Yelton disapproves of suburbanization of her town
Yelton, who does not approve of the suburbanization that has occurred around her, remembers what her town used to be.
Citing this Excerpt
Oral History Interview with Mareda Sigmon Cobb and Carrie Sigmon Yelton, June 16 and 18, 1979. Interview H-0115. Southern Oral History Program Collection (#4007) in the Southern Oral History Program Collection, Southern Historical Collection, Wilson Library, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
Full Text of the Excerpt
- CARRIE SIGMON YELTON:
-
I'm just kind of disappointed in our town, though.
- JACQUELYN HALL:
-
Why is that?
- CARRIE SIGMON YELTON:
-
Because the town is... So many stores is going to these malls.
I've heard that several stores are coming back. I just hope our town can
be built back up. Because I think the way they've got the common fixed
is beautiful. But it's just like a ghost town when you go down there. I
just don't know. I always loved to go to town, and it just kind of
disappoints me the way it's gone down. But these shopping centers is a
problem(). It's not only our town; it's other
towns. Now up here at Lenoir, their town is getting like ours, moving
out to shopping centers.
- JACQUELYN HALL:
-
Where do you do your shopping?
- CARRIE SIGMON YELTON:
-
Mostly at the shopping centers.
[Laughter]
But sometimes I go downtown. But it's just not too many stores
down there to shop at. We used to have cafes down there. We have two
theaters down there now, but we did have three more; we did have five,
and three of them they did away with. But I just hope... I
heard that Montgomery Ward might come back in the
Sears building. Now I like that store; I've traded lots at that store
when it was downtown.
- JACQUELYN HALL:
-
How else has the town changed from when you were growing up?
- CARRIE SIGMON YELTON:
-
The common sure has changed, because back in my young days they called it
"Lover's Lane," and lots of cars would just go down
there and meet and ride around and around and around.
[Laughter]
I met this woman the other day, and she said that she used to do
that, too, when they were young. Get five or six in a car and just go
down and just have a good time. And now they've changed it. And there
was the depot. You could get on the train right at the depot. Now it's
made into a cafe.
[Laughter]
- JACQUELYN HALL:
-
Oh, right. We went down there yesterday.
- CARRIE SIGMON YELTON:
-
I want to go in. I never have been in it. They say it's kind of
old-timey. Is it?
- JACQUELYN HALL:
-
Yes. We just had a bowl of chile, which was real good and not too
expensive.
- CARRIE SIGMON YELTON:
-
We've been talking about going in there one of these days. I just want to
go in and see, because I've seen it so much as a depot.
- JACQUELYN HALL:
-
It's very different.