Tar Heel Towns
Bv Sarah Friday
Efland
This western Orange County town is more than just
another exit off the interstate.
Mom people know ii as Exit 160
oil inieniiaies 40 and 85 in
Orange County. Bui take the
ramp to Ml. (>illings Road into Elland
and find a rural farm town barely
touched by the whirlwind ol progress
that spins around it.
"bits of people don’t even know it's
here." says Boyd Vestal of the Texaco M-
Mart, which is located right off the exit
ramp. “It’s like Mavbeny."
Elland. like North Carolina's favorite
fictitious town, is small with a population
of around 2.500. "And everylxxly knows
everybody else and not much goes on
here.” Vestal mins.
"Everybody knows what everybody else
is doing,” jokes fellow clerk Catherine
lankford. ringing up some Mello Yellos
and a Snickers bar in the busiest place in
town.
"The Red & White closes early, so we
get a lot ol people coming in." she
explains.
The still unincorporated community
sandwiched between Hillsborough and
Mcbanc in western Orange County has
few other businesses in what people call
"Efland proper," which stretches from
above the Eno River west to Checks
Crossing and Buckhom Road. There's a
BP station and Missy’s Grill down the
road. Then, in town, the post office, a
few mills, an air conditioning company, a
video store and Forrest & Forrest farm
equipment, which is closing this year
alter a century of operation.
Yet that’s just why residents like Pegge
Abrams. Sim Elland and Ben Lloyd love
this quiet whistle-stop, and why many
more families want to move in.
“Cosh, everybody's wanting to move to
Elland now. that's the truth," says Sim
Elland, 78. grandson of the man for
whom the town is named, Madison
Cows: Not an unusual sight in rural Efland.
Lindsay Efland. “People want to get out
of the city — you’d lx* surprised."
Newcomers commuting to jobs in
Chapel Hill, Hillsborough and Durham,
mostly, buy land (when they can find it)
for a taste of life like it used to Ik*.
"I have not been to a community like
this since I was 6 years old," says Abrams,
who grew up near Bakers in Union
County. "1 don’t think they exist any¬
more."
"If you go to the hospital or are out of
work or sick, all kinds of people show up
at your door with food." she adds.
"Everybody still docs things for each
other."
Life still revolves around the church,
too. And Efland has six.
"It’s very common to see three genera¬
tions sitting together in the church,"
Abrams say*. “That’s not just Christmas
and Easier, that's every Sunday."
Besides Sunday services, churches
hold harvest festivals each fall, church
breakfasts, wedding and baby showers,
and bnmswick stews two times a year, says
Frances Forrest, who goes to the
Methodist church in town.
hi between, women go to the Civitan
Club, and the men. to the Ruritan.
Started about nine years ago, the
Ruritan Club remains one of the most
active
* groups in town.
Most of the time, though, Elland is
quiet, except for a few cicadas humming,
cows mooing and a train whistle blowing
now and then.
"Tile reason Efland grew was because
ol the train," says Efland. Tracks laid
around 1828 gave the tiny fanning com¬
munity a lifeline to the east and west, and
new businesses downtown.
"The fish market was right there." says
Efland. (hiring west on Southern Drive.
"That's where you'd get your fish every
Friday, and your fertilizer about halfway
back."
"On the other side of the railroad is
where the station was." he adds, point¬
ing to an empty field on the right.
Farther down and to the left was Julian
Brown's store. "That’s where they sold
ice cream."
The train brought a lot of things to
Efland. but for years it never brought
the mail. Residents still tell stories of the
train snatching the* local mailbag Iroin a
post by the tracks as it sped like light¬
ning through the town.
Around the 1870s. Madison Lindsay
Efland, like a lot of folks, wanted the mail
brought to town. I le petitioned the U.S.
Government for a post office near his
flour mill.
“Everybody went to the mill." Elland
says, "so Madison set up the post office
down there." In return, the story goes,
residents named the Orange County
community for their longtime postmas¬
ter.
The mill, built around 1800 on what is
now Efland-Ccdar Grove Road, was one
of the first industries in town and was on
or near the birthplace of Thomas I Ian
Benton, who later moved to Missouri
and became the first man to serve 30
years in the U.S. Senate. One of the
nation's first excelsior mills followed,
then a number of hosiery mills — some
still in operation. Efland once had a gold
mine, a brickyard, a prep school for
young black women and the state's pilot
kindergarten.
Over the years, businesses came and
went. The highways crossed through.
People moved in. and people moved out.
"Nothing really ever changed Efland."
says Abrams. “And maybe nothing has
really changed Efland now." ^
Sarah Friday is a regular contributor to
The State from Raleigh.
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The Sutf/Novcmbci 1995
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