Davie County Mavericks: Four Men Who Changed History

Davie County, in the forks of the Yadkin River, produced several sons who climbed to national prominence. Daniel Boone learned to hunt along Bear Creek before blazing trails through the Appalachian Mountains. Hinton Helper grew up on the same piece of land, in a slave-owning family, before writing one of the defining antislavery books of the antebellum era. Peter Ney arrived in Davie County after escaping the Napoleonic Wars and influenced a generation of children as a schoolteacher. Thomas Ferebee left Davie County for a career in the army and secured a place in history when he pulled the handle to release the first bomb of the atomic age. Historian Marcia Phillips narrates the stories of these men and the dreams that were born in Davie County.

Marcia Dollar Phillips, an educator for thirty-five years, currently serves as museum educator at Old Salem. She holds a master's in historic preservation from Eastern Michigan University.