THE ET CETERA CHRONICLES - VOL. 68
FAMOUS PATIENTS - Ila Fordham Brooks, a Wilkinson County native and part time Laurens County resident, led a remarkable life. Among the highlights were her patients as a nurse and the close friends she knew. Brooks was a nurse of Mrs. Walter Reed and General Leonard Wood on his death bed. DCH 5.16.70.
LONG DISTANCE PLEASE! - Dublin’s first telephone company, the Dublin Telephone Company established the first long distance lines to Wrightsville and Sandersville in the early days of 1898. The company immediately began running lines to the nearby communities of Swainsboro, Rixville, and Mt. Vernon. Savannah Morning News, January 8, 1898.
WHAT’S THAT SMELL? - Dublin’s first sewer line was constructed from Monroe Street to the Oconee River in 1897. The pipe was placed twenty feet underground although it ran close to some of the most plentiful artesian wells between the courthouse and the river. And, yes the filth was dumped directly into the river. Savannah Morning News, April 10, 1897.
RELIGION ON THE RISE - What better evidence of Dublin’s meteoric rise during the 1890s was the fact that in 1897, three major denominations, the Episcopalians, the Presbyterians, and the members of the Christian church were constructing handsome new houses of worship. All three congregations still meet. Only the Episcopalians remain in their original 1897 churches. Savannah Morning News, July 21, 1898.
GHOST STORY - John A. Harvill and his wife had just sat down by the fire on a cold December evening in 1882. The newly wed couple were distracted when they heard a noise which sounded like a squeaking old wagon. They ignored the discord as a mere passerby. After a moment, Harvill thinking the continuing commotion to be strange, sprang to his feet and opened his front door. To his utter dismay Harvill observed what appeared to be a very large dog with a torch or lamp attached to the top of its head. He called out thinking that he must have been the brunt of some of a candid camera joke. Of course, television cameras wouldn’t be around for more than five decades. When no reply was received, Harvill did what most terrified men of his day would do, he picked up his gun and shot at it. He shot. He shot again. The dog didn’t move. In the words of a writer of the Dublin Gazette, “there stood the specter as steadfast as the rock of Gibraltar.” Harvill couldn’t believe his eyes. Was he seeing things?
It didn’t take long for the neighbors to come rushing to the scene of the skirmish. Harvill pointed out the apparition to friends, hoping that they would see it as well. Reportedly, they did. The brave generals in the crowd consulted each other and devised a plan of attack. Everyone who could, grabbed a torch and began their advance. As the first wave of the assault reached the ghostly canine, the pooch resumed his squeaking stride into the oblivion of the night. While the reporter for the Gazette was covering the calamity, a neighbor came up to him and confirmed that he had also seen the dog, without the squeak.
HERE COMES A JUDGE ! - Minnie Howell and Charles Jones were deeply in love. They couldn’t wait to get married. They rode into Dublin on a Sunday morning in February 1914. As they drove their buggy through the streets of Dublin, they desperately looked around for a “man in black,” either a minister or judge, both of whom traditionally were donned in a black suit or wearing a black robe. They wanted someone to marry them in quickly. It was then when they spotted the newly elected Judge K.H. Hawkins, judge of the superior court of the Dublin circuit walking to the First Methodist Church for its morning service. The startled judge honored the anxious couple’s request and legally joined their hands in marriage as they sat on the seat of their buggy. Had Minnie and Charles been able to wait until January of the following year, they may have spotted one W.H. Brunson on his way to church. Brunson, who had only been practicing law for three months, easily outpaced a field of older and more well known candidates to win an election to fill the vacancy in the office of Justice of the Peace of the Dublin militia district following the death of Judge Chapman. Brunson, a twenty-two-year-old attorney, was the youngest Justice of the Peace in the state.
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