Tar Heel Towns

Stokesdale, Where City Meets Country

Residents say their town is rapidly changing as the urban sprawl of Greensboro extends toward the farmlands of northwestern Guilford County.

By Ralph Grizzle

I felt conspicuously out of place as I pulled back the glass door to cross the threshold into the 24-hour restaurant known as Family Dining ("Good Food, Home-Style Cooking" reads the sign out front). Not only did all the patrons turn to watch my 6-foot-5-inch frame lumber through the door, but I was the only one (of the men, that is) without a cap.

Shuffling to the nearest table, I took a seat and fingered the menu: eggs with bacon, eggs with sausage, eggs with country ham, eggs and more eggs. The jukebox wailed Travis Tritt's "If I Were A Drinker" (at 9 a.m.!). Pictures of tractor-trailers hung on the paneled walls. I, in my trim turtleneck and tweed jacket, was aware of the real reason I stood out: I wasn't from here, and everyone at the Family Dining restaurant knew it.

Change, Inevitable Change
Welcome to Stokesdale, North Carolina, a place where city meets country, a place where, as my waitress told me, "Everybody knows everybody," a place where a cup of black coffee, a slab of country ham, biscuits and gravy, and two eggs over easy are as common as bagels, cream cheese and cappuccino in, say, such cosmopolitan confines as Charlotte or Chapel Hill.

It's also a place where change doesn't come easy (nearly half of the residents opposed incorporation in 1989), where outsiders are eyed warily until they prove, as many have, that they can be trusted, and where the notion of simple living is the rule rather than the exception. Life in Stokesdale is so unencumbered that, along with neighboring Oak Ridge and Summerfield, it has become an increasingly desirable place for urban Greensboro dwellers to relocate. "Greensboro is spreading in the direction of Summerfield and Oak Ridge rather quickly, and toward the Stokesdale area more and more," says local real estate agent John Eastep.

Will Greensboro's urban sprawl, its strip malls, fast food outlets and shopping centers, migrate north as well, I ask. "The commercial side of the real estate feels like the head count is not here yet," Eastep replies, "but I don't think they've really been out here to see what's going on."

What commercial developers would see if they made the trip north on highways 68 or 220 is a huge market potential. Stokesdale has not only proximity to the major Triad cities but also acres of undeveloped land. The community offers a rural setting against a backdrop of undulating farmlands and the distant Sauratown Mountains. Here, you can almost imagine late summer evenings, rocking on the front porch to the chatter of crickets and cicadas as the sweet smell of tobacco wafts through the star-filled night. Such bucolic images have had such appeal that between 1995 and 1996, the most recent years for which figures are available, the town's population increased by 4%, to 2,357. Discussing the increase in population, Carolyn Joyner, town clerk, tells me: "When I was in high school, the names were all Pegram, Jones and Smith. Now you're hearing names that are different." Reading from the current tax listings, she recites such new names as Agbozo, Bruno and Jurkiewicz.

To help spur growth, particularly industrial growth, the Stokesdale town council is conducting a series of public hearings to decide whether citizens would support a community water system. Supporters say a water system would bring big business. Of course, the flip side is that big business could cause Stokesdale to lose its small-town charm.

The dilemma of whether to change or to leave things as they are has been an issue of continual debate. "When we incorporated, there were so many of our folks who felt like we didn't need change," says Powell Shelton, mayor pro tem and a resident of Stokesdale for 45 years. "A lot of people wanted to leave it in a rural setting. But Stokesdale is changing whether people want it or not. We're not going to stop it because of the growth that's headed this way."

Shelton has a point. Not only is Greensboro reaching outward, but with tobacco reforms, Stokesdale is losing its farm-based economy. Ted Southern, owner of Southern Hardware & Farm Supply, serves only four or five farmers these days, compared to 40 or so a decade back. So what are all those former farmers doing now, I ask Southern. "They're growing houses instead of crops," he replies.

A Long Legacy
Southern Hardware is flanked by a row of buildings, some in need of renovation, that line one side of the main street. The solitary row, the covered sidewalks, its post and railings give Stokesdale an almost Western feel (indeed, people used to hitch horses here, Southern says). Across the street, a new fire station occupies the site of the old train depot, moved in 1977 to Madison, where it was refurbished into a private home.

Inside the Town Hall, I examine a copy of the town seal. It reveals a lot about Stokesdale's past and present. On it, the 21.4 miles of the town's boundaries are outlined. Within the boundaries are four images. One is of a still. Presumably, moonshine was distilled in the area at one time (and may still be, some speculate). Another shows a horse and harrow with farmer in tow. The remaining images are of tobacco, which gave livelihood to Stokesdale for so long, and of a pick and shovel, representing the town's rock quarry.

Below the seal are the words, "1860-Green Pond-1887, Town of Stokesdale, North Carolina" (the town was first called Green Pond, then Pond, then Stokesdale). Above is the date of incorporation and, strangely, "Amor Vincit Omnia," Latin for "Love Conquers All," a phrase popularized after British writer Dora Russell used it for the conclusion of her book "Challenge to the Cold War" (Russell was implying that only love could prevent the destruction of the world from itself).

Joyner hands me a 1956 copy of a newsletter called the "Stokesdale Star." Besides the now defunct Southern Grocery Company's advertisements for Lusianne Coffee at 90 cents a pound are two pages of town laws. Among them: "Whenever a privy, by reason of its location or condition, shall be deemed to be a nuisance by the Mayor, it shall be the duty of the renter or owner or both to remove same upon notice . . . ." (A privy, if your only experience has been with indoor plumbing, is an outhouse.)

There were fines to discourage the use of building materials other than "brick, stone, steel or concrete" on main street. There were fines for people who allowed their horses, buggies or wagons on the sidewalks. They were slapped with a $5 citation, "for each and every offense." It was even a misdemeanor to let your turkeys, geese, chickens, ducks or "other domestic fowls, or cattle of any kind to run at large."

More Tea, Hon?
It was likely the reference to cattle that made me point my car toward 220 and head out to Parker's Restaurant for lunch. Like the town seal, Parker's reveals a lot about the character of Stokesdale. It has been serving diners since 1958.

In front of the tiny, brick building are several pickup trucks. Inside, a burly man sits at the lunch counter. All five booths, less the one I choose, are occupied. No caps, no jukebox here. But all eyes are glued to the TV where a ruddy-cheeked Reba McEntire croons lovingly. Sitting under a framed picture of a NASCAR driver I overhear owner Gail Joyner ask, "Y'all want some more tea?" to which one of the booth's occupants politely declines, "Nah, hon."

Although three or four other people appear to be employed by Parker's, Joyner is doing all the hustling, keeping all the patrons happy with admirable aplomb. She refills tea here, serves a slice of peanut butter pie there, makes change at the register, greets newcomers and sends the satiated off with a good word.

When I told her I was doing a story on the town, she responded by telling me how much she loved living here. "It's the people who make it," she said to me. I asked her how so. She replied: "When our house burnt 10 years ago, the residents pulled together to replace everything, I mean absolutely everything. That wouldn't happen in a big city." Probably not. That's what residents like about living in Stokesdale, North Carolina, a town where everybody knows everybody. At least for now.