A Grave Question

On the trail of Flora MacDonald’s offspring

By Bill Case

If you are a Showtime viewer, odds are you are familiar with the show Outlander, a time travel odyssey in which the 20th century female protagonist, Clare, after touching an ancient standing stone, is mystically transported to mid-18th century Scotland. Though married in her 20th century life, Clare weds Highland Scot Jamie Fraser, and given the circumstances, her bigamy seems excusable.

Clare and Jamie share adventures in a time of historic upheaval as the Jacobite Rebellion is in full swing. The charismatic Charles Edward Stuart, popularly known as “Bonnie Prince Charlie,” is engaged in an ultimately futile quest to restore the Stuarts as Britain’s monarchial rulers. Primarily due to the Stuarts’ adherence to the Catholic faith, Parliament had removed Charles’ grandfather, James II, from the throne a half-century earlier.

The Bonnie Prince courts support for his cause from French royalty and Scottish Highland clans in hopes they will back his effort to dethrone England’s current king, George II, and restore the Stuarts. Clare knows her history and is fully aware that the uprising is not only doomed to failure but will also result in devastation to the clans but, as is usually the case with transtemporal travel sagas, the Frasers’ various schemes to alter history backfire, making the foretold result inexorably more certain.

The Battle of Culloden on April 14, 1746, represents the denouement. The Highlanders are routed, and their catastrophic defeat effectively brings an end to the rebellion. But Outlander does not address the post-Culloden story of how a young Scottish woman cleverly aided Bonnie Prince Charlie’s desperate effort to escape British capture.

At the time of Culloden, Flora Macdonald was 24 years old. She was living off the northwest coast of Scotland on the Isle of Skye with her financially well-off mother and stepfather, Hugh Macdonald. One acquaintance described her as “a woman of soft features, gentle manners, kind soul, and elegant presence.” On June 20, 1746, Flora was visiting her brother at his “shieling” (huts where cattle farmers stay when tending to their livestock) on the neighboring island of South Uist.

It so happened that the on-the-lam prince was hiding nearby in the company of two aides, Capt. Conn O’Neill and Neil MacEachen. The king’s forces were hot on Charles’ trail, having organized search parties to apprehend the man they called the “Young Pretender.” Flora’s stepfather, Hugh Macdonald, secretly sympathetic to the Jacobites, informed the prince through a third party that Flora could be useful in affecting Charles’ potential escape by boat to Skye, where arrangements were in the works to transport the prince to France and freedom.

O’Neill, leaving behind Charles and MacEachen in the hills nearby, greeted Flora at the shieling late one night, and conspiratorially inquired whether he could “bring a friend to see her.”

Flora responded, “Is it the prince?”

Minutes later, Charles was before her. A plan had been concocted. Flora would sail home to Skye in an open boat accompanied by MacEachen and Charles, who would be disguised as a woman and use the alias “Betty Burke.” The “maid’s” purported purpose for traveling to Skye would be to spin wool for Flora’s mother. Flora’s stepfather, a double agent in the affair, as he also occupied a position in the British military, would arrange passports for the three travelers.

Numerous facts of Flora’s life have been subject to varying interpretations by historians, and her eagerness to participate in the plot is one of them. According to MacEachen, Flora agreed to the proposal immediately. O’Neill, however, reported that the young woman was far more ambivalent because of the obvious dangers of the enterprise. He claimed he overcame Flora’s hesitancy by declaring she “would be made immortal by such a noble and humane deed on her part in the Prince’s distressing circumstances.”

Flora proved to be no shrinking violet. She adamantly rejected the prince’s demand to include O’Neill on the voyage — she carried passports for just three passengers — and just as sternly refused Charles’ plea to carry a gun.

The crossing to Skye was launched from Benbecula on June 28. The voyage is recalled in the lyrics of the haunting ballad that opens each episode of Outlander — the “Skye Boat Song.” Strong westerly winds, high waves and fog plagued the rowers, and the boat was fired upon by hostile militia as the craft sought to make land at Skye. But Flora and her companions managed to avert disaster and put in elsewhere on Skye, where Alexander MacDonald of Kingsburgh took charge of Charles. When the grateful Bonnie Prince bade goodbye to Flora at Portree, he is supposed to have said, “I hope, Madam, we shall meet in St. James’s yet.” In short order, Charles jumped aboard another boat to Raasay from where he would eventually make his way to France. Notwithstanding his narrow escape, Charles Stuart was destined to live in exile the remainder of his increasingly sad and dissolute existence. 

Flora, however, failed to elude the authorities. After word leaked regarding her role in Charles’ escape, she was detained and held as a prisoner, eventually taken to London in December 1746. Aside from a brief stint in the Tower of London, Flora, though technically under house arrest, enjoyed relative freedom in the city, visiting friends and entertaining visitors. O’Neill’s prediction that assisting the Bonnie Prince would lead to her lasting fame was coming true. She became a cult hero to Jacobite devotees. One woman asked Flora whether she could “have the honor of lying in the same bed with that person who had been so happy as to be guardian to her Prince.” Even royal partisans found themselves charmed by Flora. Frederick, Prince of Wales, paid her a personal visit.

Released from detention in July 1747, Flora returned to Scotland, resettling on Skye. In 1750, she married Allan MacDonald of Kingsburgh, the son of the man who had taken custody of Charles following the prince’s escape to Skye. Flora and Allan would parent seven children. Five years after their marriage, Allan succeeded his father as manager of their patron’s estate holdings. Unfortunately, he lacked business acumen and that, coupled with a cattle disease epidemic, led to Allan’s dismissal around 1766. 

Facing increasingly difficult circumstances, the MacDonalds decided in 1774 to follow the example of fellow countrymen who had emigrated to North Carolina. Allan and Flora, along with sons Alexander and James, daughter Anne, her husband, Alexander MacLeod, and their children sailed to Wilmington, North Carolina, aboard the Baliol. Flora and Allan’s sons Charles and Ranald, engaged in military service for the crown, did not emigrate. Son John and daughter Fanny remained in Britain.

Flora and Allan first settled at Cross Creek, present-day Fayetteville. They subsequently moved farther west, acquiring a 475-acre plantation about 5 miles from Norman, North Carolina. Soon after Flora and Allan moved to their new estate, the Revolutionary War began. A majority of North Carolina’s Scottish Highlanders sided with the crown, as did Flora and Allan. Flora’s segue in allegiance from the Jacobites to the Hanoverian monarchy may appear puzzling, but most Highlanders had little stomach for taking on the powerful British Army following the debacle of Culloden. They figured allegiance to King George would be their best bet for avoiding a conflict that would disrupt their efforts to start over on the frontier.

Allan accepted a commission with the Royal Highland Emigrant Regiment, commanded by yet another “Mac,” Donald MacDonald. Allan’s sons Alexander and James, as well as son-in-law Alexander MacLeod, likewise joined the unit. The royal governor, Josiah Martin, ordered the regiment to gather at Cross Creek, then march to Brunswick, where it would link up with a brigade of British troops arriving from the North. The governor believed the combined forces would easily quash the Colonial rebellion in North Carolina.

Early Flora MacDonald historians maintained she was personally active in recruiting expat Highlanders for the regiment, delivering a rousing speech at Cross Creek exhorting the recruits to fight for victory over the rebels.

Colonial forces headed off the regiment on its march to Brunswick, confronting it at Moore’s Creek Bridge on Feb. 27, 1776. Shouting “For King George and Broadswords,” the Highlanders unwisely mounted a charge across the bridge. They were greeted with withering patriot gunfire. In the ensuing disaster, dozens of Scots were killed. Hundreds more were captured, including Allan MacDonald and son Alexander. The remaining members of the regiment, including James MacDonald, scattered. The crushed Loyalists would not re-emerge as a military presence in North Carolina until near the end of the war, in 1781.

The emboldened patriots (also called “Whigs”) began confiscating the land, livestock and other holdings of Scottish immigrants still loyal to the king. Flora did not escape the plundering. The plantation was ransacked and confiscated. She suffered the loss of most of her possessions. Desperate, she sought and received refuge in what is now Moore County under the protection of Loyalist Kenneth Black. In her new abode, located near the New River and present-day Pinehurst, Flora was close to daughter Anne, whose home, “Glendale,” stood nearby.

Summoned to appear before the local Whigs’ Committee of Safety to answer for her allegedly seditious conduct, Flora coolly displayed “spirited behavior” in responding to the inquiry. She was permitted to go free.

Allan managed to obtain freedom for himself and son Alexander by successfully negotiating a prisoner exchange with Congress in August 1777. He was released in New York, where he took command of a Loyalist company. In March 1778, Flora was permitted by Colonial authorities to join her husband there. Later that year, the couple made their way to Halifax, Nova Scotia, where Allan was placed in command of another regiment.

Persuaded by her husband that she would be better off living her remaining years in Scotland where her hero status remained undiminished, Flora, then 57, and daughter Anne returned to her native land in 1779. En route, a French privateer attacked Flora’s ship. Legend has it that she mounted the deck, exposed herself to gunfire, and bravely cheered the crew’s successful effort to repel the attack. She broke her arm in the resulting melee but reached Skye, where she was reunited with daughter Fanny, by then age 14.

Completing his service obligation in 1784, Allan crossed the Atlantic to Scotland and Flora. Because siding with the Loyalists resulted in the forfeiture of his American property, he submitted a claim seeking compensation for those losses and was granted a partial award by the crown. His financial circumstances further improved after obtaining a property management role as “Tack of Peinduin.” The position enabled Allan and Flora to live in relative, financial comfort until Flora’s death in 1790. Allan passed away two years later. Both are buried in Kilmuir Cemetery on Skye.

A small locket containing a piece of heather, reputedly worn by Flora MacDonald.
Seed pearl brooch owned by Flora MacDonald, reputedly contains a lock of hair from Prince Charles Edward Stuart which was given to Flora upon departing from Skye in 1746.

Flora MacDonald’s life in North Carolina was replete with hardships, enduring lengthy separations from her husband, the harsh enmity of the Whigs, financial ruin, and virtual banishment from the state. A 1930s article in the Pinehurst Outlook disclosed another heartbreak allegedly suffered here. Citing a 1909 biography, the story claimed that after the fateful battle at Moore’s Creek Bridge, Flora “was called to grieve the loss of a son (age 11) and daughter (age 13) who died of typhus fever,” and that the two children were still buried at the MacDonald’s “Killiegray” plantation on Mountain Creek near Norman, North Carolina. A monument had been placed at the site marking the graves of her children.

While the text of the Outlook article acknowledged the graves, located in Richmond County just across the Montgomery County line, were “somewhat inaccessible,” it said they could be reached “without great difficulty,” and like an 87-year-old GPS, directions were provided. So, on a crisp mid-January afternoon, I drove to Norman. The directions said that “when almost through the village just beyond two brick churches, one on either side of the road, turn left on a dirt road.” I spotted the two churches and turned just beyond them, driving a couple of miles down a country road looking for the bridges and farm paths the Outlook said would lead to the graves. It was clear, however, that the passage of time had eradicated the helpful landmarks. I pulled over to contemplate my next move.

Just then, a young local couple drove alongside and asked if I was lost. When I explained I was looking for two Revolutionary War-era graves, the young man responded, “Oh, you mean the stones!” He suggested backtracking and veering down a crossing road that, as far as I could tell, didn’t exist. Where were these stones? Had the Outlander’s Clare Fraser experienced similar frustration when she sought to find the magical standing stone that would transport her from the 18th to the 20th century?

Reluctant to give up the hunt, I drove back into Norman and stopped at the local post office. (No dead letter jokes, please.) I told the longtime postmaster, Helen Simmons, about Flora’s children and “the stones,” and she smiled.

“I don’t know where Flora MacDonald’s children are buried, but I think I know what that fellow meant,” she said. “Tell you what, I’m getting off work. Follow me out of town to Mt. Carmel Presbyterian Church. It was founded by Scots who settled in this area during the Revolution. Several of my ancestors are buried there. There are some very old graves in the churchyard. Maybe you’ll find what you’re looking for there.”

Soon, Helen and I were walking about Mt. Carmel’s ancient graveyard. The black headstones from the late 1700s, worn down to the nub, some no more than 6 inches high, did not bear any decipherable script. If these were the “stones” my young acquaintance had had in mind, I doubted Flora’s children’s graves were among them. They were supposed to be located on private property — not in a church graveyard — though I did later learn that Flora attended the Mt. Carmel church during her abbreviated stay in the area.

I must be adept at appearing forlorn and in need of assistance, because after Helen left, another local resident came to offer help. Arriving in the church’s driveway was Bill McFadden, retired life-time Norman resident and a Mt. Carmel congregant. After hearing my tale of frustration, Bill placed a call to a historically-minded friend who suggested we look for the graves down another road that led into Richmond County. In short order, I was tailing Bill to another clearing in the countryside, but this foray didn’t pan out either, and the graves’ location remained a mystery.

It turned out that in 1937, three years after the Outlook article, what was left of the children’s bodies had been disinterred and reinterred at the Red Springs campus of Flora MacDonald College, now Highlander Academy. But why?

I toured the Red Springs campus with Alex Watson who explained that prior to 1915 it was a women’s college named Southern Presbyterian College and Conservancy of Music. Dr. Charles Vardell founded the institution in 1896 and served as its president for decades. Linda Rumple Vardell, Charles’ wife and an accomplished pianist, ran the college’s music program. Since the area had been settled by transplanted Scots, many Southern Presbyterian students were of Scottish ancestry.

When Canadian James A. Macdonald, editor of the Toronto Globe and an ordained Presbyterian minister, came to Fayetteville to attend a gathering of Scottish clans in 1914, he also toured the Southern Presbyterian College campus. Wowed by what he saw, the editor made a pledge to the endowment of the school and encouraged fellow Scots to do likewise. Macdonald felt that fundraising would be facilitated if the college’s scope was “broadened to bear the name of the Scottish heroine (Flora), herself a Presbyterian, a college graduate, and a noble example of Christian womanhood.” Thus in 1915, the Canadian persuaded Vardell to rename the school Flora MacDonald College, though the Presbyterian Synod of North Carolina still remained in ultimate charge.

The MacDonald tartan
Charles Vardell (holding bouquet) at the 1922 dedication of Flora MacDonald Cross at Kilmuir Cemetery on Skye

The name change occurred not long after the publication of Flora MacDonald in America, by J.P. MacLean, in which the author claimed that Flora’s two children were buried at the aforementioned Killiegray plantation, approximately 50 miles from Red Springs. It occurred to Vardell that relocating the children’s graves on the Red Springs campus would provide the campus an additional element of Scottish heritage and testament to Flora’s memory.

But a legal obstacle stood in the way. Digging up a grave and relocating the remains was not a simple matter. The North Carolina legislature first needed to authorize any such disinterment. Before approaching the legislature, Vardell thought it prudent to undertake additional research to confirm that the graves were actually those of Flora’s children. To perform this task, Vardell turned to W.R. Coppedge, the highly respected former pastor of Mt. Carmel Presbyterian Church and superintendent of Richmond County Schools. Rev. Coppedge spoke with several longtime residents, all of whom believed the graves contained Flora’s children based on traditional accounts that were now a minimum of four generations old. Coppedge was persuaded that the residents knew what they were talking about and signed an affidavit indicating he was “convinced that these are the graves of Flora MacDonald’s children.”

Armed with Coppedge’s affidavit, Vardell obtained the legislature’s approval in 1917 to move the remains. For reasons unknown, the graves at Killiegray stayed undisturbed until the 1930s, when Vardell turned his attention back to bringing the graves’ remains to the campus. He was on the scene when they were finally dug up.

Vardell reported that natural elements and the passage of time had transformed the bodies into dust, which was collected in separate receptacles and brought to Red Springs. Corresponding with a project booster, an enthused Vardell wrote, “I think we can now say, so far as an intelligent person can judge, that the remains of Flora MacDonald’s children are now on the college campus.”

Having constructed a granite wall as a backdrop for the graves, the college made ready for an elaborate funeral ceremony at Red Springs on April 28, 1937. Prior to the ceremony, the double coffin was placed under the campus dome and laid “in state.” A 30-piece Fort Bragg military band and an honor guard of young women adorned in Stuart plaid lent a dignified atmosphere to the occasion. Four Flora MacDonald College students, all fittingly named Flora MacDonald, carried the remains from the dome to their permanent resting place.

Soon after the widely reported ceremony, questions were raised by skeptical historians whether the remains reinterred at the college were really Flora’s children. The naysayers advanced a simple argument that, in essence, involved the counting of noses: Flora had borne seven children, and they all could be accounted for. Sons Ranald and Alexander were lost at sea in 1783, and the earliest death of the remaining five took place in 1795 — 19 years after Flora fled the plantation. 

Supporters of the view that the remains were of Flora’s offspring pointed to a letter she allegedly sent in February 1776, beseeching her friend Maggie to visit because Allan was with the regiment “and I shall be alone with my three bairns (Scottish word for children).” It was asserted that two of the “bairns” could only be the children who perished at the plantation. The 1872 edition of American Historical Review quoted this correspondence and stated it was being preserved in Fayetteville. But the letter’s existence is considered suspect since no one knows where it is today. Moreover, its slangy language is thought to be inconsistent with other writings of the well-educated Flora.

If two of Flora’s children did perish from typhus, it stands to reason she and Allan would have memorialized that fact somewhere in their writings. It would have particularly served Allan’s interest to report any such deaths in his 1784 petition to the British government in which he sought compensation for the confiscations and other losses he and Flora suffered in North Carolina. In his submission, Allan pulled out all the stops, pouring out the litany of hardships and heartbreaks inflicted upon the MacDonalds while in America, including the loss at sea of son Ranald. Tellingly missing from the petition is any mention of deaths of other children, young or otherwise.

Research of Colonial-era property records by Pinehurst’s Rassie Wicker further weakened the frayed case that the graves contained Flora’s children. Wicker found that Allan MacDonald never owned land at or very near Mountain Creek, the site of the unearthed graves. He did, however, own a 475-acre plantation in Montgomery County about 4 miles away on Cheek’s Creek. A 1775 letter authored by Royal Gov. Martin buttresses Wicker’s position. Martin wrote that he intended to spend the summer “with my friend Mr. MacDonald of Kingsborough … on Cheek’s Creek.” Wicker made the additional point that had Alan been inclined to name his plantation, he would surely have called it Kingsborough, not Killiegray — a name associated with a different Scottish clan.

The reinterred graves at Red Springs
Tartan-clad pallbearers at the April, 1937 funeral: (l) to (r) Flora MacDonald, Flora MacDonald, Flora MacDonald and Flora MacDonald

This historical brouhaha failed to generate much impact at Flora MacDonald as the college refrained from involving itself in the controversy while continuing to project a spirited Scottish motif throughout the two decades following the aforementioned 1937 funeral. The college faced a far more significant challenge in 1955, when the Presbyterian Synod decided to consolidate the operations of various colleges they had been supporting. As a result, Flora MacDonald College and Presbyterian Junior College in Maxton were combined into a co-educational institution and moved to Laurinburg. The resulting school subsequently became St. Andrews University.

Flora MacDonald College was closed in 1961 and its personal property, including valuable paintings, a pearl brooch reportedly containing a locket of the Bonnie Prince’s hair, a snuff box given by Allan to Flora on their wedding day, and other artifacts, were packed up and shipped to Laurinburg. Nothing was left of the school in Red Springs except its vacant and rapidly deteriorating campus buildings.

The vacating of the campus devastated the community of Red Springs and the college’s female alumni. A combined preparatory school and junior college was reopened at the campus three years later. In 1974, the institution became a K-12 co-ed school. While undergoing multiple name changes since the 1961 reopening, the school has continued to venerate its Scottish heritage, Flora MacDonald, and her putative children.

But if, as seems most likely, the remains of Flora’s children are not housed in the campus graves, whose are they? It is doubtful anyone will ever know with certainty, but presumably they are children of either early Scottish immigrants or slaves. But there is no question about the authenticity of the damaged marble tablet that the college placed on the graves. It originally graced the monument on Flora’s gravesite on Skye. After a storm damaged that monument, Charles Vardell helped raise funds to replace it, journeying to Scotland for the installation of the new stone. He was permitted to return to Red Springs with the original tablet, which bore the following inscription:

FLORA MACDONALD

Preserver of Prince Charles Edward Stuart
Her name will be mentioned in history,
and if courage and fidelity be virtues,
mentioned with honour. PS

Pinehurst resident Bill Case is PineStraw’s history man. He can be reached at Bill.Case@thompsonhine.com.

Almanac

By Ashley Wahl

May is a blushing bride, lips sweet as plump strawberries, humming an ancient rhyme for luck.

Something old (snakeskin), something new (four eggs), something borrowed (birdhouse), something blue (songbird).

The second stanza starts with honeyed warbles. Tu-a-wee sings the bluebird on the pitched roof of the birdhouse. Tu-a-wee trills the bluebird at the nest.   

Verse three is the sound of movement through soft grass. In the black of night — a shadowy flash — four eggs swallowed one by one.

Lucky rat snake, with its new skin, its luscious fluidity, its bellyful of tender life.

Lucky rabbit, nibbling in the garden at dawn, bellyful of baby lettuce, salad greens, Swiss chard, snow peas.

May is a banquet, a ceremony, a celebration.

It is the vow from bee to flower, flower to bee. The sacred oath to give until there is nothing left.

And there is so much here.

An apple blossom for the maiden. Wild berries for the groom. An ancient rhyme. Sweet nectar and the tender, green promise of a full and luscious life — pleasant and bitter, in darkness and in light. 

It was such a spring day as breathes into a man an ineffable yearning, a painful sweetness, a longing that makes him stand motionless, looking at the leaves or grass, and fling out his arms to embrace he knows not what. ― John Galsworthy, The Forsyte Saga

Strawberry Fields

Behold the earliest strawberries, fat and sweet. Like love notes from summer, ripe for the picking.    

And if ever you picked them straight from the bush, perhaps you’ve noticed that they smell as scrumptious as they taste. Members of the rose family, strawberry plants are perennial. Fruit can be picked green (pickle them) or ripe (you’ll know what to do), but don’t fret if they’ve gone a bit soft. Instead, make wine —  or jam.

You won’t need much: Two pounds of fresh strawberries (mash them), four cups of white sugar and one-fourth cup of fresh lemon juice. One heavy bottomed saucepan, too.

Stir mixture over low heat until sugar dissolves, then bring to a full rolling boil, stirring often, for about 15 minutes.

Sure, you can transfer to hot sterile jars, seal and process — or save yourself the trouble. Let cool and eat right away.

The May Wreath

May takes its name from the Roman goddess Maia, midwife of plants, flowers and the riotous beauty of spring.

Speaking of flowers, it’s time to gather them.

On the first of the month, May Day, celebrate this fertile, fruitful season by fashioning a wreath of twigs and greenery. Weave in wildflowers: crab apple, dogwood, painted trillium. Add pomegranate, garlic, herbs and nettle. Hang it on your door until midsummer night.

Wreath-making is an ancient Greek custom believed to ward off evil and invite prosperity. The act itself is a sacred dance between the weaver and the natural world. PS

In the Spirit

Batching Tips

How to be fast and flavorful

By Tony Cross

Now that our state’s restrictions are easing up and spring is in full effect, more and more folks are venturing back out to their favorite restaurants and watering holes. It’s nice to have a form of normalcy back, isn’t it? I know the word “normalcy” has been thrown around a lot lately, but if you’re a foodie (and drinkie) like I am, you appreciate what it means.

Despite the dumpster fire that last year left us, it is interesting to see how different businesses got out of their comfort zone and adapted to the chaos that quickly became everyday life. My business has been rooted in our slogan “flavors to go,” and we definitely had our run this time last year — we delivered over a thousand growlers of our carbonated cocktails to help medicate cabin fever sufferers. Batching is what we do. Now that we’re almost back at full capacity in bars and restaurants, I’d like to offer a few ways where you can get those drinks out fast while being able to connect with your guests for a longer period of time.

Punch

I still don’t get why more places don’t have punch on their menu. Once you have a great recipe in place and get it balanced, you should be able to make other concoctions around your base recipe. There are myriad examples in cocktail books and even more on websites that will give you the specs you need. It’s up to you to understand why these ratios work and go from there.

I read online a few weeks ago that a good rule of thumb for punch goes like this: 8 parts spirit; 5 parts water; 3 parts sour (citrus); 2 parts sweet (sugar cane, demerara, gomme syrup, agave, etc.); 1 part bitters or bitter liqueur; 1 part salt. For your sweet and sour, it always pays to start with oleo-saccharum. A trick I learned from bartender Jeffrey Morganthaler is to vacuum seal your oleo-saccharum syrups ahead of time and place them in the freezer. This way you can just pull out whichever one you need for the punch of the day. Let it thaw and build your punch.

Not only is a good punch delicious, it allows speed of service. Getting out cups of punch during a busy shift is effortless and allows you or your bartender to interact with your guests without running behind the bar like a crazy person.

Bottle

My business, Reverie Cocktails, started offering bottled cocktails to go last year for a few reasons. First, we know our flagship carbonated cocktails are not for everyone, and we wanted to attack sales from a different angle. Second, I know firsthand how delicious stirred cocktails are when they’ve had time to marinate. So, we started by delivering bottled old fashioneds and Sazeracs, and then graduated to martinis.

Yes. Martinis. I amaze myself how dumb I can be. How in the hell did I not offer these years back when I tended bar? One of the issues with a martini is you want it to be very cold when it arrives in front of your guest. Problem is, on a busy night it might take a server longer than usual to get that cold martini out. And even if it’s cold when it arrives, your guest’s second half won’t be as cold as the first. That is, unless they throw them back like I do daiquiris.

Enter prebatching. Being able to pull a bottle of martinis out of a freezer, and just pour into a chilled glass (be it a coupe or traditional martini glass), is a little bit of heaven. Your cocktail is now piercingly cold. Not only is it frigid, but now it will stay cold in that glass way longer than making it from scratch. I’m pretty confident in saying that it’ll be a long time before I make one at a time at my place from here on out. It’s too easy and yummy to just pour from the bottle. It’s one of life’s simple luxuries.

Don’t forget to dilute your stirred cocktails with good drinking water, and in the case of martinis, you’ll need to scale back on the H2O, or your bottled cocktail will freeze.

Draught

This is not a shocker. It’s my business’s expertise. To be honest, cocktails on tap can be easy, yet painful at times. If you’re starting out for the first time, start simple. Just because you have a great cocktail on the menu doesn’t mean it’s going to go well on draught. One does not simply take the ingredients and multiply by 50 and then fill up a keg and go to town.

Our customers often ask, “Can you do this drink? It’s killing our bartenders on the weekends.” Sometimes we can, sometimes we can’t. Try a modified highball cocktail (vodka plus soda) on draught. Add some of your favorite bitters and/or a liqueur to match. You will soon see what flavors amplify, and how you’ll need to balance it out.

A quick rule of thumb: Do not serve anyone a 2-ounce-at-a-time pour of carbonated spirit or they will light up like a Christmas tree. And make sure the water you’re using is delicious. It makes all the difference.

I have other suggestions, too, and if you’re interested in starting your own draught cocktail program — or just have questions — feel free to contact me via the email address below.  PS

Tony Cross is a bartender (well, ex-bartender) who runs cocktail catering company Reverie Cocktails in Southern Pines.

Pleasures of Life Dept.

A Southpaw’s Lament

On the wrong side of history

By Scott Sheffield

It’s high time somebody spoke up for us. We have been neglected and marginalized for far too long. We, the people of the left-handed persuasion. Depending on your source, left-handed people comprise roughly 10 percent of the world’s population. Nobody knows the troubles we’ve seen — unless you’re one of us. Try walking a day in our gloves.

It started during the Roman Empire. The Latin word for right was “dexter” and the word for left was “sinister.” As time went on, dexter started taking on the connotation of “proper” and “correct,” while sinister became synonymous with “unlucky” and even “evil.” This perception of the word sinister, and by extension the people who were left-handed, reached a pervasive level during the Middle or Dark Ages, when belief in the existence of sorcery and black magic was at its peak. Abnormalities were viewed as vile, even dangerous. Because only a small percentage of the population was left-handed or “sinistral,” left-handedness was considered an abnormality, and those who exhibited the trait were shunned and vilified.

A negative view of left-handedness persisted into the 20th century. A couple of my elementary school teachers tried to get us left-handed kids to write with our other (wrong, right?) hand by scolding, or worse, a rap on the knuckles. No amount of chastisement was sufficient to compel me, or many of the other brave resisters in my class, to change hands.

As time went on, the slights piled up. I was dismayed to learn that “left-handed compliment” basically meant an insulting statement disguised as praise. I discovered that many ordinary consumer products were made specifically for righties, or “dextrals.” Scissors, for example. The blades are fiendishly aligned to benefit the right-handed. If you doubt me, trying using your left. How does that make your thumb feel? And what about the common soup ladle? The lip is always on the left side, the way a right-hander would pour. If left-handed folks do that they end with untidy consequences. Manual can openers are right-hand, too. In yet another power move the handle must be held in the left hand while the user turns the crank with the right.

How about clothes? Belts, for example. I once bought a belt with a decorative buckle, but if I slid the belt strap through the pant loops to the right, which is the natural way for a left-hander to put on a belt, when I got around to fastening the belt to the buckle, the design was upside down. The belt was meant to be put on from right to left. And shirts. A standard man’s shirt has its buttons on the right, buttonholes on the left. It’s designed to be buttoned from the right. Trying to button my shirt with my left hand ties my fingers in knots. That goes for suit jackets, too. Yes, yes, standard women’s shirts have their buttons on the left, but that’s not to help out left-handed ladies, it’s just tradition.

Tools, machines and even some weapons are configured for the dextrals. Not long ago, when I was checking out my order at the grocery store and when the payment device asked me to sign my name, my hand bumped into the plastic COVID shield that separates shoppers from the clerk. It was nearly impossible to write my signature. Was this a plot hatched by Apple Pay?

There have been some bright spots for me as a left-hander. On a business trip to San Francisco many years ago, one of my co-workers and I went to Fisherman’s Wharf for a seafood dinner. Afterward, we attempted to walk off our sumptuous meals by strolling around the piers. At Pier 39 I noticed a sign written in bright yellow script that said “Lefty’s.” Below the name, in somewhat smaller, bright purple block print, were the words “San Francisco Left Hand Store.” Everything in the store, EVERYTHING, was left-hand oriented. It was the materialization of Homer Simpson’s neighbor, Ned Flanders’, Leftorium.

I was like a kid in a candy shop. I had to be dragged out of the store by my right-handed friend. While surfing the net recently, I was happy to see that Lefty’s is still there.

Of course, we were thrown a bone with International Left-handers Day. It was originally observed in 1976 to celebrate the uniqueness and differences of left-handed people. You 90-percenters may not celebrate it, but it’s a national holiday in my house.

In fairness, I have to give grudging credit to this right-handed world for one thing — out of necessity I’ve become quasi-ambidextrous. But let’s hope that the only left-handers who are considered vile or dangerous today are the ones who are, well, vile or dangerous.  PS

Scott Sheffield is a contributing writer for PineStraw and The Pilot. He may be reached at ssheff@nc.rr.com.

A Celebration of Mother’s Day

Gracefully doing the hardest job in the world

By Jenna Biter   •   Photographs by Tim Sayer

Photographed at Weymouth Center for the Arts & Humanities

If Dad wasn’t married to Mom, he would live in a one-room house with beige carpeting, beige walls, a chair, three remotes he can’t find and cable TV he can’t surf. He has a sense for décor now, but that’s only because Mom has been training him for three decades plus. Last time I asked, Dad didn’t even know what bank they use or how much money they make. Mom could yank their well-decorated house right out from under him but, instead, she makes it his home — our home. Dad isn’t the only one who hopelessly leans on Mom, Captain Kath, as we affectionately call her, much to her faux chagrin. My brothers and I are in our late-20s, early-30s and we still phone the Captain when crises arise, from a lost set of car keys to a lovers’ quarrel. Without fail, she rejiggers her jam-packed schedule to solve our problems long distance. Thank you, Mom — we certainly don’t say that enough. What follows here is the tip of a very large iceberg — six Sandhills mothers who, just like Mom, keep all the balls in the air and make it look easy, even when it’s not.

Katie Wyatt

President and CEO of El Sistema USA

El Sistema is the colloquial name for a Venezuelan program that was founded in the 1970s to bring world class music instruction to underprivileged kids, and the movement has since spread worldwide. “The whole model of El Sistema is like an Olympic development program for music,” says Katie Wyatt, the founding president and CEO of El Sistema USA, a nonprofit organization that supports all El Sistema-inspired programs nationwide. “It’s way beyond your general music class, and the idea is to offer that kind of access and opportunity to all kids.” But El Sistema USA isn’t all that Wyatt does. She is the Carolina Philharmonic’s principal violist, supports the Weymouth Center in an interim capacity, teaches at Duke University, and is mom to 2 1/2-year-old Petra. “We’re buddies; we do a lot together,” Wyatt says of her daughter with a smile. “A lot of modeling for her is — this is who I am, this is something to aspire to be. It’s just the idea that you can do a million things. You can have this entrepreneurial mindset, which I think is this mindset of curiosity and challenge and discipline. The motto of El Sistema is ‘tocar y luchar,’ to play and to strive — and I am big on the luchar.” Petra is, too. “She is just rough and tumble. From the minute she could walk, she ran.”

Micaela Murphy

Lead Guide at Moore Montessori

Until last fall, Micaela Murphy and her family lived in Austin, Texas. But after student teaching observation at Moore Montessori, she was offered a job and the trio came to live in the Sandhills. “By study, I was in biology. I just loved the sciences and that was my path,” says Murphy, who’s now a lead guide at Moore Montessori. She pivoted away from the sciences after her daughter, Maliha, came home from school one day. “She was like, ‘Mom, where are all the teachers that look like me?’ She was like, you know, the brown skin and the curly hair that look like me.” Murphy had a conversation with one of Maliha’s teachers, who said there just aren’t a lot of Black teachers in Montessori. “Well, surely that’s not the answer,” Murphy reflects. And, if that was, it didn’t seem like a good one. “So, I was like, ‘OK, well, there’s not a lot?’ I’ll go ahead and become one.” And she did. “Long story short, I became a Montessori teacher, and my daughter encouraged the path that I’m on now.” Murphy describes her daughter, who’s now 9: “She’s everything that I’m not, all the best parts of a person, untouched by adult interference. And I say that because she still has this beautiful take on the world. She still has this humanitarian spirit. She still has this ‘But what if we can?’”

Ashley Tramontin

Owner of Against the Grain Shoppe

“I remember one time Reid told someone that I didn’t know — he was like, ‘Yeah, my mom owns a store,’ and, it was right after we opened, and it didn’t really feel real until he said that,” says Ashley Tramontin about her 7-year-old son. “I mean, I know he’s aware and paying attention, but it was so special to hear him be proud about it.” Tramontin started making and revamping furniture after hers was damaged in a move to the middle-of-nowhere Kansas. She recalls, “I started doing furniture for myself and then friends and built it into an Etsy store.” When she relocated to the Sandhills, she started selling her furniture in the area and eventually opened Against the Grain Shoppe to sell her wares and those of other local makers. Reid might be among them someday soon — he recently made and sold his first bench. But what he really enjoys is the back end of the business. “He loves to count the drawer for me,” says Tramontin, laughing. “He knows there’s supposed to be X-amount of money in here, and then he can figure it out, and then he can yell at me for not having it correct, and he loves it.”

Jane Claire Dawkins

Registered Nurse, Quality Department at Moore Regional Hospital

Jane Claire Dawkins is going on her 16th year of nursing — she’s now the quality coordinator for sepsis at FirstHealth Moore Regional Hospital. “There are certain core measures that we have to meet as a hospital, and my job is making sure that we’re compliant,” says Dawkins. She’s no longer providing bedside care in her day-to-day, but she has been administering COVID vaccines a couple of times per week at the community clinic. “It’s my way of giving back,” she says. Dawkins started her career in pediatric intensive care units. After she and her husband were married, they decided to make their way back to his hometown in the Sandhills. “We just felt called, really, for the sense of community,” she says. They liked the idea of raising their kids, Mary Britt, age 8, and Will, who’s just turning 5, in the area. “Mary Britt is super mature, and she’s super outgoing,” Dawkins says. “Will, he’s kind of like, he’s just my sweet little guy.” She smiles. As Dawkins’ family grew, her nursing career evolved, and she’s proud of the work/life balance she’s struck. “It’s definitely a dynamic field,” she says of nursing. “So many opportunities to work more or less, at the bedside or behind a desk, just depending on where you are . . . the season of life.”

Tiffany Fleeman

Owner of Workhorse Fitness & Yoga

“Regardless of what you try to shield them from, I think she was pretty aware that it was a tough year,” Tiffany Fleeman says about her new business, the pandemic and her 9-year-old, Olivia, or Liv, as she and her husband, Joel, call her. After a 2 1/2-year upfit, Fleeman opened Workhorse Fitness & Yoga in November 2019, just in time for the COVID pandemic. “This year was just such a hard time, teaching her not to give up. I mean, there were so many times this year — it’s hard to admit this — but giving up, it crossed my mind,” she says. “The business was new, and it was tough, but looking back, that’s never the example I want to set.” Liv is already resilient and blazing entrepreneurial trails just like her mom. “She has, through all of this, started her own little business.” Fleeman smiles. “She has this little plant business, and so we do that together. I help her make her little Marimo moss balls and these air plants that she sells in our store.” Workhorse has an in-house retail shop, fittingly called LIVWell. Fleeman continues, “She’s like, ‘Mom, you owe me this amount.’” She laughs and shakes her head. “She’s going to be a great businesswoman someday.”

LeAnn Bailey

Occupational Therapist

About 13 years ago, LeAnn Bailey closed her eyes, jabbed her finger at a map and happened to hit North Carolina. “I was finishing up my master’s degree in occupational therapy and had never lived outside of the state of Florida,” Bailey says. But because of that fateful jab, she met her husband while interning here in the Tar Heel State. Now years later, she works as an occupational therapist, driving daily to her patients in Moore’s surrounding counties, and goes home to a camper that she and her family are living in while their new house is being built in the Seven Lakes area. “I always thought I was a tiny living person like, ‘Oh, I can do that.’ I’ve learned very quickly now my life is not meant for tiny living. The 43-foot camper with three humans and two dogs gets a little . . . ” She laughs. Their 9-year-old daughter, Addie, has adjusted well to their interim housing. She seems to adjust well to anything; she just made friends with two kids while her mom was talking. “She doesn’t meet a stranger,” Bailey says. “She’s energetic. She is fun-loving, intelligent yet challenging at the same time, very intuitive.” She also likes to cheerlead and horseback ride. Addie runs over. “How would you describe your mom?” I ask her. “She’s really hardworking. She helps a lot of people, and I like it.”  PS

Poem

I Swear

This won’t hurt.

I’ll always love you.

You’re perfect.

I do. I will.

I didn’t. It wasn’t —

You’ve got it all wrong.

I only want what’s best for you.

This will be good for both of us.

Nothing can be done.

You’ll never change.

It wasn’t my fault.

I’m only trying to help.

No one’s to blame.

It will be better soon.

— Debra Kaufman

Sporting Life

A Day to Remember

An ice-cold beer and a bale of hay

By Tom Bryant

Mother took the photo.

Three good old boys. She liked to say we were her good old boys.

We were kicked back on the little screen porch right off the kitchen. In the photo on the left is my brother, Guery. The guy in the middle is my brother-in-law, Mike. Relaxing proudly on the right is yours truly. The foreground of the picture is a classic, probably found only in the South: a ’50s kitchen table with half a watermelon, accompanied very importantly by an Old Milwaukee beer.

This photo was taken during one of our annual vacations at the beach. Ocean Drive Beach, South Carolina, that is. A tradition that started with my grandparents back in the ’20s. Their farm has been part of our family dating back to 1830, when the old plantation house was built. Living in the low country of South Carolina, the only way to beat the summer heat and ravages by mosquitoes and biting flies was to spend as much time as possible at the coast, where the cool ocean breezes helped make the relentless summer heat bearable.

It was a simple plan. Granddad would load the farm truck with enough provisions to last for weeks: canned vegetables, hams, crates of live chickens, and every kind of provender possible. After the truck was loaded with goods, Mother and her seven siblings would climb aboard, and with Grandmother in the front seat, they would head to the beach.

Now Granddad had a farm to run, so naturally he couldn’t stay. He would unload the truck and the family and head back home to the farm, only returning on weekends or whenever there was a break in the constant chores of growing crops and raising livestock.

When we grandchildren came along, the tradition continued. Summer meant the beach. Mother and Dad would herd us into the family car, and we would make the trek to Ocean Drive, Crescent Beach, Cherry Grove or Windy Hill for a week or two, enjoying the gentle ocean, summer breezes and laid-back atmosphere of coastal living. It’s ironic, but even in the early ’50s, Myrtle Beach was considered to be too big and raucous for our family, and we never ventured farther south than Windy Hill.

After Linda and I were married, our first summer vacation was spent with the family. Mother, recognizing that we probably weren’t flush with cash, invited us to join her and Dad along with my brother and sisters at Ocean Drive. We jumped at the invitation. So the tradition continued. When my brother and sisters got married, it was only natural that their spouses join the crowd, and every summer we enjoyed a mini family seaside reunion.

My grandparents passed away in the ’60s, and Mother inherited their house and its surrounding fields. The old, antiquated house was in serious disrepair, having been abandoned by my grandmother when she moved to smaller quarters. It took several years, but Mother was a patient, determined woman. Her memories of growing up on the farm added to her determination to restore the family homestead.

That was part of the reason the three of us good old boys ended up holding forth on the little breakfast porch that summer. It’s simple really. Mother had reintroduced cows to the farm pastures and needed hay for their winter food. What better free labor than the three of us to haul the hay to the barn?

The adventure was preplanned. Mother called me the week before we were to rendezvous with the other members of the family. She asked my opinion about how the hay task would be received by the rest of the folks, and I heartily approved. She then talked to my sister in Florida, who also thought it would be a great event. The idea was to take a day from the beach, head back to the farm, about an hour away, and go to work. My Uncle Tom had inherited cleared farmland from Granddad’s estate, and he was already a full-time farmer of tobacco, soybeans, cotton and wheat. He had all the equipment necessary to harvest hay. Before we arrived, he baled the hay and waited for our labor to get the hay to the barn. When I pulled in the drive to the old house, we saw him out in the field with the tractor and hay wagon hooked up and ready to go.

It was a chore. It took all day to fill the barn, but fill it we did. I don’t think we could have pushed one more hay bale into the attic of that ancient outbuilding.

Linda and my sisters and the kids stayed at the beach while we loaded, hauled and hoisted all day. Mother was at the house preparing fried chicken and all the trimmings for supper, which naturally included a watermelon and most importantly a cooler full of cold beer. Mike provided the beer, Old Milwaukee. It was excellent and one of the few times I drank that brand. I’m not sure they even have that label anymore.

That week at the beach and the one day on the farm remains one of the family’s fondest memories. Mother was glowing. She was doing what she loved, spending time with her children. After supper when we were getting ready to drive back to the beach, she and I were sitting on the long, front porch. Guery and Mike were inside watching TV. My dad, Monroe, had passed away years before from a job-related illness, lung cancer. This was before all the government oversight monitoring industry for health regulations. Mother never remarried.

“You know what, Tommy?” She was in her favorite rocker. I was in the swing. We were looking out across the fields. A full moon was slowly rising. “Your daddy would have loved to have been part of this day.”

I was kinda choked up and could only mumble an answer.

She slowly stood and stretched and said, “Let’s get those boys moving and go on back to the beach. I bet that moon is beautiful over the ocean.”

The reunions continued for a few more years. But then the children had children, and those children had more children, and the meetings at the coast went away like the outgoing tide.

Mother passed away at the age of 99. During her later years, whenever I was around her for any length of time, she would invariably reminisce about summer and beach vacations. Those were some of her happiest memories.  PS

Tom Bryant, a Southern Pines resident, is a lifelong outdoorsman and PineStraw’s Sporting Life columnist.

Story of a House

Time Warp

A modern family flourishes in a century-old house

By Deborah Salomon  •  Photographs by John Gessner

At first glance, the interior of Ashley and David Johnson’s house bordering the Southern Pines Historic District resembles a movie set. A silent movie, of course, since the house was built in 1920. On the walls hang portraits of somebody else’s relatives. Furnishings — a few heirlooms among the reproductions — lean toward weathered leather and dark woods. Beds have metal frames, and sinks look like layouts from Better Homes and Gardens, first published in 1922. Instead of native heart pine, the unusually narrow floorboards revealed under layers of carpet and linoleum are oak, signaling . . . what?

Obviously, the Johnsons are sticklers for the authentic, continually sleuthing used furniture stores and architectural salvage warehouses. Because, as Stephen King wrote, “Sooner or later, everything old is new again.” That applies to push-button light switches enjoying a revival throughout the Johnson homestead.

Time was, young couples with growing families wanted new houses tricked out in the latest gadgets. In the extreme, this spawned “smart” homes with Siri and Alexa calling the shots. Ashley and David missed that trope. They represent a group intent on reproducing the past, within reason, financed by sweat equity. Nobody shuns air conditioning or dishwashers, decks or gas grills. But the Johnsons don’t mind occupying a work-in-progress with their five home-schooled children, ages 5 to 13, and an adolescent Great Dane named Odysseus, whose blue-gray coat matches the kitchen cabinets. Like almost everything else, these handsome cabinets were wrought by David, meaning that if a molding or door frame needed replacing, he would reproduce it.

A winding but not unfamiliar road led them to this project, which they hope to complete by 2024. “My five-year plan,” David calls it.

Ashley grew up in a historic home in Charleston renovated by her father, David, on a farm in western Canada. He learned carpentry and construction from his father, a general contractor. Ashley studied design. Both come from moderately large, home-schooled families.

David joined the military, and while at Fort Bragg, spent a weekend in Charleston, where he met Ashley through her brother, at a home-school event. After their marriage, David was stationed in Colorado until their infant daughter was diagnosed with cancer. The military approved a compassionate relocation to Moore County, which was closer to Ashley’s family, and Duke, where Payton, now 12, received chemotherapy.

First they rented a home in Seven Lakes, but as “doers,” wanted their own place. They found it while talking to the Levy family, owners of the Toy Shop in downtown Southern Pines and this cottage.

Little is known of the house built during the pre-Depression boom except a general description from the National Register of Historic Places, which “attributes” the design to architect Aymar Embury II, an active participant in the growth and popularity of Southern Pines. “Dutch Colonial style, distinguished by gambrel roofs, shed dormers, German siding,” it reads. No occupants are listed, suggesting spec-built.

With few photos available, the Johnsons went to work researching or imagining what once was. They decided to alter the footprint as little as possible. Then, two days after they moved in, David was deployed for six months.

“While he was gone I did some painting,” Ashley says. And planning, since nothing inspires renovation more than occupation. Otherwise, the six of them “just hung out.”

After David returned, the first thing they tackled was the master bedroom, previously pine-paneled, located just beyond the living room, with plumbing for a shower in between. Off came the paneling, on went vivid blue paint. Ashley liked the look of a fireplace, so David assembled a decorative one, with an antique grate and mantel but no chimney. A tiny bathroom with window became their closet-dressing room while the larger existing closet became a bathroom.

Next, they tackled the floors. Those narrow oak boards were removed, very carefully, a subfloor laid, the strips retuned and refinished. Their older kids helped pull up the nails. A door between kitchen and dining room was widened, and the front hall coat closet is now a powder room.

Ashley’s hunt for furnishings and period décor is ongoing. Nothing matches, everything relates. “I’m obsessed with antlers,” she admits. Several pairs hang from the parlor wall along with hunt-themed prints and a boar’s head bagged by somebody else. The sofa is leather; a massive spinet and son Holden’s cello anchor the music corner.

Ladies in long skirts and corseted bodices (not Roaring ’20s flappers) would look quite at home taking tea here.

The children sleep upstairs. Do the math: five kids, two bedrooms. (A third is being renovated as a guest room.) The boys, Holden, 9, and Gunnarr, 7, occupy bunk beds in the smaller room, while daughters Payton, 12, Haydanne, 13, and Charlotte, 5, have the original, long, sun-splashed master bedroom, with three frilly white beds lined up dorm-style. The five share a typically ’30s black-and-white bathroom.

Ashley concedes that this arrangement may change as the girls become teenagers.

The Johnsons eat all their meals in the dining room, sparsely furnished with a long narrow table, bentwood chairs (another of Ashley’s obsessions) and a sideboard.

Nowhere is the couple’s ingenuity better displayed than in the kitchen of moderate size with a refrigerator made by The Big Chill, resembling an old-timey icebox on steroids. A brass rod added to the dishwasher matches fittings on the gas stove. Instead of a range hood David installed an exhaust fan behind a classic wall grate over the stove. A friend offered them the ancient porcelain sink, just worn enough to confirm its age.

At the back door, a clam-shell sink from Ashley’s Charleston home encourages the kids to wash up after playing outside.

Restoration stops at the large deck on stilts overlooking the fenced (for Odysseus) yard and chicken-duck coop, which the girls helped build.

Few cottages of that era had basements. The Johnson family needed one. Here, down a narrow, steep flight of stairs, the children sit at desks while being schooled by Ashley — also a play area with TV (watched sparingly), a laundry nook and fitness equipment.

Somehow, by allocating every inch of space, seven people fit into 2,400 square feet without crowding or clutter. “This is big. The house we moved out of was 1,500 square feet,” Ashley recalls.

The work-in-progress is also an experiment. When David leaves the military he plans to consolidate his research and construction expertise along with Ashley’s design skills into a business focusing on turn-of-the-century homes.

“We’re always dreaming,” Ashley admits.

Which still begs the question: For an active young family, why is old better than new?

“The history and craftsmanship, the beauty and design,” Ashley answers. “And the simpler lifestyle is good for our family.”  PS

Out of the Blue

Hands Off My Keepers!

In defense of not quite hoarding

By Deborah Salomon

I’m not a hoarder but have always owned a modicum of . . . well, things.

Not big things. Not expensive things. Just non-essentials found at Goodwill-type outlets, yard sales. This includes books, dishes and things to hang on the wall. 

They are NOT junk. Some are interesting, artistic. Many represent places I have been, people I have met or written about, like the tin can artist. Others fall into categories, thus qualifying as “collections.” For decades I collected masks, including a papier-mâché lady from Venice and a clay one from Florence, both mementos of 10 glorious days in Italy. Yet I also see value in now extinct Hellmann’s mayo glass jars with metal screw-on lids that hold a quart of homemade soup for a sick friend.

Where is Andy Warhol when you really need him?

However, as a recreational observer of humanity I know the difference between save (including collect) and hoard. Frugal people save. Eccentrics hoard. People who stockpile twist ties don’t deserve a classification.

The pandemic blurred definitions, leaving the late-night comedians reams of toilet paper to ridicule. Keep laughing, guys. Should COVID circle back you’re not getting any of mine. But I will share an inventory of what’s stored in the corners, pantry, closet, even the trunk of my car:

Jars: Besides Hellmann’s I hang onto glass maple syrup containers, with finger hooks at the mouth. Faux canning jars filled with pasta sauce are nice for storing anything, wet or dry. Remember the jelly jars that became kiddie glasses, often fought over? Kraft spreadable cheese still comes in them but the kiddies, even the grandkiddies, are long grown and gone.

Canned goods: I cannot resist a sale on canned tomatoes — crushed, stewed, whole, herbed Mexican or Italian — which I use for many recipes. A tower of cans fills a corner of the pantry because you never know who’s coming to dinner. So, should the virus provoke another quarantine and you’ve got an urge to make spaghetti sauce, I’m your gal.

Dishes: I saved a few dishes from every set I’ve owned, a mishmash of family history, plus single bowls, plates, mugs, soup crocks, cake plates I couldn’t resist. Definitely a hoard, but precious.

Socks: I could outfit a centipede. Being from a frigid climate, I know the value of warm feet. About 40 years ago I found a pile of men’s cashmere sock “seconds” (mostly unpopular colors) in a department store basement, for $2a pair. I bought at least a dozen. My husband wore them, my kids wore them, I wore them skiing until they disintegrated. I still have one pair, in red. I’m told the devil wears red socks. Me, too.

Buttons: Many sweaters, coats, blouses and other apparel come with an extra button or two, in case of loss. Great idea. Couldn’t possibly throw those away although I can’t recall using a single one. Sometimes I rifle through the jar, trying to remember the long-gone garments they matched. 

Boxes: Internet shopping means boxes . . . handsome, strong cardboard hopefully recycled after this single use. I want to adopt each one for kitty condos, pirate ships, footstools. When my kids were small, I would drive around on garbage day, looking for a washing machine or dishwasher carton reinforced with wood to keep in the garage for a rainy-day fort or playhouse.

Business cards: On my desk, four piles held together with rubber bands — probably 300 cards total. I only use two or three but what fun to flip through them, trying to recall when and why they were obtained.

Magazines: Everybody laughed when I hoarded/collected years and years of The New Yorker covers. Then, after moving into a new house I wallpapered one bedroom wall with the first batch and, in another house, an entire powder room, where guests sat a while and exited laughing.

Black pants: A girl can’t have too many: wide-leg linen, skinny stretch with or without stirrups, tailored synthetic, yogas, charcoal denim, crushed velvet gauchos, marled sweats for all seasons, all occasions formerly served by the little black dress.

Goofs: When LED and fluorescent light bulbs took over I read that regular incandescents would be phased out. No! The newbies hurt my eyes. So, I laid away a supply from 15-watt nightlights to 3-way floor lamps.

Well, the purge never happened. So I’m set for life.

Things I wish I’d hoarded: Money.

Things I wish I’d collected: Comic books, from the ’40s and ’50s, now worth big money.

Spring cleaning is the collectors/hoarders nemesis. We divest, reorganize.

Things I’ll throw out: Any of the above?

Not a chance.  PS

Deborah Salomon is a writer for PineStraw and The Pilot. She may be reached at debsalomon@nc.rr.com.

PinePitch

TRUST BUT VERIFY: As our communities deal with the challenges presented by the novel coronavirus, please be aware that events may have been postponed, rescheduled or existed only in our dreams. Check before attending.

Art Here, Art There, Art Everywhere

The Campbell House Galleries’ May exhibition opens at 5 p.m. on Friday, May 7, and runs through May 28, featuring Jugtown Pottery, paintings by Sharon Ferguson, JLK Jewelry, and woodworking by Andrew Ownbey. Campbell House is at 482 E. Connecticut Ave., Southern Pines. For info call (910) 692-2787 or visit www.mooreart.org.

Also on May 7, the Artists League of the Sandhills, 129 Exchange St., Aberdeen, will hold a reception from 5 p.m. to 7 p.m. featuring the work of Kathy Lueck in an exhibition titled “Adventures with a Palette Knife.” The exhibition runs through May 27. For additional information, call (910) 944-3979.

Have Corkscrew, Will Travel

Enjoy wine, light hors d’oeuvres, silent auctions, a wine raffle and jewelry at “Ladies Wine Out” at the Weymouth Center for the Arts & Humanities, 555 East Connecticut Ave., on Thursday, May 6, from 5:30 p.m. to 7:30 p.m. The rain date is May 13. Tickets are $20 for members and $25 for nonmembers and are available at www.ticketmesandhills or by calling (910) 692-6261.

Mother’s Matinee

Celebrate Mother’s Day with a special showing of The Sound of Music at 2 p.m. on Sunday, May 9, at the Sunrise Theater, 250 N.W. Broad St., Southern Pines. Tickets are $10 per person, and masks are required inside the theater. For additional information visit www.sunrisetheater.com or call (910) 692-3611.

Cinema En Plein Air

The Sunrise Theater, 250 N.W. Broad St., in Southern Pines, will be featuring outdoor movies beginning with Mamma Mia! on Friday, May 7, and Saturday May 8, at 8:15 p.m.; and Ghostbusters on Friday, May 21, and Saturday, May 22, at 8:30. Tickets for the movies are $10 per person. In the event of inclement weather, the movies will be screened indoors. For more information call (910) 692-3611 or go to www.sunrisetheater.com.

Gilded mummy called Lady Isaious. © 2020 Manchester Museum / Michael Pollard

Mummies Day

What says Mother’s Day more than a visit to the North Carolina Museum of Art’s exhibition of the Golden Mummies of Egypt? In a series of lavishly illustrated sections, the exhibition uses the collections of the Manchester Museum to showcase multicultural Roman Egypt (circa 300 B.C.E. to 200 C.E.) where diverse Egyptian, Roman, and Greek communities and influences were blended. Visitors will learn about the three mummies in the exhibition using interactives to see underneath the wrappings, thanks to digital radiography paired with multidirectional CT scanning. The exhibition runs through July 11. For tickets visit ncartmuseum.org.

Dig This

The Master Gardener Hotline will be back to talk you down off the horticultural ledge beginning Monday, May 3. Questions about lawns, plant care and sustainable gardening are all fair game. The Master Gardeners will be available from 10 a.m. to 12 p.m., Monday through Friday at (910) 947-3188. The program continues through Oct. 31.

Taste of North Carolina

Given Memorial Library and Elliott’s on Linden will team up for another delicious Given to Go on Tuesday, May 18. The menu will be a seasonal spring mix, grilled chicken breast, herb red bliss potato salad and assorted cookies. Pickup is from 5:30 p.m. to 6:30 p.m. at the Given Memorial Library, 150 Cherokee Road, Pinehurst. Tickets for the fundraiser are $22 per meal and sales end on Friday, May 14. Meals can be pre-purchased at the Tufts Archives at (910) 295-3642 or by email at giventufts@gmail.com.