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102-year-old known as a giver
by Jule Hubbard
Ada Bell Blevins, who turns 102 today, wasnt even looking for a job when she was hired to manage the Smithey's Goodwill department store cafe on 10th Street, North Wilkesboro, in the late 1950s.
Mrs. Blevins had just entered the store when Smithey's Goodwill Manager Joe Pearson, who knew her and her reputation as a good cook, walked up and told Mrs. Blevins she was in charge of the store's cafe.
"He told me to go in there and go to work. I told him I had no intention of doing that," Mrs. Blevins recalled in an interview. "He just said, 'go in there and serve dinner,'" meaning lunch.
Mrs. Blevins, who spent much of her life doing things to meet the needs of others, gave in that day and worked at the Smithey's Goodwill for 16 years.
Smithey's Goodwill burger
She credited Pearson with "inventing" the famous Smithey's Goodwill burger, but said she added two spices-sage and chili powder-that became part of the recipe.
Mrs. Blevins was sent to the Smithey's stores in Boone, West Jefferson and Taylorsville to show employees there how to make Smithey's Goodwill burgers.
"Selling them for 10 cents each, we probably sold about 500 of them in a day at times" at the store on 10th Street," she said. Soft drinks were 6 cents each.
On weekdays, factory workers and others also often waited in long lines for Mrs. Blevins' stew beef and mashed potatoes.
"At Christmas time (in the late 1950s and 1960s), there would be so many people in the store that we would have to put in extra floor support," she said.
"Once, a man came in and offered $100 for the (Goodwill burger) recipe and I told him I couldn't," added Mrs. Blevins.
She describes the recipe for free now, but some parts remain vague. It included 5 pounds of hamburger meat, two dozen buns torn into small pieces soaked in water (with excess water squeezed out), half a box (about 4 ounces) of chili powder, a small amount of sage "and enough flour to make it stay together." Goodwill burgers were served with mustard and slaw.
Mrs. Blevins' four daughters and three sisters also worked at Smithey's Goodwill. Her sisters were the late Sally Bell Cleary, Dorothy Bell Billings and Edna Bell George. Her brothers were the late Dewey Bell, Claude Bell, Major Bell and Freeman Bell.
Her daughters are Virginia Blevins Bauguess of Kernersville, Iva Lee Blevins Ellis of Mulberry, Vea Blevins of Mulberry and Peggy Blevins Greene of Purlear. She and her husband, the late Lonnie Blevins, also had a son, the late Rufus Blevins.
Childhood memories
Raised near Walnut Grove Baptist Church in the Springfield community of northern Wilkes, Mrs. Blevins was the daughter of the late Bill and Alice Harris Bell. Nearby are two mountains named "Bell" and Bell Branch, reflecting her family's roots.
In her early childhood, Mrs. Blevins lived with her parents and seven siblings in a two-room log house built by Bill Bell and two neighbors. "Pa always got up and built the fire before we got up," she said, recalling cold mornings and snow blowing through cracks in log walls.
The family had a more modern home later.
Bill Bell owned and operated a country store and sometimes made liquor. "He made liquor in the fall for money to buy shoes for us young'uns. In the spring, he made it to buy clothes for us," she said.
"One time, Pa lost his hat when he was running after the law came. They (law enforcement officers) tried to get my sister, Dorothy, to say it was Pa's hat, but she wouldn't."
Mrs. Blevins remembers seeing the muddy streets of downtown North Wilkesboro when she was a child.
"Pa would take two of us kids at a time to town with him when he had a wagon load of tan bark," she said. This was the bark of American chestnut and chestnut oak trees, which was sold to C.C. Smoot & Sons Tannery in North Wilkesboro to tan cowhides for shoe leather.
The Bells stayed overnight in their wagon, pulled by steers and later by horses, at what now is Memorial Park, before returning home the next day. Many others did the same.
She remembers seeing part of a house in her community being washed down a stream in the 1916 flood, when she was 9 years old.
Mrs. Blevins said her earliest memories include playing with childhood friends Izetti Blevins, who married Dewey Owens, and Vallie Blevins, who married Bob Johnson.
They built playhouses out of rocks and moss and attended New Life School, one of Wilkes County's last three one-room schools to be consolidated into larger schools. The other two were Loggins and Harmon schools in Union Township.
Her teachers at New Life included Monroe Blevins, who was Vallie Blevins' brother. "The boys in school had to go to the woods and get wood for the pot bellied stove and go to the spring for water," she said.
Important lessons
Mrs. Blevins said she learned important lessons about helping other people from what her parents and other people in her community did for each other, particularly in times of need.
Men assisted each other in constructing buildings and the larger farm tasks. Women got together for corn shuckings, shared food and helped in other ways.
"They would divide up what they had to give to others, like my mother, who had a big barrel of kraut and would share it with others," said Mrs. Blevins. The Bells attended Walnut Grove Baptist Church.
Mrs. Blevins said she also learned a lot about cooking from her mother, who was known for her fried chicken and cornbread.
Mrs. Blevins grew up about a half mile away from Lonnie Blevins. They dated for eight to nine months before getting married in 1925.
The Rev. Coy Walker conducted the wedding as the couple stood beside their car beneath a large tree in Traphill, while people waited at a church where they were expected to be married. Mrs. Blevins said she couldn't recall why they didn't go to the church.
"We went straight to my husband's daddy's home and moved in," she said. Mrs. Blevins took care of her husband's parents and aunt and her own parents in their later years.
They raised their family and farmed in the same community where they grew up. Mrs. Blevins often helped take care of other children in the community who were in difficult circumstances. This included making clothes for them.
She said the Depression wasn't as hard on them as some others because they produced much of what they needed. Lonnie Blevins, who died in 1963, had a job building the Blue Ridge Parkway in the late 1930s.
Blevins had a store on N.C. 18 North in McGrady, served as a deputy sheriff and was active in Republican politics. They raised chickens for Zollie Eller of Millers Creek, who had a hatchery on 10th Street.
Mrs. Blevins, who has eight grandchildren and numerous great- and great-great-grandchildren, moved to North Wilkesboro later in life and now lives at Avante nursing home in Wilkesboro.
A gathering honoring her for her birthday was held Nov. 21 at Avante. |
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