Nash County, NC - Biographies - Interview with John Hansel Proctor ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ JOHN HANSEL PROCTOR - EARL P. BELL, JR. CONVERSATION ABOUT THE PROCTOR FAMILY IN NASH COUNTY, NORTH CAROLINA The Interview Took Place in Aulander, Bertie County, North Carolina 28 December 1975 The following conversation took place on the 28th of December, 1975 in Aulander, North Carolina between JOHN HANSEL PROCTOR, age 82, son of WILLIAM HENRY PROCTOR and MINNIE MOORE PROCTOR, grandson of HANSEL HARRISON (HARRY) PROCTOR, JR. AND SARAH JANE VAUGHN, and EARL P. BELL, JR., age 37, son of EARL P. BELL, SR. and ALICE LEIGH PROCTOR. ALICE PROCTOR is the daughter of JOHN SIDNEY PROCTOR the brother of WILLIAM HENRY PROCTOR and ISAAC PROCTOR. The summary of the conversation is recorded by EARL P. BELL, JR. The genealogy of the PROCTOR Family is: HANSEL HARRISON PROCTOR, SR = SALLY BOON HANSEL HARRISON PROCTOR, JR. = SARAH JANE VAUGHN b. 1829 b. Aug. 1835 ISAAC PROCTOR = WM HENRY PROCTOR - JOSEPH PROCTOR - JOHN SIDNEY PROCTOR b. Oct. 1865 b. Sept. 1867 b. 1870 b. Sept. 1873 m. LOU BOTTOMS m. MINNIE MOORE d. before age 10 m. MARY E. JONES JOHN HANSEL PROCTOR was born and reared in Nash County, North Carolina between Westry and Barnes Hill Missionary Baptist Church. He knew all the PROCTORS as well as the JOHN (JACK) DANIEL JONES Family. JACK JONES is the father of MARY ELIZABETH JONES PROCTOR, wife of SID PROCTOR. According to JOHN, HANSEL H. PROCTOR, JR. and his three sons - ISAAC, HENRY, AND SID attended the Methodist Church in Nashville, North Carolina. JOHN PROCTOR said that as an adult he was a member of the Oak Level Baptist Church as was the ALBERT TURNER BELL Family of Nashville Township, Nash County, North Carolina. ALBERT T. BELL is the grandfather of EARL P. BELL,JR. His wife was MARY WILLIAM HARPER. JOHN (JACK) DANIEL JONES attended Barnes Hill Missionary Baptist Church. His daughter MARY ELIZABETH JONES PROCTOR attended the Falls Free-Will Baptist Church after 1930. [John Hansel Proctor and his wife Gertrude Joyner lived in their later years in Scotland Neck, North Carolina} In 1911, JOHN HANSEL PROCTOR, when he was 18 years of age, worked in the county store of JOHN SIDNEY PROCTOR, grandfather of EARL P. BELL, JR., at Westry's Siding in Nash County. The work was from sunrise to sunset, and after. SID PROCTOR would borrow money from local banks for stocking the store. Then he would run a credit business for the area farmers and their families. The only records kept were on tickets, no record books were used, and the balance from old tickets would be carried forward as each new ticket was started. Everyone was borrowing against their yearly crop. In the bad years, in this rural economy, destroyed everyone financially. Bad crops meant no payment on the money owed to Sid Proctor. While a businessman, like Sid Proctor, could have won a lien against a farmer's crop, such a remedy was not a realistic option when crops were bad. Despite the sizable volume of credit business sustained by Sid Proctor and the hard times that inevitably come in farming, especially tenant farming, almost everyone paid off their debts. It was a matter of family pride and honor. The stock of Sid Proctor's country store was extensive. The stock included all kinds of farm implements and tools. Cloth of all types was sold; calico, outting, poplin (the most expensive cloth), and muslin. It was all sold by the yard. Molasses came in 800 to 900 pound barrels. Crackers came loose in 20 pound boxes. Cracker boxes were highly valued by local people and Sid Proctor maintained a written waiting list of people who wanted used boxes as they became available. Also, the round boxes in which cheese came were highly valued. JOHN recalled how many people would use the cracker boxes for carrying food to various functions, especially church meetings. A few individuals used the boxes for carrying clothes. Cider was a big seller. John remembered drawing several barrels (four or five barrels) on a typical Saturday. One Negro man, Yank Zimmerman, a tenant of Sid Proctor, stood out in John Proctor's memory. Yank had perfected a the skill of hanging around the store on Saturdays in order to get free glasses of cider which various men offered to all people in the store when they came in to shop. This behavior was especially upsetting to Sid Proctor. One incident that John related occurred on a Saturday, when Sid told Yank that he had freeloaded enough cider for one day. Yank did not respond in a fashion suitable to Sid, so Sid hit Yank on the head and in the struggle Sid's thumb got caught in Yank's mouth. Several men had to intervene to stop the scuffle. There were a number of local characters that frequented Sid Proctor's store. The two clearest in John's memory were Turner Whitney and a Mr. Edwards. Both men were called "conservative" by local people, a better term might have been "mizer." Both men were known for going barefooted from frost to frost. John remembered that the bottoms of their feet became as tough as shoe leather. Mr. Whitney stood out in John's memory he would come to the store late in the afternoon and stay, sometimes as late as ten or eleven o'clock at night. This practice was especially hard on John, who usually closed up, because he was anxious to get home, eat, and go to bed. John was paid $20 a month plus room and board at Sid Proctor's home. His next job was in Rocky Mount selling cars, a job that paid the incredible salary of $120 a month. The store had a pot-belly stove around which a number of pop crates sat. There was usually a collection of black laborers in the store. Often John would measure out a small portion of kerosene and throw it on the stove with an obvious explosive effect to run them out. Some of the favorite purchases by local people included sausage, cheese, sardines, and crackers with everything. Also, John told about going to Oak Level School as a boy. Each family carried food to school for their children. John carried his lunch in a five pound lard pail. The larger the family, the Bells were one of the largest families, the larger the food basket. A favorite lunch was a sausage biscuit. The basket would be placed on a fallen tree log and the kids from each family would come by for food usually disbursed by the most responsible child. Fights were common during the lunch hour since over turning lunch baskets or pails was a favorite prank. Of course, some of mischief was just plain meanness. In this category, John, being a Proctor, recalled some of my Bell great uncles. The train between Nashville, North Carolina and Rocky Mount, North Carolina arrived in Westrys each day at 12 o'clock noon. and then at 4 P. M. it returned from Rocky Mount. Farmers would leave their wagons at Sid Proctor's store for loading with fertilizer, feed, etc. while they traveled to Rocky Mount and back. The merchandise was stocked by traveling salesmen. Delivery of all goods was by wagon and train. The work day was extremely long with Sid Proctor often eating supper and returning at night. Everyone worked until the last customer left the store. John remembered that Sid Proctor for a short while was providing local people with fresh fish that came by train from Norfolk, Virginia. At first it made a good profit. Then the locals caught on to how to buy the fish at the cheapest possible price. They would just wait as late in the day as possible knowing that no process existed to keep the fish from spoiling over night. Finally, Sid dropped the daily fish business as profits from it evaporated.. Also, John remember that as a boy at the turn of the twentieth century his Uncle HODGE VAUGHN was a local "banker" because so few of them existed in Nash County. He remembered that when they were farming tobacco his father would tell to go up to Uncle Hodge's house and get some money so the help could be paid. John said the money was kept in shoe boxes under the bed of his Uncle Hodge. John stated that Sid Proctor was quite a handsome young man and that Mary Elizabeth Jones was, in his judgment, easily the prettiest girl-woman in the county. Sid Proctor and Mary Jones were married when he was 26 and she was 16. Mary Jones was my grandmother. She died in 1957. Since she was born and raised on Sappony Creek, I always teased her about being "Miss Sappony Creek." She was a Free Will Baptist. She was taught to dip snuff by her uncle Calvin Jones. When I was a boy she was partial to Tube Rose. I chewed her brushes for her and cut them short, so she could take into her mouth when company came by. Also, she would hide her spit can, usually a peach can, as well. As stamps she acquired from the snuff purchases accumulated, she would glue them in books and receive prizes that she gave to her grandchildren. My first cousin carries her name MARY ELIZABETH "Beth" JENKINS of Yorktown, Virginia. The families' hard times, brought on by the Great Depression of 1929, destroyed Sid Proctor financially. By 1929, he was a sick man (he died in 1934). A mysterious fire destroyed the country store in 1930, burning all the credit records. My grandmother, Mary Elizabeth Jones Proctor, told me once that during these hard times there were many local people that lived in her section that would cross over the street in Rocky Mount rather than have to make direct contact with her. The Sid Proctor-Mary Jones Proctor Family moved to Rocky Mount in the early 1930s and lived on Thomas Street. John said that if Sid Proctor had been a healthy man, with all his financial gifts, he would have surely survived the harsh challenges of the Great Depression. Sid and Mary Jones Proctor are buried in Pineview Cemetery in Rocky Mount, North Carolina. ___________________________________________________________________ Copyright. All rights reserved. http://www.usgwarchives.net/copyright.htm This file was contributed for use in the USGenWeb Archives by Earl P. Bell, Jr. ___________________________________________________________________