Preface

This story sounds like it comes from one of Rod Serling’s Twilight
Zone television shows.  In fact, I did borrow one idea from his
Twilight Zone episode called “Willoughby.”  Most of the background
information for this story is factual.      




                            Chapter One - Background

This story starts out in Greensboro, North Carolina, during August of
2007.  Now that I am retired, I find I have more moments to reminisce
about old times and the way I made many of the things in my life happen the way I wanted them to happen.  However, sometimes things just don’ t work out the way you plan.  I remember vividly how my father moved his family from Rockingham to Gastonia in June of 1954.  It certainly changed my life.  At first, things didn’t go as well for us in Gastonia as it had in Rockingham.  My father’s health developed into a problem, and it became a struggle just to make the house payment and have food on the table.  My three older siblings helped with the family’s finances with part- time jobs while they were in high school and for several years afterwards.  By the time I graduated from high school in 1960, things had settled down a little.  I headed out to State College (now NC State University) down in Raleigh.  I had some student loans and a few grants- in-aid to help with about one-half the expense, but I had to work both during the summer and during the school year to finance the remaining portion.  The college estimated the expense for two semesters to be $1,750; however, I was able to accomplish this with about $1,100.  

Obviously, in order to achieve this, I had to trim some expenses.  One
expense I easily trimmed was the cost of commuting back and forth
home every several weeks.  When I went home, I would go out to
Western Boulevard (in Raleigh), which was also US 64.  I then
hitchhiked my way to Gastonia.  I could usually make this 155-mile trip
in about four hours, which is about the same time I could have driven it
myself if I had had a car.  Obviously, my budget had no room for an
automobile at that time.

There were not many interstate highways back then, except for a little
section around Charlotte and from Greensboro to Durham.  A good
hitchhiker doesn’t like the Interstates anyhow, as they make hitchhiking
more difficult.  The three Golden Rules for a hitchhiker are: (1) Stand
where people can see you and have time to evaluate you,   (2) Make sure
the driver has a good place to pull off the road as he stops for you, and
(3) Be very presentable (look like a struggling college student).

If you got a ride and things were not just right, you would ask the driver
to let you out at the next suitable spot.  One time I got a ride with three
men who were drinking.  I stayed with them for only a couple miles
when I asked the driver to let me out at this upcoming intersection.  
Most of the people who picked me up were upstanding traveling
salesmen.  On a real lucky day I would get a ride all the way from Raleigh to Charlotte.          

By the time I graduated after summer school in 1965, I would have
hitchhiked back and forth at least one hundred times.  I usually took my
laundry with me in an old suitcase with a big red NC State logo (a big “S”
with a pack of wolves guarding it and a small ”N” and a small “C” inside
the curves of the big “S”) stuck to the outside.  Sometimes my mother
would do my laundry for me when I was home if she had time.  In
addition, the time at home was an opportunity to get some good food for
a change.  The food at the college cafeteria was okay but certainly not
outstanding.  It was cheap, and that is what was important from my
point-of-view.

My trek started out on US 64, which took me through Cary, Apex,
Pittsboro, and Asheboro.  At Asheboro, I changed to Highway 49 to
Charlotte.  From Charlotte I took US 29 on to Gastonia.  Highway US 29
was interspersed with connections to Interstate 85 in the Charlotte
area.  Back then the highways (except for the new interstates) went right
through the center of town just like US # 1 and Highway # 74 went right
through the center of Rockingham.  They didn’t start building bypasses
until the late 1950’s.  In particular, I went right through what is now the
historical district of Cary.  Cary wasn’t that big in those days.  Later, as
one of the bedrooms of Raleigh, it became much larger.  Back then, as
you left Raleigh on US 64 you had to cross US 1 as it headed south
toward Sanford.  About halfway between the US 1 intersection and Cary,
there was a fork in the road.  I always wondered where that fork went.  It
looked so beautiful and peaceful down that road.  There were no road
signs telling you where that road went, nor could I see a name for it.  

Sometimes when I was hitchhiking, people would let me out in terrible
places as they turned into some obscure side road, way out in the middle
of nowhere.  I got so I would always ask the driver how far he was going
when I first got into his car.  If that turned out to be a bad place, I would
get him to let me out earlier at a place more suitable for catching the
next ride.  As I mentioned earlier, the most important rule for being a
hitchhiker back then was to look clean-cut.  People wouldn’t pick you up
if you were not cleanly shaven and neat looking.  The large Wolf pack
logo pasted on my suitcase seemed to help a lot.  I assume it made me
look like a clean-cut college student, which I was.  Once I tried
hitchhiking without the logo.  That was a bad idea.  After that, I always
took my suitcase with the logo even if it were empty.  By the way, I don’t
recommend picking up hitchhikers mostly because of the current drug
problem.      

Sitting in my study at home in Greensboro, my mind kept going back to
that fork in the road just before you get to Cary on what is now business
US 64.  I never saw a car go down or come out of that side road in all the
two hundred times (one hundred round trip) I went that way.  Back
then, it was out in the middle of nowhere.  I couldn’t find it on Map
Quest on the Internet.  I know the price of gasoline is high these days,
but I decided I should just get in my car and drive down to Cary and find
that old fork in the road if indeed it were still there.  That’s one of the
nice things about retirement; you can do things on the spur of the
moment sometimes. You certainly have a lot of extra time on your
hands.  I filled my car with gasoline at what I thought was a cheap gas
station.  Then on early Tuesday morning of last week, I hugged my wife
goodbye, and told her I would be back before dark.  She told me that she
couldn’t go with me that day but hoped I had a good time.  I hadn’t slept
well the night before because I was thinking about this upcoming trip,
but I wasn’t going to let that stop me.  I had wanted to do this for many,
many years.  There’s nothing like a little caffeine to get you going early in the morning.


To be continued....