Nov. 19
100 Years ago – 1924
Moore’s Interstate Bus Line took passengers from Martinsville to Winston-Salem: At 11 a.m., to Ridgeway, arriving at 11:20 a.m., 30 cents; To Price, N.C., at 11:30 a.m., 50 cents; to Stoneville, 11:45 a.m., 70 cents; to Mayodan, noon, 90 cents; to Madison, 12:10 p.m., $1; to Walkertown, 12:50 p.m., $1.80; to Winston-Salem, 1:15 p.m., $2.15. The same route also ran in the evening, and also in reverse, from Winston-Salem to Martinsville.
75 years ago – 1949
Pinckney G. Davis had one heck of a 96th birthday celebration: he went to the dentist for the first time in his life, and he had several teeth pulled, two days in advance of his birthday. He spent his birthday quietly, with a few fewer teeth, at his home with his son and daughter-in-law, Mr. and Mrs. Charles Davis of U.S. 220 a short distance south of the city limits. He was born on Nov. 21, 1853, in his family home in Oak Level. He married Lucy Ann Jones in 1881, and the couple moved to Martinsville in 1916. Four of their five children were still living: Charles H. Davis, J. Ben Davis, Mrs. Jesse S. Draper and Mrs. John Dyer Draper. Pinckney Davis was believed to be the oldest living person in the area.
1960
Judd Schreibfeder, 20, of 837 Hundley St., and a junior drama major at RPI in Richmond, was invited to join Bob Perterfield’s Barter Theater’s touring company’s production of “The Golden Fleecing” in Virginia, West Virginia and North Carolina, through December. He had played several parts in Martinsville High School shows. He would go on to California and be on television, under the name Judd Laurance. By the 1970s he was on “The Dating Game,” “The Incredible Hulk,” “Ironside” and various TV commercials. He and Chuck Lorre went on to create popular television shows including “Cybil” and “Grace Under Fire,” and he worked on the creation of “Roseanne.” His father was the manager of the Standard Garment factory in Martinsville.
50 years ago – 1974
If you joined the Christmas Club at Piedmont Trust Bank, you’d get four ironstone stack mugs for free. There were choices for the 50 weekly payments, ranging from 50 cents a week to save $25 to $10 a week to save $500.
25 years ago - 1999
Clarence Monday was Martinsville’s fire marshal, and Rodney Howell was the fire marshal for Henry County.
Martinsville Uptown Revitalization Association and Gateway Streetscape sold wreaths and swags for holiday decorating.
— Information from museum records and the Henry Bulletin and the Martinsville Bulletin.