|
|
|
1930-1954
Footnotes
A parade and other festivities marked the premiere of the "Carbine Williams" movie at the Colony Theatre in Fayetteville on April 24, 1952. Actor Jimmy Stewart portrayed Williams (pictured), a native of the Godwin area who invented the M-1 carbine rifle.
There were 240 families with the surname Smith listed in the Fayetteville City Directory for 1937.
Sixty-three new businesses started in Fayetteville during 1938.
Raymond O. Stein, a 15-year-old from Fayetteville, was the youngest student in the freshman class at the University of North Carolina in 1930.
Schools and businesses closed early as fans flocked to see Babe Ruth's Boston Braves play the N.C. State college team in an exhibition at Highland Ball Park in April 1935. More than 4,000 fans paid to see Ruth (pictured), whose professional career began in Fayetteville in 1914.
During World War II, three ships bore names associated with Cumberland County.
In 1943, two Liberty Ships were made in Wilmington.
The SS Flora Macdonald was launched at the North Carolina Shipbuilding Co. on Feb. 9, 1943, and was sunk by a German U-boat in the south Atlantic Ocean on May 30, 1943.
The SS Robert Rowan was launched April 13, 1943, with Jean Huske of Fayetteville swinging the traditional champagne bottle. The Rowan was moored off Gela, Sicily, on July 11, 1943. It was full of ammunition for the invading troops. A German bomb hit the Rowan's forward hold, causing an uncontrollable fire. The ship's crew of 421 men evacuated. Twenty minutes later, the Rowan blew up. The explosion was the equivalent of 500 tons of TNT.
The USS James C. Dobbin (pictured), a destroyer tender, was launched in May of 1921. It survived the attack on Pearl Harbor and served in the Pacific Theater until the war's end.
1930 Census
County: 45,219
White: 62 percent
Nonwhite: 38 percent
Fayetteville: 13,049
|
1940 Census
County: 59,320
White: 65 percent
Nonwhite: 35 percent
Fayetteville: 17,428
|
1950 Census
County: 96,006
White: 72 percent
Nonwhite: 28 percent
Fayetteville: 34,605
|
|
|
