Plaid Shorts, Striped Shirt and Bottle Caps

I'm not sure how old I am in this photo.  I was a skinny, scrawny kid, so my age is just a guess.  Maybe I was six, seven, or eight.  I know I was old enough to have moved to Haw River from Reidsville.  The move came when I was four and I am definitely older than four.

Haw River was a paradise compared to life in Reidsville.  Haw River meant flush toilets, electrical outlets everywhere, and light bulbs in every room.  My father's decision to give up the Reidsville farming life and move to Haw River to work at Burlington's Western Electric plant was a wise one.

In Haw River, we even had a telephone and eventually a black and white TV and an air conditioner and a clothes washer and clothesline.  What with the cost of electricity and all, an electric clothes dryer would come much later.

I remember the phone number: 578-0874.  The area code has changed so many times over the years I can't remember it.  It was a wall phone with a rotary dial and a two-foot cord.  The phone was a four-party line.  If you wanted to make a call, you had to wait until your neighbors got off the line before you could dial.  You took the risk of a nosey neighbor picking up and listening to your conversation.

A multi-party line was much cheaper than a private line.  Even though my father was an employee of AT&T and got a discount on his phone bill, we had to save money where we could.  Money was very important to my mother.  Her obsession with money lasted to her death and beyond, but that's a complicated story that I'll save for another day.

Despite all the indulgences in Haw River, we still made the trip back to Reidsville every Sunday to visit my grandparents.  We would leave after 9:00 AM Mass at Blessed Sacrament and drive to Reidsville to spend the day.

At some point in his life, my grandfather, Albert Wall, decided he wanted a taste of the entrepreneurial life.  He didn't give up tobacco farming (that was in his blood), but he decided to buy a country convenience store.

He had one of his two daughters (my aunt Louise Carroll) and her husband and five kids run it, although I believe there were only four kids at the time.  They all lived in the apartment that made up the second floor of the store.  Notice the open window high up on the left in the photo.  That's where the apartment was.

I remember one special visit to the apartment.  Aunt Louise had cooked an opossum in the oven.  Yes, you read that right - an opossum.  I was never sure whether it was meant as a joke or whether it was a real deal meal.  I remember a lot of laughter, but I also remember tasting the opossum.  I think carrots, and maybe potatoes, were involved.

The store sold gasoline - Esso regular and premium.  The pumps are just out of view on the left of the photo.

By the way, how do you like my attire?  Plaid shorts with a striped shirt.  Very cool.  Very hipster.

There was an oil change pit outside.  It was about six feet deep with tracks for a car to drive onto.  It was a bit longer than an automobile and had steps for the mechanic (my uncle Eugene) to enter the pit to drain the oil from underneath the car and make adjustments.

The pit replaced a lift, which I'm sure was very expensive, if even available at the time.

In the store, behind the counter, was a large electric air compressor that would kick on infrequently to refill its red tank with air.  I suppose the compressed air was to fill flat tires.  I doubt there were any tools that operated on compressed air.  Compressed air was free at that time.  These days you have to drop quarters in a slot to inflate your tires.

The entire left-hand side of the store was used as a garage for auto repair.  The right-hand side was the actual store.

I don't recall much "mechanicing" being done in the garage.  I think the garage was eventually filled with a pool table and car repair ended.  Years later a mechanic bought the place, closed the store part, and opened an auto repair shop.

In about a three mile stretch there were five such convenience stores - one of which was across the road from the Carroll-Wall Esso.  Only one of the five is still open today.   One of the five closed when the owner was murdered during a robbery and two closed when the owners died.

 I think the auto repair place that replaced Carroll-Wall Esso has even closed.  I never see anyone there and the large garage door is never opened.  Grocery stores in town and convenient transportation put an end to it all.

I don't ever recall seeing my grandfather at his store.  Never.  I suppose he left it to his daughter and son-in-law to operate it.

I do recall seeing and listening to gossip from the gang of five or six "farmers" who were always at Carroll-Wall Esso.  In the winter time, they huddled around a wood-burning stove.  They sat in metal chairs which today would be called "retro".

They all wore overalls, had few or no teeth, and constantly spit chewing tobacco into a tin cup they kept on the floor by their chairs.

I'm guessing most were full-time alcoholics or were temporarily drunk.  No, I'm not guessing - they were hardcore.

I remember a large "drink box" which was filled with the little original Coke bottles.  This was a time when the little 12-oz. bottles were the only thing available.  They were not nostalgic.  Coke is the only drink I remember, but I'm sure Carroll-Wall Esso had RC Cola and possibly Pepsi and maybe Dr. Pepper.

Notice in the photo on the outside of the store are signs advertising both Pepsi and a glimpse of a Coke sign.  By the front door is a large thermometer which I believe has a Pepsi emblem at the top.

I don't remember any drinks that were not cola-colored - no Mountain Dew, Sprite, or Sierra Mist.  There was possibly 7-Up, but that's just a guess.  There were no energy drinks.

In the center of the store were racks of snacks and candies.  It was a wondrous sight to a kid my age.

Packs of peanuts to pour into your Coke bottle were very popular.  Carroll-Wall Esso is where I learned the exotic technique of putting peanuts into your cola.  It's also where I learned to "cuss" like Cease and Pink who were regulars at Carroll-Wall Esso.

Moon Pies, Honey Buns, and nabs (cheese and peanut butter) were big sellers.  I have a vague memory of ice cream, but I can't picture an ice cream freezer.  Maybe the ice cream is just coming from my imagination.  I don't specifically bread, milk, and sandwich fixin's, but I suppose those were possible.  I know it's the place you went to buy drinks and nabs for folks working in your tobacco fields.

I remember a collection of auto parts hanging on the wall behind the counter - fan belts, cans of oil and such.

I remember Dennis.  He was a little boy about my age who lived nearby.  Dennis and I would play around the store.  Many years later I would meet Dennis again at the American Tobacco Company where his mother and father also worked.  Dennis was a nice guy as both a little boy and as a grown man.

Most of all I remember BOTTLE CAPS.  Tens of thousands, maybe hundreds of thousands of BOTTLE CAPS paved the parking lot at Carroll-Wall Esso.  There was no asphalt, just BOTTLE CAPS.  If you squint your eyes and look closely, you possibly see them on the ground in the photo.  From the front door, all the way out to the road was a sea of BOTTLE CAPS.

Despite selling enough sodas to pave the parking lot, aunt Louise and uncle Eugene would give up on the place and move on.   My grandfather sold the store and that was the end of his entrepreneurial life.

Early Elections Indicate Voter Enthusiasm

Municipal early elections have come in.  People are really excited about electing their city leaders.  

From a low of 11 voters on October 22 to a high of 65 on November 3, 360 people crowded the polls over 13 days to register their obvious satisfaction with local leaders.

Early elections results cover the cities of Eden, Reidsville, Madison, Mayodan, Stoneville, and Wentworth.

My sympathies go out to the poll workers who manned the voting booths.  It must have been a very boring experience.

GIBBERISH FROM YOUR PRESIDENT

DONALD TRUMP EXPLAINS SOMETHING IN A SPEECH IN SOUTH CAROLINA IN 2016.

“Look, having nuclear — my uncle was a great professor and scientist and engineer, Dr. John Trump at MIT; good genes, very good genes, OK, very smart, the Wharton School of Finance, very good, very smart — you know, if you’re a conservative Republican, if I were a liberal, if, like, OK, if I ran as a liberal Democrat, they would say I’m one of the smartest people anywhere in the world — it’s true! — but when you’re a conservative Republican they try — oh, do they do a number — that’s why I always start off: Went to Wharton, was a good student, went there, went there, did this, built a fortune — you know I have to give my like credentials all the time, because we’re a little disadvantaged — but you look at the nuclear deal, the thing that really bothers me — it would have been so easy, and it’s not as important as these lives are — nuclear is powerful; my uncle explained that to me many, many years ago, the power and that was 35 years ago; he would explain the power of what’s going to happen and he was right, who would have thought? — but when you look at what’s going on with the four prisoners — now it used to be three, now it’s four — but when it was three and even now, I would have said it’s all in the messenger; fellas, and it is fellas because, you know, they don’t, they haven’t figured that the women are smarter right now than the men, so, you know, it’s gonna take them about another 150 years — but the Persians are great negotiators, the Iranians are great negotiators, so, and they, they just killed, they just killed us.”

THIS GIBBERISH WAS SPOKEN BY THE MAN YOU ELECTED TO SERVE AS PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES.

11 Days to Acknowledge Wink Hoover

It took the Reidsville Review 11 days to acknowledge the passing of former Couty Commissioner and School Board member Wink Hoover.  Sad.

Dubby kicks robber's ass!

Former County Commissioner and Guru of Rockingham County W.L. "Dubby" Pryor threatens to kick my ass for photographing him at a public event.  Many Rockingham County Commissioners have made the same threat. 

Badass Dubby singlehandedly managed to fight off a pistol-packing robber at his Sweepstakes Depot in Ruffin at 4:30 AM Saturday morning in much the same style as he handled me at the Eden Country Club.

Pryor was picking up his daily haul to take home when he was approached by a man with a pistol.  A struggle ensued, Dubby was struck in the head with the gun, and the cowardly bandit made off with most of the loot after Dubby put up a brave defense. 

There were no witnesses, but Dubby reported the robber was a six-feet tall black man, 190 lbs. and was wearing a black hoodie.

Expect an insurance claim to be filed.

Movin' On Up! (to light bulbs and electrical outlets)

Here is a photo of our new home under construction.  My father did much of the work on the house when he wasn't trying to eek out a living on the tobacco farm owned by my maternal grandfather

Sometime between the age of zero to four years old, my family moved north into the much nicer new home.  I can't say exactly when it happened because I was a very young pup at the time.

I say we moved north, but that's not entirely true.  We moved north exactly 50 yards.  It was not much of a move.  My mom, dad, and brother probably carried everything we owned in just a couple of trips.  One of the three likely carried me in their arms.

But at least we moved out of the log shack that had been my home.  Since I wrote the log shack story, I have learned we had a single light bulb dangling on a wire in one room.  There were no electrical outlets.  If you needed to power up something, you replaced the one bulb with a socket and plugged in.  When you were finished powering whatever needed powering, you replaced the socket with the light bulb.

Running water was also available in only one room - the kitchen.  There was no bathroom.

I'm guessing there was no water heater.

The road in front of our house was sandy clay dirt with a few large gravels.  I remember the state occasionally driving large yellow tanker trucks down the road spraying used motor oil.  The oil was to hold down the dust clouds that followed any vehicle that traveled down the road.  I am confident the state no longer sprays dirt roads with used motor oil.  It was not an environmentally sound practice.

It was seriously rural living, very primitive  - much like Jed Clampett's family before they struck black gold when Jed was huntin' for some food with a musket.

I have also learned my grandparents lived in the log shack before building their new home in the 1920s.  Over the years many tenants on my grandfather's farm also lived in the log shack.



Our new house had multiple light bulbs, electrical outlets, and a water heater.  It was luxury living.

My mother reportedly took credit for designing our new home.  It's a nice, sturdy house for the time, but not something I would take credit for designing.  What you are looking at is the front of the house - notice no door.

Another thing it was missing was a bathroom.  That's right - no bathroom.  It had the same facilities as the log shack.  There was space for a bathroom, but it was never finished.  The blank space had a pot you could use or go to the outhouse near the log shack.

Notice the house in the background.  It was built in the 1920s,  That's where my grandparents lived after moving out of the log shack.  It's also where my wife and I live now.

I am told electric service did not come to anyone's house until around 1940.

It's a long story, but at one point my wife and I moved into the house in the foreground.  Then we moved to Haw River and then Danville and then back into another house a few hundred yards up the road and where we lived when we were first married.  Then we moved into the house in the background.  Like I said, it's a long story with many moves not listed here and I am a bit ashamed of the bizarre nature of our circus-like life.  Maybe I will tell the whole story someday.

I am told my maternal grandfather gave my parents the property where my dad built the new house.  Grandfather Wall also provided all the logs for the lumber and helped finance its construction.

We only stayed in the new house for a few years.  We left the farming life behind.  My father got a job at Western Electric in Burlington, so we moved to Haw River to eliminate the daily commuting.

When I was four years old my parents sold the new house to my grandfather and borrowed money from him to buy a nice middle-class home in Haw River.  I am told my parents bought the Haw River home and 15 acres of land for $11,000.

Haw River is where I lived for 14 years before beginning my college life.  In a short time, my life had gone from living in a log shack with one lightbulb to being a college graduate living nearly 24 hours from home.  My entire life has been strange.



My dad, holding me, stands in front of a log pile.  These logs were milled into the lumber which was used to build our new house.

My brother tells me the logs were cut and milled on another part of my grandfather's farm.  I have always believed the logs were cut from the spot where the house was built.

Whatever the case, nothing explains why my father was so dressed up to stand in front of a log pile.  I have started to believe my father dressed up whenever a camera was present.

Notice dad's log pile hat.  He could pass for a gangster instead of a farmer.



Here my mother holds me while posing with logs for the new house.  Posing with logs seems to have been a Moore specialty photography technique.  I am pleased to know I was always part of the style.

My dad, older brother, and I prepare to load into an unidentified car.  I suspect we were on the way to St. Joseph's of the Hills Catholic Church in Leaksville.  Reidsville's Holy Infant Church did not yet exist.  Leaksville had the sole Catholic enclave in Rockingham County.

I will one day explain how we came to be one of the few Catholic families in Southern Baptist land.  There is a whole story behind our involvement with Catholicism.

Check out these three sporty dudes.  Judging from the background, I believe this photo might have been made in the yard of the log shack rather than at the new house.

I am particularly envious of my older brother's suit.  He was indeed a sharp-dressed dude.  He still is.

Dad looked pretty spiffy too.  Notice the folded handkerchief in his left-hand suit pocket.

I looked pretty good in my white beret and boots.

We were a desperately poor family living in what might be referred to as squalor, but we damn well dressed nicely.

Here's the same shot with my mother holding me.

No suits - apparently, we were caught unprepared for this photo.

The boys are at the new house in the "front yard".  I recognize the "storage house" in the rear.  It still stands and is still used.  It's been painted green and a door and ramp put in to accommodate a riding mower - something we would not own for many, many years after moving to Haw River.

That's my brother's bicycle and my tricycle on the ground.  I doubt I was old enough to ride the tricycle by myself.

It looks like we got off the bicycle and posed on the front steps of the new house.  The "front" door was located on the side of the house and was never used.  We used the "back" door which was indeed logically located on the back of the house.  The back door has since moved to the same side of the house as the front door which is being used quite frequently by the current tenants.

Here I am posing beside my dad's Willys.  Dad was a technical Sargeant in the Army.  He worked on Jeeps.  Jeep made Willys and dad's work experience convinced him Willys was the only car to own.

My mother appears to pass me through a window to my brother.  Notice the window shutters.  The shutters were fake, but an indication that we had moved up the socio-economic ladder when we moved into the new house.  Actually, we had not climbed the ladder. That would come some years later when we moved to Haw River.

I attempt to scale the "front" doorsteps at the new house.

I cling to the fence that isolated the outside basement steps from the hazards of youth.  I have no idea how old I was, but I've obviously grown from the little kid who attempted to climb the "front" steps.

That's my grandmother Wall holding me in what I believe is the yard of our new house.  My grandmother was a good woman.  She would look after me for many, many years, even when I was a grown man.

Here's a modern-day view of our former home.  Notice the asbestos siding has been replaced with vinyl siding.  

The old storage shed can be seen on the right behind a vine-covered utility pole.  It is now painted green.

Six fully-grown beautiful Penn Oak trees now surround the house - three on the property line in the rear, two in the front yard, and one on the side of the house as shown in the photo.

A small addition has been added to the rear of the house.  It's just large enough to hold a freezer and some household items.

This photo was made from our carport (former home of my grandparents and mother).

This is my dad on a mule in front of a cornfield.  Believe it or not, he was born in the city in New Jersey, just across the river from New York City. Despite appearances, his life was not meant for farming.

I am told dad was teased mercilessly by grandpa's family for his lack of farming skills.  Dad's decision to move to Haw River and work for Western Electric changed everyone's life.  I will tell some of that story in later editions.

A LEGEND HAS PASSED ON

I was sure he was immortal.

He was a former Rockingham County School Board member and a County Commissioner.

He once voted to remove the children's book "I Want to Keep My Baby" from the school libraries because the book annoyed an evangelical minister

He once threatened to beat my ass (I forget why) and threatened to sue me when I jokingly told him I had filled out a political questionnaire and signed his name to it.

His daughter was convicted of stealing more than $20,000 from the school system.

He was a terrible Commissioner and School Board member, but the people loved him and he served for decades.

Wink Hoover has died.