Newspapers / The News-Journal (Raeford, N.C.) / May 21, 1981, edition 1 / Page 1
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On Teal Drive Near 401 Bypass New Armory Seen Opening By April Raeford's new National Guard Armory is expected to be ready for use by next April if weather is good through the construction period. Bids on the planned 20,012 square-foot building will be opened in Raleigh at 3:30 p.m. Tuesday. Burley Mitchell, secretary of the State Department of Crime Control and Public Safety, announced last ( week. This and other information was relayed to Capt. Alvis Dickson, Jr., commander of Headquarters and Headquarters Company, Second Battalion, 252nd Armor, by letter last week by Elbert McPhaul, Jr., director of facilities for the State Crime Control and Public Safety Department. Headquarters and Headquarters Company, composed of 136 officers and enlisted person nel, is based in the present armory and will be based in the new one. McPhaul, incidentally is a native of Hoke County. He will open the bids. The U.S. National Guard Bureau has approved $712,000 for construction of the new building. It will be erected on a five-acre tract lying on the west side of Teal Drive and between the N.C. 211 west cutoff and U.S. 401 south bypass to Laurinburg. A street, , named Up church. is to be opened subse quently between the new building and the 21 1 cutoff. The new building, which will be two-story in part, will contain about 4,000 more square feet of area than the present building, on Central Avenue. The reason is. McPhaul said, it will contain space for battalion headquarters (four offices) and training facilities and equipment storage which the pre sent building doesn't. It will be heated by natural gas, and the offices and classrooms will be airconditioned. I he rest of the building will be ventilated me chanically. Bids have been received from 18 general contractors, and six to 10 heating, plumbing, and electrical contractors, McPhaul added. The construction is expected to start soon after the first of July, and the contract will allow 320 working days to complete it. which would be in about eight months if good construction weather prevails. The building would be ready for use within 30 days after construction is completed. The work would start three weeks atter the contracts are awarded, and this is expected to be within 30 days after the bids are opened. McPhaul explained that after the bids are opened they will be reviewed by the state construc tion office of Crime Control De partment and by the National Guard Bureau. The bids will be opened before bidding contractors and state and federal officials in the office of Maj. Gen. William Ingram, state adju tant general. The plans show the new building will contain a 6,300-square-foot assembly hall, and offices for officers and noncommissioned of ficers. library and classrooms, a ritle range, food preparation and scullery areas, as well as a locker room, rest rooms and showers. The State Crime Control De pan ment is involved because the North Carolina National Guard is one of its divisions. The old National Guard build ing. on the north side of Central Avenue, between Adams and Mc Duffie Streets, will revert to the Hoke County government after it is vacated. 25 ^ke. <~Yle.w6 The Hoke County News - Established 1928 journal 25 The Hoke County Journal - Established 1905 VOLUME LXXIII NUMBER 4 RAKFORD, HOKE .COUNTY, NORTH CAROLINA SB PF,R YKAR THURSDAY, MAY 21, 1981 Commissioners Hit Vocational Cuts Young Retires; Air Proposal Rejected Around Town BY SAM C. MORRIS The temperature got up into the 80s Monday, but the rain that had been forecast, didn't arrive. There was only a 50 percent chance Monday and it is 80 percent Tuesday. As this is being written late Monday afternoon, we will wait and see about Tuesday. I told Jake Austin that if we could get 110 percent chance of rain, then maybe it would come the next day. * * * Mrs. Kerr Stevens was by the office a couple of weeks ago and was telling me about an item that appeared in The Reader's Digest. Rachel said that Mrs. Harry Hol land had visited with her a few weekends ago and was telling her that an item in the February issue had been written by her daughter. Mrs. Charles Boney of Wilming ton. The item appeared in the "Life in the United States" section of the magazine. It was on page 80 and I would print it here except it is prohibited. If you can't find a copy I have one. but I am sure there is one in the library. Mrs. Holland's husband was the late Harrv K. Holland, who was pastor of the Raeford Presbyterian Church in the 1940's. Mrs. Boney was the former Bettv Holland. ? * ? The Hoke County commissioners Monday night received the notice of retirement of Wendell S. Young effective June 30 as county Agricul tural Extension Service chairman after 18 years' service in the position, also indicated the already cut county schools' budget would have to be cut more, and opposed proposed lowering of Air Force training flight routes over the county to 300 feet from 500 feet altitude. The motion on the aircraft proposal on Pope Air Force Base training routes says the proposal was opposed till the commissioners get more information. Carl Miller, who appeared at the meeting in connection with a road-paving request, said he dis agreed with the proposal, stating among other objectives that lower ing the altitude to 300 feet would create a hazard for crop-dusting aircraft flying while the Air Force Younger Snead was by the office this week and brought me a codv of the May issue of "The Tarheel Guardsmen. " This is the monthly publication of the North Carolina National Guard. An article in the magazine is entitled, "The Guard Is Big Business in North Carolina." The annual payroll of the Na tional Guard in North Carolina for weekend drills and the annual summer training exceeds $21 mil lion. Of course the guard has other expense like gas, repairs, mainte nance. etc. Now to get to Hoke County, the annual payroll for the Raeford guard is $244,258.83. Now this is not peanuts. So when you read about the construction of the new armory, just think of it as more revenue for the city and county. Don't forget that the gurad is ready to defend our country. 1 should know because it took five and one-half years of my life during World War II. * * * Mr. and Mrs. Bill Lancaster have just returned from a trip to Hawaii. Bill went to play in the World Left Handed golf tourna ment that was held on Maui Island. Bill stated that approximately 185 golfers were in the tournament. New Zealand had 40, Australia had 40, British Columbia had 42 and some 60 or more were from the United States. The tournament was played on Wailia Golf Course. He did real well in the tourna ment, as he was fourth in the first flight. Of course all he talked about was golf, so if you want to know about the scenery, food, etc., you must (Sec AROUND TOWN, page 9) training flights were being held. Miller said he favored raising the minimum altitude allowed for training flights to 1,000 feet. At a public hearing on suggested uses of the county's federal revenue-sharing funds for 1981-82, Elwood Baker, president of the Hoke County Firemen's Associa tion, asked the commissioners to provide the association's nine rural volunteer fire departments with the same amount each they have been getting in the previous years. (The association does not include the Raeford department). Anne Pate, director of the Coun ty Parks and Recreation Depart ment, asked the commissioners for $20,000 to develop for public recreation the 6.7 acres of land on West Prospect Avenue N.C. 211 that Burlington Industries donated this month to the county for a recreation park. The hearing was held Monday night before the regular mid-month meeting. The commissioners did not act on the requests. In other business, the commis sioners: -Adopted a motion to table action on a petition to pave SR 1465, in Sunset Park, till the priority list for road work for 1981-82 is received by the State Department of Transportation . The commissioners agreed that efforts to get action by DOT on the paving requested by the petition should be made after the commis sioners see what standing the project has on the priority list. Miller and another resident of the area, Edward Lumbley, had ap peared at the meeting to ask the commissioners to push for paving of the road, which Commissioner Danny DeVane agreed with Miller and Lumbley is in bad shape. The road is scraped twice a month, the commissioners were informed. Second Shooting Victim Died May 13 Fire Damaged Club Friday The mass shootings of May 10 in Hoke County has claimed their second life, and someone tried unsuccessfully to burn down the Hour Glass club, whose parking lot was the scene of the shootings. The club is about four miles south of Raeford. Ronnie Jacobs, 26, of Rt. 2. Raeford. shot in the head, died about 5 a.m. May 13 in Cape Fear Valley Hospital in Fayetteville. The other victim was Charles Ray McNeill, 25, of Rt. 2. Shan non, stabbed in the neck, then fatally wounded in a volley of gunfire after he allegedly had fired one shot with a rifle, according to witnesses. McNeill allegedly had wounded James Luther Hammonds, who was unarmed, during an argument, before McNeill went to his car and got the rifle. McNeill died almost immediately. Others were admitted to Fayetteville, Lumberton and Sales Tax Collections Decline Hoke County's net collections of its one percent sales tax totaled 584. 053. 38, for the quarter ending Bloodmobile Due The American Red Cross Blood - mobile will be at Raeford United Methodist Church Thursday from 1 p.m. to 5 p.m. Hoke County blood program leaders are looking especially for donors in downtown Raeford. in March, compared with $49,721. 42 for the same quarter ending March 31, 1980, the State Depart ment of Revenue reported last week. The collections for the quarter through December 31, 1980. were $78,308.61. Of the net collected in the past quarter. $71,970.44 went to the Hoke County government and the rest to Raeford. Jane Pratt Served In 1946 Laurinburg hospitals, and one. Anthony Bryant. 18, of Rt. 3. Laurinburg. was released later the day of the snooting after being treated at Cape Fear Valley Hospi tal. The conditions of the other wounded have been reported good to satisfactory. They are Junior Lee Jones, 27, of Rt. 1, Shannon. Clayton Bullard of Red Springs, and Harold Gene Brooks, 23. of Shannon. Brooks has been charged with murder in McNeill's death, and Bryant with engaging in a riot. The attempt to burn the Hour Glass, operated by Donald Lock lear, was made early Friday. Someone threw a bottle of gaso line onto the roof, but the resulting tire did little damage, the Antioch Volunteer Fire Department re ported. The bottle rolled off the roof, and some of the fuel burned on the roof but the Fire didn't get hot enough to burn the shingles. The Firemen reached the club about 2 a.m. soon after receiving the Fire report. The sherifF s department investi gated. "Adopted a resolution on the proposed DOT Secondary Road Improvement Program for 1981-82: that of $19,008 provided. $15,206. 40 be used for countywide spot stabilization, intersections im provement. and the school bus safety program. --Approved a request that the county ask for $11,593 in federal Juvenile Justice Delinquency Pro gram funds for the Upchurch Junior High Scool Alternate Learn ing Center and $17,111 in state Community Based Alternatives funds for the ALC at J.W. Turling ton School for fiscal 1981-82. The requests were presented for the County Youth Services Task Force by Ken Witherspoon, a member of the Task Force. --Appointed Dennis Brewster and Betty Rogers as new members and reappointed David Purcell, Lloyd Home, Leonard Wiggins. Harold Livingston and Wither spoon to new terms on the Task Force. All the terms run to June 30. 1983. Mrs. Rogers replaces Viann Howard, and Brewster replaces Chris Guy. - Adopted a motion to advise the Laurinburg District AME Zion Church that the commissioners have already done all they can do according to law in exempting the church organization from paying taxes on the district's Hoke County property of 8.5 acres with build ings. The commissioners have ex empted the church from paying taxes on $38,630 value of a total evaluation of $47,000 for the property. Part of the property is being used for a district recreation center, which excludes it from exemption as church property. County Tax Supervisor Les Simpson informed the commissioners that the ex empted portion is not producing income as far as he knew. Though exemption is for non-profit organi zations for churches, it was indi cated that income-producing pro perty. regardless of whether profit is made or not. is subject to taxation. -Heard a request from D.H. Huff, Jr.. chairman of the Hoke County Soil and Water Conserva tion District Supervisors, for $5,000 in the 1981-82 budget. He said the supervisors didn't know what the state was going to provide the county with this year. Huff said, indicating one need for funds, the Soil Conservation District office secretary, working parttime, is paid the state minimum wage, $3.60 per hour, a total of $4,492 per year, and has been working on the job for four years. Huff spoke after the commissioners were shown slides of Hoke County soil and water conser vation problems and remedies. The slides were shown by Sam Warren, county district conservationist for the U.S. Soil Conservation Service. ??Approved a request made by Sheriff David Barrington to buy for $1,450 a 1978 Plymouth cruiser for the sheriff s department to replace a department 1970 Chevrolet. SCHOOL BUDGET The County Board of Educa tion's proposal to cut four voca tional education teachers to help trim the school system's budget drew adverse criticism from Com missioners DeVane and Mabel Riley. DeVane said he had calls from people expressing objections and declared. "1 feel that with per capita income 98th in the state (among the 100 counties), that the cuts be made elsewhere, that cuts be made where really needed in the county." Mrs. Riley said the board of education ought to cut "some other departments." that vocational teachers are needed. The school board accepted re commendations made at the bud get meeting of May 7 by County Schools Supt. Ra/ Autry. The recommendation to terminate the jobs of four of Hoke County High School's 17 vocational education instructors was one of many Autry made to cut the proposed budget to a level the county commissioners could approve without raising the county tax rate of $1.01 per $100 property evaluation, which the commissoners are determined not to do. The jobs proposed for termina tion are those of Peter Sawyer, carpentry instructor; Arthur Kemp, electronics; James Baxley. electrical; and Linwood Simpson, brick-laying. These and other cuts approved by the school board reduced the school system's tentative 1981-82 (Sec YOl N(.. r-ieo l>) Raeford-reared Ex-Congresswoman Dies Miss Eliza Jane Pratt, reared in Raeford and the only North Caro lina woman ever to serve in Congress, died May 13 at 5:05 p.m. in Mercy Hospital. Charlotte, after a period of declining health. Miss Pratt was living in retire ment in Wadesboro, Anson Coun ty. at 305 E. Martin St.. at the time she went to the hospital. The funeral wis conducted at First Presbyterian Church of Wadesboro at 10 a.m. Saturday by the pastor, the Rev. Charles Gamble. A graveside service was conducted at 11:30 a.m. Saturday at the Pratt family plot in Raeford Cemetery by the same minister. The graves of Miss Pratt's parents. James L. Pratt and Lena Valetta Little Pratt, are in the family plot also. Miss Pratt is survived by her brother. Lacy Pratt of Roanoke, Va.; and her sister, Mrs. Neville Smith of Silver Spring. Md. She was born in Anson County, at Morven, about 10 miles south of Wadesboro, March 5, 1905, and came to Raeford in childhood when her parents moved here. Her father owned property in Hoke County and built the two-story Pratt Build ing, completed in 1911, in down town Raeford, on the west side of the North Main Street between West Edinborough and West El wood Avenues. In recent years the building housed Hoke Auto Co. and now is occupied by Pilot Industries, which moved in 1979. The Pilot management remodeled it. Miss Pratt served in the U.S. House of Representatives, tilling the unexpired portion of the term of Congressman William O. Burgin of Lexington in 194b. She was nominated by the Eighth Congres sional District Democratic Execu tive Committee on April 23 and she was elected May 25 to serve the unexpired portion of the term. Burgin died April 11, 194b, in Doctor's Hospital in Washington, D.C. He had announced he would not run for reelection. Miss Pratt was serving as the congressman's secretary at the time of his death. She served as congresswoman til) January 3. 1947, when U.S. Rep. C.B. Deane of Rockingham, also a Democrat, took office. Deane had been elected in the November general election to the full-two-year term, defeating Republican Whicker. Miss Pratt had not run for the full term. Before joining Burgin's start. Miss Pratt had been serving as secretary or administrative assis tant to Eighth District Democratic congressmen since 1923 when Rep. William C. Hammer of Asheboro appointed her his secretary. She had met Hammer two weeks earlier while she was reporting on a Candor peach festival at which the congressman made a speech. Miss Mary Louise Medley of Wadesboro relates in her "History of Anson County" Hammer "liked everything about her until she bobbed her hair. The representa tive from Asheboro warned her that it would be fatal if he found her smoking 'a cherootY' Miss Pratt (See JANH PRATT, page 9) Jane Pratt
The News-Journal (Raeford, N.C.)
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May 21, 1981, edition 1
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