N.C. remembers the 1850s heyday of ‘plank road era’

In the 1850s, North Carolina’s new Fayetteville and Western Plank Road intersected with the new North Carolina Railroad in Guilford County.

This “crossroads” was the highest point on the railroad line, which stretched between Goldsboro and Charlotte, thus inspiring the name of the new town. High Point was chartered on May 26, 1859. The former plank road is now the city’s Main Street.

The “Plank Road Foreman” is a bronze statue that was sculpted by High Point native son David Astor Dowdy Jr. The art, which is positioned on the patio of the community’s historic train depot, was dedicated in 2004.

 

Dowdy was viewed as High Point’s “Renaissance man.” The narrative from his obituary in 2019 stated: “Throughout his life, he embraced art, music, travel, science and technology and successfully pursued these interests through a myriad of hobbies” that included collecting ancient Jewish coins, developing daylily hybrids, astronomy, breeding Great Danes and repairing antique clocks.

 

Dowdy graduated from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in 1954, earning a degree in pharmacy. Dowdy and his brother, James Henry Dowdy, helped their father David Astor Dowdy Sr. found and grow a chain of drug stores known as Mann Drug Company. 

Numbering at one time 27 stores throughout the Piedmont, Mann Drug was sold to Rite Aid in 1982. David Dowdy Jr. was nearly 50 when he began to sculpt; he was completely self-taught. Most of his work was commissioned by individuals, corporations, churches and universities. 

He and his wife, Doris Ann Boone Dowdy, especially enjoyed spending time at Pine Knoll Shores in Carteret County, “where they sailed, played tennis and studied horticulture and art for hours on the shore.” 

There’s another episode from North Carolina history where the plank road “crossed paths” with the railroad. 

One of the principal financiers of the Fayetteville and Western Plank Road Company was Jonathan Worth, a wealthy attorney from Randolph County. He also served four years as the company’s general superintendent. Worth was a rising star in North Carolina politics as well.

 

Jonathan Worth

Dr. Richard L. Zuber, a professor emeritus of history at Wake Forest University, said Worth studied law under the eminent judge Archibald DeBow Murphey, who was deemed the “Father of Education” in North Carolina.

 

While serving in the state senate in 1840, Worth wrote the law that established the basic structure of the state’s antebellum public school system. He then served almost two decades as Randolph County’s superintendent of schools, Dr. Zuber said.   

“In 1858 Worth returned again to the state senate, spending most of his time in an unseemly squabble over the operation of the North Carolina Railroad.” 

At this point, Charles Frederick Fisher was running the railroad. Author Dorothy Fremont Grant said Fisher was elected a state senator from Rowan County in 1854. “The following year, even though by experience he was not qualified, he was elected president of the North Carolina Railroad, succeeding former Gov. John Motley Morehead.”

Charles Fisher

 

“Three years later, while still president, Fisher was the contractor for the extension of the railroad to Morganton. His management caused so much criticism that Jonathan Worth organized and headed an investigative committee. When Fisher forcefully protested the committee’s report, Chairman Worth found his rebuttal ‘insolent and insulting.’” 

“Worth was relentless; he continued to attack Fisher in the press and in public speeches,” Grant said. 

Fisher (about age 42) responded by challenging Worth (about age 58) to a duel. The Worth family historian duly noted that cousin Jonathan “wisely declined.” 

Both men would continue to make North Carolina history.