'I MUST HAVE TRIPPED'
© 2001 James D. and Rebecca P. Pearce
When Christine was around 18 years old, her parents decided to transfer her from the co-ed college she was attending in South Carolina to the all-female Southern Baptist school called Chowan College in North Carolina.
The reasoning behind Mr. and Mrs. Leonhirth's decision to make the transfer was that they felt their daughter might be in less danger of early marriage or other personal mishaps in the young ladies' school in North Carolina than in the mixed field of the academy in their Southern state.
However, when the good-looking Christine arrived and began attending classes, she immediately became a star attraction for the young swells in the little Northeastern North Carolina village, who liked to spend a whole lot of their leisure time hanging out around the college gates, ogling and attempting to "date" the young ladies.
The upshot of all this parental protection effort and maneuvering was that before Christine completed her appointed time at the new institution, she dropped out of school to become the young bride of one such swain ~ George, by name.
But here we are tending to get ahead of our story.
~~~~~~~~~
There was a lot of romance flowering in the little Hertford County river town in those days, and two of the most romantic were locals Beva Overwood, an aspiring barber, and Joice Cuthrell, part-time telephone-switchboard operator and part-time proprietor of a dress shop.
About the time Christine came to town, studied books a while and then boys ~ and got married to George ~ Joice and Beva, who themselves were a constant couple, decided to announce their engagement.
But when they were set to tie their knot, Joice's mother fell ill and she and Beva decided they would just have to delay the nuptials.
The mother's illness wasn't really serious, but a little time was required for her to recover, and the engaged pair decided to wait a while before setting another date.
But they remained a constant couple.
~~~~~~~~~
Beva persevered at the barbering business, and soon was doing well enough to open his own two-chair shop, even though at first he was the only barber and had to move back and forth from one chair to the other to keep the seat-wear at an even keel.
Beva's shop was on the first floor of a small two-story building on Main Street.
The building was so constructed that customers didn't walk directly off the street into Beva's barber palace.
The door from the street opened upon a small hallway, which had two doors.
The door to the left went into the barber shop, and generally was left open. There was no door to the right. The door straight ahead opened at the foot of a stairway that led to the loft law office of one J. William Courtland, the town's leading legal eagle.
This stairway was pretty steep, and at the top the climber was faced with another door that when open would allow access to J. William's legal chamber.
~~~~~~~~~
Beva's business prospered to the extent that he was able to get another barber, Billy Brown, to come in and work full time ~ working on "halves" ~ with Beva getting the rakeoff in return for furnishing the tonsorial equipment and the roof over their heads.
And Joice also was full-time now at her dress shop. Doing well.
She and Beva decided to set another date for their wedding.
And they did. But something happened ~ nobody remembers exactly what ~ but it was of sufficient seriousness that they decided they again would have to wait a while.
Which they did.
But they still remained a constant couple.
~~~~~~~~~
Beva's shop by now had become a fairly attractive rest stop for the off-duty males of Murfreesboro ~ both employed and unemployed ~ those who wanted haircuts and shaves or just wanted to sit a spell, read old magazines or The Hertford County Herald, discuss the major issues of the day, and debate the proper way to pronounce the town name, Murfreesboro.
At least 99 per cent of Beva's clientele was native. And like most of the folks in Hertford County at the time ~ as well as present-day Bostonians ~ they all had a little trouble trying to pronounce the letter "r," with which the word Murfreesboro was well supplied.
They knew how it was written, and how it was supposed to be said.
But try as they might, when they attempted to put it to the vocal test, it just about always came out "Muffasbuhuh." And they took a lot of ribbing for this when they ventured to places like "Nawfok" and "Pawchmuth" and people asked where they were from.
So they just sat around, got haircuts and so forth, and talked about other things, such as who in their neck of the county made the best corn likker and why in the heck did David Duncan think he alone was going to be able to make way with half of it.
~~~~~~~~~
All the while, Beva and Joice remained a faithful, constant couple.
Joice was a nice-looking woman. A whole lot of people even went so far as to say she was pretty, with her hair always fixed just-so in the neat, tight pin-curl fashion of the day.
Beva wasn't a bad-looking man ~ getting a little middle-aged now, though, with a receding hairline that refused to respond to the ministrations of either of the town's two best barbers.
But he was a classy dresser.
For that matter, so was Joice.
And most everybody remarked about what a nice-looking couple they made when they went out on the town in Beva's 1929 Oldsmobile on their regular Sunday and Wednesday-afternoon dates. (In the small Hertford County villages of that time, small businesses would no more operate on Wednesday afternoon than they would on Sunday.)
Everybody was happy when they set another date.
But again something ~ nobody was sure what it was ~ happened, and the sad turn of events once more forced Beva and Joice to temporarily put off their wedding day.
~~~~~~~~~
David Duncan was a clothing salesman in the town's leading mercantile store. Matter of fact, he was the head of the men's department. He even may have been the entire men's department.
And he was a good, faithful and reliable employee, even though he was one of the foremost patrons of that thriving cottage industry of the countryside, where the product of the cornfield was boiled, "mashed" and bottled in quart Mason Jars.
David was one of those fellows who could walk a chalk line when he needed to, for work or worship, but who when he had a little time of his own, liked to imbibe.
At such times, he didn't always walk the straightest of chalk lines.
~~~~~~~~~
The fellows assembled in Beva's shop that day were discussing the possibility of momentous happenings.
It looked like that fellow "Roosyvelt" was going to beat Hoover, and it had been stated on some good authority (in The Hertford County Herald) that if he was, it might mean hard times for the "moonshine" manufacturers because it was said "Roosyvelt" was going to do away with "Prohibition" and let the whole country get drunk.
Legally.
In pious, strait-laced Southern Baptist and United Methodist Murfreesboro, the prospect was the cause of no little amount of discussion.
The barber-shop patrons were thoroughly worn out with Hoover, and ready to see him depart. But the prospect of "legal" liquor caused some differences and led to a little added warmth in the debates about the coming election.
In the midst of their latest exchanges, all heck seemed to break loose, and the haircut crowd was brought to sudden, standing attention with all eyes on the open door to the little hallway.
"Blam-a-lam-a-lam-a-lam-a-lam ~ BOOM!" was the way George and Christine's oldest offspring, Walter, later described the commotion.
~~~~~~~~~
They all rushed to the doorway, near where a slightly pie-eyed David Duncan was busily brushing down his natty gray suit and struggling to regain his full height.
"Ho! Ho! Ho!" said David, pointing toward the top of the stairway where the loft door was still closed.
"I must have tripped!"
~~~~~~~~~
Christine and George went on to struggle through the long Depression years, shepherding two kids along the way.
Some other problem arose to delay again the wedding of Beva and Joice.
But they remained a faithful, close, constant couple for a long, long time.
Until one day, many years later, when Beva fell ill and died.
~~~
George and Christine
Chowan College campus
c. 1920
