Download this June 2007 article as a

Here is “Round 33” of your insights into how to know if someone is from North Carolina. You may also want to check out

• Round One (February 2004)
• Round Two (March 2004)
• Round Three (May 2004)
• Round Four (July 2004)
• Round Five (August 2004)
• Round Six (September 2004)
• Round Seven (November 2004)
• Round Eight (January 2005)
• Round Nine (February 2005)
• Round Ten (March 2005)
• Round Eleven (April 2005)
• Round Twelve (May 2005)
• Round Thirteen (June 2005)
• Round Fourteen (August 2005)
• Round Fifteen (September 2005)
• Round Sixteen (October 2005)
• Round Seventeen (November 2005)
• Round Eighteen (December 2005)
• Round Nineteen (January 2006)
• Round Twenty (February 2006)
• Round Twenty-one (March 2006)
• Round Twenty-two (April 2006)
• Round Twenty-three (May 2006)
• Round Twenty-four (June 2006)
• Round Twenty-five (July 2006)
• Round Twenty-six (August 2006)
• Round Twenty-seven (September 2006)
• Round Twenty-eight (October 2006)
• Round Twenty-nine (November 2006)
• Round Thirty (December 2006)
• Round Thirty-one (January 2007)
• Round Thirty-two (March 2007)

If you can think of anything to add to this list, send it to us:

E-mail: Carolina.country@ncemcs.com
Mail: P.O. Box 27306, Raleigh, NC 27611.
Phone: (919) 875-3062.

From Mary Hampton, Bessemer City

• Your Maw-Maw would tickle your legs with a hickory switch when you were acting up.
• Your Mom said that she was going to bring you down a few button holes.

From Jan Lingle, Monroe

• You dropped a dime in the “pickalo” at Sustare’s swimming pool and punched B-8 to play “Rockin’ Robin” by Bobby Day.
• You crawled under the fence at Bickett Stadium to watch Monroe beat Albemarle.
• You thumbed to “OD” with $5 in your pocket, stayed a solid week, and came back with $6.
• You ran into your house in the heat of summer to cool off in front of the window fan and your Hattie Mae was listening to WGIV with DJs Chattie Hattie and Genial Gene.
• You sneaked in the men’s room window at the H.H. Davis cotton warehouse to see Maurice Williams & the Gladiolas.

From Becky Fowler, Atkinson

• You would catch fireflies and mash them on your finger for your diamond ring.

From Tim Perry, Hertford

• You and Dad set the nets at sundown.
• You and Dad fished the nets at night, and you held the flashlight.
• You picked up the fish and put ‘em back in when Dad missed the washtub.
• You went to the fish market every morning to sell the catch.
• You could name all of types of fish before you knew your ABCs.
• Breakfast was herring roe and eggs fried in bacon grease.
• Supper was fried mullet, mullet gizzards, mullet roe, fried potatoes, coleslaw and lacey cornbread.
• You pinched the swimmer fin to see if a crab was ready to shed.
  
• You broke off the pincher of the busters and peelers so they could go in the shedder.
• Mom put the hard crabs in the crabpot with the long-handled tongs, but Dad just picked ‘em up an’ put ‘em in there.
• Shucking oysters from Ocracoke Island meant one for the bowl, one for Dad, and one for you.

From Delores White, Barco

• You scrapped the cotton patch to buy Blue Horse notebooks and yellow #2 pencils for school.
  From Douglas Mozingo, Stantonsburg
• Your Ma and Pa told you to shut up so they could hear “Lum & Abner” on the radio.
• You were afraid to go out after dark because the “Kitty Mouse” might get you.
• You bush-hogged your ditch banks in the winter with a swub blade.
• When your company was ready to leave, Ma and Pa would say, “’Tain’t a while to rush off.”

From Rachel Poole, Denver

• You had a fire board over your open fire place.
• You went to the branch to get white wash for your hearth.
• When you walked to church others would join along the way.
• You made snuff from cocoa and sugar.
• You used baking soda to brush your teeth.
• Men rolled their own cigarettes.

From Stacey Cumber, Monroe

• Your mama and daddy told you to watch out for the sack lady when you were playin’ in the woods.
• All your relatives live just a stone’s throw away.
• Instead of using the phone, your mama yelled for you to come on home from your cousin’s house.
• Your mama sent you over to your grandpa’s potato shed to pick out some for supper that night.
• Your feet were black at the end of the day from playin’ outside.
• You would hang old drink cans from part of your clothesline and use them for target practice.
• Your grandma put ketchup on your scrambled eggs when you were a kid, or she crumbled up a biscuit with your eggs and poured coffee on it.

From Wade Euliss, Burlington

• You hunted for duddle bugs by hollering down their hole, “Duddle up! Duddle up!” And they would come up out of their hole to see what the noise was about.
• You hunted for a white worm by sticking a leaf of wild onion down the hole. When the worm started pushing the leaf up, you pulled it out, along with the worm.
• You made a toy tractor out of an empty thread spool, a rubber band, paraffin and a small stick. You wound it and it would go under its own power.
• During the Depression you built a homemade tractor for farming, called a Hoover Tractor, out of a T-Model Ford and an old school bus transmission.

top