Pitt County celebrates 250 years

By Chris Thomas

Staff Writer

Published: Thursday, February 4, 2010

Updated: Thursday, February 4, 2010

Rebecca Hartman | The East Carolinian

Viewers enjoy lookng at one of the three featured exhibits in Joyner Library.

The celebration of Pitt County’s anniversary began at Joyner Library with an art exhibit displaying photos and artifacts from Pitt County’s history.

The exhibition started on the second floor with a display of photographs depicting various moments in Pitt County’s history, including freedom marchers in Bear Grass, the very first Hardee’s (which opened in Greenville in September 1960) and President John F. Kennedy while on the campaign trail, speaking in front of students and staff at what was then East Carolina College.

The display even included copies from a 19th century issue of The Daily Reflector and the quarter used to buy the first subscription. The third and fourth floors included government documents, postcards and photos from Pitt County’s past that gave the viewer a look into the distant past of a city and county that looked dramatically different from present day.

The evening was highlighted by refreshments and short speeches from a few of the people that made the evening’s festivities possible, including assistant professor Christopher Oakley, who said in his speech that he was proud to partake in the project as “a lifelong North Carolinian and an adopted Greenvillian.”

Through the evening’s guest speakers, the attendees learned of Pitt County’s roots, development and the work put into the 250th anniversary project, which got its start a year and a half ago. The county was founded as an extension of Beaufort County in 1760, though it didn’t take full effect until the beginning of the following year.

The keynote speaker for the evening was Roger Kammerer, a Pitt County historian. Kammerer was born in Nebraska but moved to North Carolina as a boy. He attended Swansboro High School, and upon graduation continued his studies at ECU.

In 1984, Kammerer became one of the charter members of Pitt County Family Researchers, a Pitt County genealogical group and has also been a columnist for the Greenville Times on Greenville History.

Kammerer’s lecture was on what he called the consciousness of Pitt County — The Daily Reflector.

“It started out as a small four-page paper … but it was the consciousness of the community … the moral center [for Greenville],” said Kammerer.

According to Kammerer, the paper’s roots can be traced back to the 1880s when paper founders David Jordan and Julian Whichard started the paper in their mother’s school house. In those days, the county had fewer than 1,000 people in it and circulation was less than 700. Despite its humble start, Kammerer said the paper was the eyes, ears and mouth for the county.

“You’d read about people who would come to and from the community: Mrs. so and so came in from Atlanta and stayed for three weeks … The paper would push for things like new street lamps and railroads through the towns … If you had a railroad come through, it was like opening up the world,” said Kammerer.

The exhibit not only had a personal meaning to Pitt County natives and historians, but to ECU students who worked to make it all possible.

One of these students was senior Naomi Gerakios.

“I worked on [the event] for about six hours a week for two or three months. It took a while and I volunteered countless hours,” said Gerakios.

Despite the hard work, Gerakios said it was well worth her time and will be valuable to her future pursuits.

“It’s awesome seeing all this. I’m doing museum studies and it was great to see what goes into research … I want to be a curator and all this will definitely help out,” said Gerakios.

This writer can be contacted at news@theeastcarolinian.com.