was struck on the
shoulder by a mortar shell and
suffered a flesh wound. This ac
cident necessitated his being sent
to the hospital in Richmond, and
from there his sixty-day leave of
absence.
In 1873 Mr. Blue married Nan
cy McKenzie, who is now in her
69th year, and is active and vig
orous. From this union twelve
children were bom, eleven of
whom are now living, all within
a short distance of their childhoo^
home. There were five girls and
Gdntiniied mi page 8
Take time at a railroad crossini^—
< talw stesuity.