Eastern North Carolina Encyclopedia/Halifax County's Call
HALIFAX COUNTY'S CALL
Through Force of Facts, Facilities, Advantages and Accomplishments
From its low lying bottom lands along the banks of the Roanoke to the hills and highlands of the northern portion, Halifax County abounds in opportunities awaiting development.
RICH IN HISTORICAL INTEREST
Though rich in historical interest, being the proud possessor of the site of the first state capital, where the first state constitution was written, and from the days of the Revolution until the time of the Reconstruction following the War Between the States, dotted with the homes and broad acres of the aristocracy of the old South, it has imbibed and grasped the spirit of modern progress until today it ranks among the first counties in the State in material wealth, school facilities, and good roads.
WATERPOWER
Traversed along its northern border by the waters of the mighty and noble Roanoke, an abundance of waterpower is available, which, while it has been developed to some extent and furnishes electric power to drive the wheels of industry in that bustling little city of Roanoke Rapids-Rosemary, where are located the largest damask mills in the world, and other mills that turn out the finished product produced from the cotton grown within sight of its looms, yet offers an opportunity for enormous future development.
NO LARGE CITIES
Halifax County boasts of no large city, but in Littleton, Roanoke Rapids-Rosemary, Weldon, Halifax, Enfield, Hobgood and Scotland Neck it has progressive trading centers which provide every modern facility for marketing the products of the splendid farms which abound throughout the length and breadth of the county. Each of these towns, with the exception of two, provide employment for large numbers in their knitting mills and other mills manufacturing cotton products.
TRANSPORTATION FACILITIES
Adequate transportation facilities are provided by trunk lines of the Atlantic Coast Line and the Seaboard Air Line Railroads.
GEOGRAPHY
Halifax County is situated partly in the Coastal Plain and partly in the Piedmont Plateau. It has an area of 676 square miles or 432,640 acres. In the vicinity of Weldon, Littleton, and Roanoke Rapids the country is rolling to hilly, while in the south end of the county around Scotland Neck and Hobgood the country is less rolling to flat with gentle slopes toward the bottom lands. The general slope of the county is toward the southeast. According to the records of the Atlantic Coast Line Railroad, Hobgood is 88 feet above sea level, Scotland Neck 96 feet, Halifax 101 feet, and Enfield 99 feet. Points in the western part of the county reach an elevation of 400 feet.
SOILS AND SEASONS
The climate and soils of Halifax County are well suited to a wide range of general farm products. The winters are short and comparatively mild; the summers long but not excessively hot. The mean annual rainfall is 47.22 inches and the mean annual temperature is 59.8 degrees F. There is a normal growing season of 195 days which is sufficiently long for all ordinary crops. Based on such facts as the above, it is only natural that Halifax County should be one of the best agricultural counties in North Carolina.
FARMING
Diversified farming is the chief occupation of the majority of its more than 40,000 inhabitants. Tobacco, cotton, peanuts, corn, soy beans and sweet potatoes comprise the principal growing crops, with yields per acre which are surpassed by no section of the South, while hogs, sheep, cattle, and poultry are prominent in the live stock activities of the farms. Halifax County has the highest average acreage yield of lint cotton in the South. Two agricultural agents are employed by the county to look after its diversified agricultural program.
SHEEP AND POULTRY
During the past year sheep and poultry raising has become quite an industry; scores of farmers throughout the country having become successfully interested in this branch of industry, which is a part of the program which is being pushed to meet the situation which will be brought about by the advent of the boll weevil. The progress in these two industries has surpassed even the fondest hopes of the originators, and they bid fair to become a large economic factor in the county in the next few years.
HALIFAX COUNTY ANTICIPATES BOLL WEEVIL
As an evidence of the progressive spirit which animates the citizens of this section, Halifax County is the first one in the South which has begun the fight against the boll weevil well in advance of its advent. Other sections have waited until they have become devastated and bankrupt before beginning to fight. Not so with Halifax. Two years before the pest was due it began its fight for a diversified system of agriculture, and a "live-at-home" program, and now in the face of immediate entry of the event which has tried the souls of other sections, it is ready for the fight and will win because it is prepared.
SCHOOLS
Halifax County is justly proud of its schools, as much as a half million dollars being invested in one high school building alone. But it is not so much in the schools which are provided in the progressive towns of the county that it takes pride, but in the consolidated schools which dot the county from end to end. The old one-teacher crossroads school has given way to eight handsome district schools where the children are assembled daily by means of motor trucks over excellent roads.
The property valuation of the rural schools of the county is placed at about $175,000.00, providing modern school buildings and facilities to meet the needs and requirements of around 2,200 pupils.
ROADS
Education and good roads go hand in hand. Long before the State as a whole inaugurated its comprehensive program of road building, Halifax County had issued serial bonds and built its own roads and today, in addition to the road mileage which has been taken over by the State and maintained by them, the county has its own road building organization headed by an experienced civil engineer and road builder, and its collateral and county roads, which connect with the State highway system, are a credit to any section.
BANKS
An indication of the progress which the county of Halifax has made in a material way it may be stated that twenty-five years ago there were three banks in the county with total resources of $145,185.10, while today there are fourteen banks with resources of $7,111,729.99.
INVITATION AND WELCOME
In the light of the above facts, facilities, advantages, and accomplishments Halifax County extends an invitation to any who may be seeking opportunity in a land greatly favored by a benign Providence.
WRITE
REGISTER OF DEEDS
HALIFAX, N. C.
