“I take some liberties with the truth, of course, to make a better story.” ... Tom Byrd

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Lamar, N.C. – A Garden of Eden

 

Lamar, NC, is a community by consensus of its residents, but is not large enough to warrant a road sign saying “Lamar.” It is known legally as Lamar because it has a small post office, with a sign that reads ‘Lamar’ on the entrance door, and so “Lamar” can be defined geographically as being composed of the area where the Lamar post office delivers mail by rural routes.

 

At the end of World War II, there were not many paved roads in the area; only the principal north-south highway was paved.

 

Between 1949 and 1953, a North Carolina governor named Kerr Scott instituted a road paving program that helped to make Lamar a thriving community, so that over the next thirty years, the area grew large enough to support not only the small post office, but three or four country convenience stores, two of which also sold gasoline.

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The true heartbeat of Burly’s store was the continuous spades game that went on in the back of the store in the large display room, attended by players, hang-a-bouts waiting to play, kibitzers, and even on-duty state and county policemen who would play occasionally if they were certain no one likely to report them for dereliction of duty was in the vicinity.

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Comments on Wildman's Death

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In the matter of Wildman, I guess the Lord knows what’s best, and as Roscoe Pullen, indulging his penchant for philosophical pith, said yesterday afternoon when Burly Lewes and I were getting some water at the Welcome Center and bumped into him, “It was just a matter of it bein’ Wildman’s time. The Lord knows what’s best and He has took Wildman to a better place.”

Burly, effecting a very serious look, said, “What can be better than around here?”

Roscoe said, “Prob’ly some parts of Heaven.”

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