Vacation

The official history of Johnston County gives her exactly one sentence. "The first woman to hold elected office was Luma McLamb, Republican Register of Deeds from 1928 to 1932." That's it. No paragraph. No chapter. One sentence in a list of firsts. But here's what that sentence doesn't te…

There is a ledger in the North Carolina State Archives. Bound in leather. Column after column of names. It is titled Johnston County Permanent Registration of Voters, 1902 to 1908. Every name in it is white. That was the point. Smith Brooks had sat on the Smithfield Board of Commissioners. Mack Sow…

There is a bronze soldier standing on the courthouse lawn in Smithfield. He has been there since 1926. He stands at parade rest — chin up, eyes forward — with the posture of a man who doesn't yet know what's waiting for him. On the stone beneath his feet: forty-seven names. Buck Hill. Pearlie H. Ha…

In 1920, a woman in Smithfield sat down and made a decision. Her husband had just died. He'd been the editor of the Smithfield Herald. She had children, half-ownership of a newspaper she'd never run, and a list of things a widow in Johnston County in 1920 was expected to do. She walked into the off…