How The Grand Old Paper Was Born
Title: Stories of Southern Gothams
’Verse/characters: Southern Gothams (my original fictional universe)
Prompt: 1. Beginnings
Word Count: 684
Rating: PG
Notes: This is the first of one hundred stories that will comprise a future novel called Stories of Southern Gothams, based on an alternate universe where the small towns of Rutherfordton, Spindale and Forest City, North Carolina, along with the surrounding communities, are actually huge urban metropolises with their own unique history and culture.
How The Grand Old Paper Was Born
By Braxton Donnelly, Managing Editor of the Forest City Tribune
This great paper which we call the Forest City Tribune turned one hundred years old today, October 1, 2012. Originally the paper was to start the day before, but the printing presses broke down and had to be fixed. The big stories of that day were the intense growth of our fair city and rumors of annexation of neighboring city Bostic (which happened just two years later after a controversial vote) fought with reports of racial unrest in the Grahamtown section of Forest City, as two young black men were accused of raping a young white woman, which threatened to turn our city upside down, had their verdict read in City Municipal Court.
But for those of us who were born and raised here, we remember that Bentley Washington and Clovis Applegrove were found not guilty by a white jury to the stunned amazement of the Tri-Cities on that very day. Thanks to the heroics of then-unknown lawyer Cramerton Matthews, he convinced a court that seemingly wanted those innocent black men lynched by laying out the evidence that the two men were nowhere near where Patty Ray Salmon alleged the rape took place. With calm, measured voice, he politely took apart Salmon's story on the witness stand. Such was the dissection that the lead prosecutor, Graham Waltrip, didn't even bother with a follow-up, and his team's whole case fell apart like a house of cards. Waltrip lost decisively in the next election for city district attorney, and soon he was off to Atlanta to try and rebuild his career. Matthews, as we all know, went onto bigger and better things, winning the mayor's race against Republican Darvis Farnsworth in 1933 and serving as mayor throughout World War II.
Of course, sports were a part of the day as well, as reports from the football game between Forest City College and Rutherford State College as well as Spindale State defeating rival Spindale Polytechnic the weekend before introduced the sports section. The big story in sports, though, was the final of the Foothills League championship, as the Forest City Owls defeated the then-Rutherfordton Raccoons (the name was changed to the Racers in the 1960s at the behest of some minister you might have heard of: Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr.) 3-2 to win game seven of the best of seven series at Hardin Field. Babe Carrington slammed a home run in the bottom of the eighth to give the home standing Owls the title, and pitcher Wally Lawrence went the distance for the clinching win.
In what was called the "Cultural Section" at the time, the main story focused on Foothill Studios, recently opened in the neighboring city of Cliffside. Wide-eyes entrepreneurs were looking to take advantage of the good weather and low tax rate to try and rival Hollywood in film-making. As we all know, Hollywood did win its share of battles, but the war is far from over, as the studios of Cliffside continue to churn out picture after picture to rival what "Tinseltown" churns out.
Times were simpler then, of course. As the days turned into weeks and weeks turned into months, the Forest City Tribune would chronicle the rise of the Tri-Cities from ambitious small cities to the large metropolises that they are today. They looked back at the cities' history up to that point, especially the years after the Civil War where carpetbaggers from Yankeeland came down to the Thermal Valley and decided to create their own version of New York here in the South. It wasn't easy, but with the advent of the railroad and electricity, things began to pick up at a startling pace here where the Green and Broad Rivers flow, and we became what we are in the course of nearly a century and a half.
We saw the rise and fall of local leaders and personalities, as well as two world wars, presidential campaigns, sports championships, movie premieres, the golden age of television, and enough joy and pain to fill two hundred years...perhaps even three.
Happy Hundredth, You Grand Old Paper! May you see a hundred more!
’Verse/characters: Southern Gothams (my original fictional universe)
Prompt: 1. Beginnings
Word Count: 684
Rating: PG
Notes: This is the first of one hundred stories that will comprise a future novel called Stories of Southern Gothams, based on an alternate universe where the small towns of Rutherfordton, Spindale and Forest City, North Carolina, along with the surrounding communities, are actually huge urban metropolises with their own unique history and culture.
How The Grand Old Paper Was Born
By Braxton Donnelly, Managing Editor of the Forest City Tribune
This great paper which we call the Forest City Tribune turned one hundred years old today, October 1, 2012. Originally the paper was to start the day before, but the printing presses broke down and had to be fixed. The big stories of that day were the intense growth of our fair city and rumors of annexation of neighboring city Bostic (which happened just two years later after a controversial vote) fought with reports of racial unrest in the Grahamtown section of Forest City, as two young black men were accused of raping a young white woman, which threatened to turn our city upside down, had their verdict read in City Municipal Court.
But for those of us who were born and raised here, we remember that Bentley Washington and Clovis Applegrove were found not guilty by a white jury to the stunned amazement of the Tri-Cities on that very day. Thanks to the heroics of then-unknown lawyer Cramerton Matthews, he convinced a court that seemingly wanted those innocent black men lynched by laying out the evidence that the two men were nowhere near where Patty Ray Salmon alleged the rape took place. With calm, measured voice, he politely took apart Salmon's story on the witness stand. Such was the dissection that the lead prosecutor, Graham Waltrip, didn't even bother with a follow-up, and his team's whole case fell apart like a house of cards. Waltrip lost decisively in the next election for city district attorney, and soon he was off to Atlanta to try and rebuild his career. Matthews, as we all know, went onto bigger and better things, winning the mayor's race against Republican Darvis Farnsworth in 1933 and serving as mayor throughout World War II.
Of course, sports were a part of the day as well, as reports from the football game between Forest City College and Rutherford State College as well as Spindale State defeating rival Spindale Polytechnic the weekend before introduced the sports section. The big story in sports, though, was the final of the Foothills League championship, as the Forest City Owls defeated the then-Rutherfordton Raccoons (the name was changed to the Racers in the 1960s at the behest of some minister you might have heard of: Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr.) 3-2 to win game seven of the best of seven series at Hardin Field. Babe Carrington slammed a home run in the bottom of the eighth to give the home standing Owls the title, and pitcher Wally Lawrence went the distance for the clinching win.
In what was called the "Cultural Section" at the time, the main story focused on Foothill Studios, recently opened in the neighboring city of Cliffside. Wide-eyes entrepreneurs were looking to take advantage of the good weather and low tax rate to try and rival Hollywood in film-making. As we all know, Hollywood did win its share of battles, but the war is far from over, as the studios of Cliffside continue to churn out picture after picture to rival what "Tinseltown" churns out.
Times were simpler then, of course. As the days turned into weeks and weeks turned into months, the Forest City Tribune would chronicle the rise of the Tri-Cities from ambitious small cities to the large metropolises that they are today. They looked back at the cities' history up to that point, especially the years after the Civil War where carpetbaggers from Yankeeland came down to the Thermal Valley and decided to create their own version of New York here in the South. It wasn't easy, but with the advent of the railroad and electricity, things began to pick up at a startling pace here where the Green and Broad Rivers flow, and we became what we are in the course of nearly a century and a half.
We saw the rise and fall of local leaders and personalities, as well as two world wars, presidential campaigns, sports championships, movie premieres, the golden age of television, and enough joy and pain to fill two hundred years...perhaps even three.
Happy Hundredth, You Grand Old Paper! May you see a hundred more!