Local News - January 2004

4-H members relive Chicago trip 40 years past

By SARAH GRANO, Staff Writer

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Over 40 years ago, eight teenagers from rural Lincoln County traveled to Chicago in hopes of winning the national 4-H championship.

On Saturday, the four surviving members of the team came together to reminisce about Kentucky Derby horses, stolen overcoats and the moment they lost the competition.

“I still remember dropping the ball on the potatoes,” said Louis Reep, one of the club’s members. “I won’t ever forget it.”

No one else remembered Reep’s mistake, but they did remember other parts of the ten-day trip that took them out of the state for the first time.

“A bunch of hillbillies went up North,” said Inez Beam, one of the club’s members. “Raleigh was the furthest away we’d ever been.”

The Lincoln County Historical Association video taped the conversation the four members had with Martin Eaddy, the president of Lincoln County’s Rotary Club.

The former 4-H Club members wanted to thank the Rotary Club for raising money to send them on the trip.

“Had it not been for the Rotary, we would not have made it to Chicago,” Reep said.

The teenagers had already won the state championship, which took place in Raleigh.

Chicago proved to be a much bigger adventure. The eight teenagers rode up to Illinois in two cars.

“It struggled up the hill,” said John Parker, remembering the car he traveled in.

On the way there, they stopped at a horse farm in Kentucky and saw race horses that had won the Kentucky Derby.

They also had their overcoats stolen out of their car. Luckily, the Highway Patrol was immediately on the case.

After finding the girls’ coats, which the thief had tossed out his car’s window, the culprit was found, and the boys’ coats recovered.

Once they arrived in Chicago, the teenagers heard big band music for the first time. The farms they lived on didn’t have electricity, and the only music they listened to originated from the Grand Old Opry.

“In those days radios were few and far between,” Reep said. 

In Chicago they learned that “opry” music and “opera” music were two separate things.

At the competition the team showed their farming skills by identifying diseases in produce and determining seed quality.

The Lincoln County Historical Association collected memorabilia from the trip, and the members looked through it while recalling the experience.

“I haven’t seen this for 40 years,” said Mabel Sain.

The women looked at old pictures of themselves at the championship banquet wearing hand-me-down prom dresses as evening gowns.

“It’s great y’all saved this stuff,” Eaddy said. “I’m sure it survived many a spring cleaning.”

Now the group’s memories will be preserved as part of Lincoln County’s history.

All four survivors still live near Lincoln County, except for Reep who now lives in South Carolina.

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Staff Writer Sarah Grano can be reached at 704-735-3031 or sgrano@ltnews.com

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© 2001 Lincoln Times-News  

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