Newspapers / The News-Record (Marshall, N.C.) / June 26, 1980, edition 1 / Page 1
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Flea Market Opens Saturday To Rousing Start Downtown Awakens To New Interest, Expects Larger Crowd This Saturday - The of Marshall's fiea-and-farmer's market got off to ? good start Saturday when more than enough ven dors showed up to fill the stall spaces set up in the parking lot of the American Legion hall. Merchants who had worked to get it off the ground said it bad exceeded their expecta tions. George Penland, one of the operators of Penland and Sons Department Store, said the volume of business in his store had increased tremendously as the flea market attracted a lot of walk-in traffic to the downtown area. Darien Tweed, who operates Tweed's Auction House, said he did not recall seeing so many people in downtown Marshall since be had been in business here. A1 Dirago, operator of the Rock Cafe, said his business had picked up tremendously. I had beard Marshall was once buys on Saturday's, but this was the first time I had witnessed it," he said. Some problems arose in the first day which are in the pro cess of being worked out. For one thing, most of the vendors closed up and left the lot by mid-afternoon. Merchants said that after six p.m., a number of people showed up at the lot ready to do business. Plans are to encourage the vendors to remain open throughout the afternoon to take advantage of late shop pers. Several musicians have also agreed to appear in the late afternoon and make music at various locations "If the people want to stay and dance in the streets, no one will object," said one of the booster's of the market. "We're willing to let this thing grow in whatever direction it will. It is one of the best things to happen in Marshall in a long time. Another problem was toilet facilities. However, Penland and Sons opened their women's rest room to the ladies. Tweed said that his business will provide rest room facilities to men this coming Saturday. The Rock Cafe will also provide facilities, the owner said. Many vendors were surpris ed at the reception. J.B. Reid ?aid be did more buainoaa at Marshall than he usually did at flea markets around Aihevilie. Vendors showed up from as far away as Greenville, S C. and GreeneviHe, Tenn. The opening day was rich in variety, and shoppers had available to them anything from ancient plow-points to pocket knives and talking par rots. Merchants urged people to come back this coming Satur day, since the market is ex pected to attract twice as many vendors and the pro spects for a spontaneous street dance and party look very good. A VENDOR, whose business was good. The News Record SERVING THE PEOPLE OF MADISON COUNTY On the Insldo ... For Mars Hill Horse Show Winners - turn to Page 10 79th Year No. 26 PUBLISHED WEEKLY IN THE COUNTY SEAT AT MARSHALL, N.C. THURSDAY, June 26, 1980 15* Per Copy Grave Robbers Desecrate Old Tombs THE DESECRATION of a family's dead. A vauit pulled. Looking on are Frank Roberts, Randy Combs, and family members Mrs. Peggy Dotterer and Ed Gentry. By LEWIS W. GREEN Graverobbers broke into two mausoleums in fs a secluded little family cemetery in Hot Springs last week, battered some crypts and scattered the remains of people dead for decades about the site. Three skulls were missing from remains scattered about Rumbough Cemetery, and Sheriff E.Y. Ponder theorized that the ghouls were after jewelry and dental gold. He said the mouths of two other skeletons had been pried open with sticks in an effort to determine if they had fillings. "There have been a lot of fantastic stories over the years about these people being buried with valuables," Sheriff Ponder said. "I do know that it was a very wealthy family at one time, and that the forebears settled in here about the tirffe of the Civil War." One member of the family said that despite such stories, the farflily in later generations had little wealth except land which was sold piecemeal over the years. Sydney 0. Izlar of Chattanooga, a grandson of one of the dead women, said that he had been thinking for years about removing his grand mother from the crypts and placing her tor est in , a grave, but had let it go. The bodies were found Thursday after three young men from North Wilkesboro had walked up on the ridge after delivering a truckload of goods to the Blue Ridge shoe manufacturing plant, which is two or three hundred yards down the slope from the cemetery. Sheriff Ponder said that the three young men had some time to kill during the lunch hour and wandered up to the cemetery, which is under several giant oak trees and almost out of sight across the ridge from the shoe plant. The men finding the desecrated crypts were David Ray Johnson and Harry Rader of North Wilkesboro, and Jeff Ray of Hayes, N.C. The cemetery site is so situated that graverobbers could easily have worked undetected during daylight hours since the back side of the cemetery bends to a sheer drop through foliage to a creek. Some deteriorated (Continued on Page 8) Shattered Crypts By LEWI8 W. GREEN There it was in the Rum bough Cemetery, a strange thing done to a quiet family, old pain renewed, old memories revived and new ones of horror laid on, new pain... It is Friday. The day after the robbing of the crypta, ghoulish, reprehensible, in comprehensible. Friday and noon and the bright June light blazes down through trees onto a lush green ridge A light breeze along the grass and into the trees and the sense of the place changes and there is the mood of heavy strange pondering which belongs to old midnights of other times, other minds. Bright June flashes onto old corpses, shattered vaults, splintered coffins, the light of the sky striking those things of secrecy and the whiaphered darkness of our minds. ??? Strange Minds, Dark Thoughts The stark contrasts of a mountain summer day. A bird flits and across the valley soft ly rises the rush of the river. Corroded handles, dry ex celsior, the ancient stink, an old rosary on old hands. Sydney 0. Izlar of Chat tanooga, a member of the family: "From the days of old Egypt, the lowest form of life is a grave robber..." For decades, tales had per sisted that the family was very rich, that those interred members in the mausoleums on the ridge had been laid away with their jewelry, gold, diamonds. "Not rich," a family member said. "The family had land, some money. No one was buried with Jewelry..." But the wealth? Of service to the communi ty, of accomplishment. They gave to causes, of themselves, of money, of land. A Baptist Church was built on land deed ed by Bonnie Hill, one of the long dead now tossed so carelessly from her resting place. - Mrs. Peggy Dotterer, 76, of the family: "I remember them all quite well. James Rum bough Saf ford died in 1913 ? my cousin. He owned an ice plant here. In the winter he had to work some in the creek... pneumonia... "Bessie Mae Safford. She (Continued onfag* I) Still Confiscated By Sheriff Ponder Sheriff E.Y. Ponder and his i Urge wttakey ttill found in the Cutalwll Town Mction. The Sheriff Mid no ?m waa charg ed, that the still wm alone when found and that said still waa not talking He brought rj " *? ? #>? \ , 'fSt-lk x , Reward Offered Sheriff K.YMarlN??f fared a tsoo reward for infor ?Mttee leading to OM arreat ?ad conviction of the peraon or peraona who entered the arypta in R vj Oamatary ta?t weak. Wt m the component parts of the ?till in to his department waiting for someone to come in, identify it and claim it. + + + Sheriff Ponder announced the arreat of an Asheville man on housebreaking charge* home of Nate Ray at Mara Hill pieces of furniture removed, a big round table three smaller ones, one anti que bed, one antique sofa, four racking chair, one large The Sheriff said a Ure track w?s found in the road near ths ? ? *. f:r . 'i + + + j Sheriff Ponder last week returned about $80,000 worth of cable television material and components to several out-of-state firms Me had earlier announced the arrest of Charles B Id wards Of Blacks burg, S.C. at The Sheriffs Catch MADISON'S SHERIFF E.Y. Ponder with liquor still at jail. (Photo by Lewis W. Green)
The News-Record (Marshall, N.C.)
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June 26, 1980, edition 1
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