Bostic Brumfield, Sr., who lives a mile South of Wayne, will celebrate his 75th birthday next Monday, the 13th. Mr. Brumfield is one of the county's pioneers and recalls the days when Wayne county was the home of deer, bear and other wild animals now extinct.
Mr. Brumfield recalls shooting a deer in 1869 near what is now the Millard Johnson farm near Iverson Shoals; in the year'74 he shot another deer at the mouth of Wolfe Creek. In those days the woodland of the country was infested with wild hogs which afforded real sport for hunters. He recalls one hunting experience as follows:
"In the year 1869 while I was going to school to Ligan Bowen at lower Newcomb, at the noon hour one day we heard a pack of hounds coming and we looked and saw a deer leap through the school yard. Saul Harmon and myself got permission from the teacher to follow the deer. The ice was partly frozen on Twelve Pole, but the deer crossed anyway. The creek full of ice bluffed all the dogs except one named "Pot Licker" owned by Fletcher Garrett. That dog never stopped and neither did Harmon and myself.
"As we went along we borrowed an old flint lock rifle from R. M. Luther, who used to be county surveyor. We kept in the chase till we got just opposite "Buger Hollow," near Millard Johnson's. At this point I shot the deer, while "Pot Licker" was close on his heels. Harmon and I skinned the deer, tied it on a pole and carried it home."
Mr. Brumfield recalled going to school to America Showater at Buffalo Shoals in 1858. Of the forty pupils in school then only three are living: Mr. Brumfield, M. F. Drown and Luke Drown. At that time one of the duties of the teacher was to make goose quill pens while the pupils would write their lessons. Brumfield and B. G. Chapman, of Wayne, were school mates 66 years ago. Mr. Brumfield still has in his possession a little book given to him by Mrs. Showater on his birthday in 1858. Mrs. Showater was the daughter of the late Benj. Drown, Sr., and was the mother of M. F. Drown and G. B. Booth, both well known Wayne citizens.
The new department of Vocational Agriculture which will be added to the Wayne County High School when it opens next month will prove an important asset to the school in the opinion of Superintendent C. T. Hatcher. The local high school starts its second year on September 4th. Additional teachers have been added this year and prospects are promising for a highly successful term. In making public the news of the new department, Superintendent Hatcher gave out the following announcement Wednesday of this week:
Ever mindful of the fact that the people of Wayne county wish to be in the front rank educationally, the County High School Board of Education has added to our system the department of Vocational Agriculture. This work is very practical as the students learn to do by actually doing things. They learn to work with the hands as well as to think with the head. . . .
It is entirely likely that the department of Home Economics of the County High School will be enlarged at an early date.
We only hope that every boy and girl in the county, not in school, that is eligible to enter high school will be with us the beginning of the term.
Send for Sherlock Holmes.
The three-legged chicken, the nine-days wonder of Dock's Creek, has mysteriously disappeared and left behind not a clue, not even a track.
Wayne county once again strutted its stuff by producing a chicken in a million--a three-legged one. This chick which disappeared last week belonged to Wiley Irons of Dock's Creek. It was a Plymouth Rock and was about six or eight weeks old. . . .
Transcription by June White