Lewis Shore Brumfield December 14, 1933 – February 01, 2019 Share this obituary View/Sign Guest Book Lewis Shore Brumfield, 85, of Yadkinville, NC, passed away of natural causes on Friday, February 1, 2019 at SECU Hospice Home of Yadkin. He was one of North Carolina’s leading folk historians. He was interested in the people, places, and events that made local, state, and national history, and published books about them.
He was known locally for pedaling his bicycle along public roads, where he stopped to study interesting places. Lewis was born December 14, 1933, in Statesville, NC, the second child of Lewis Floyd Brumfield of Louisiana and Ethel (Shore) Brumfield of Yadkinville. He was raised in Yadkinville in a historic home built by his maternal grandfather, John Benjamin Shore.
Their first child, Alice Mae Brumfield (1929-2005), compiled a history of the Shore family of South Deep Creek, Yadkin County. His father was the first agricultural extension agent for Yadkin County. His mother, “Miss Ethel”, taught English and Latin at Yadkinville High School.
Lewis showed an early aptitude for music. He studied piano under Miss Kate Dobbins of Yadkinville. He said that “Miss Kate” taught him to play with feeling, instead of just the notes on the page.
Among his lifelong friends in Yadkinville was Gene Wagoner, a school classmate, fellow musician, and teacher of public school music. Lewis was a lifelong member of Yadkinville First Baptist Church, where he sang in the choir. Later he served as the rehearsal pianist for the UNC School of the Arts, 1971-1983.
He loved to play bridge with his friends in Yadkin County and Winston-Salem. In 1951 he graduated from Yadkinville High School, where he composed the school song, “Dear Old Yadkinville High”. In 1956 he was a high honor graduate in English from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, where he took a leading role in campus politics.
During his college summers, he assisted Lon West, Yadkin County Clerk of Court, where he increased his knowledge of local history and the people who made it happen. After college, he enrolled in the law school at Duke University, but did not complete his degree. When he attended the 50th anniversary of his graduation from Carolina, Gene Wagoner and he often attended succeeding reunions.
After college graduation, Lewis served four years in the United States Navy as a lieutenant (see photograph). One of his jobs was to navigate ships in and out of the harbor at the Norfolk Navy Yard. After his tour in the Navy, Lewis spent time in Florida and New York’s Greenwich Village, where he wrote some salacious novels under the pen-name, Tom Lockwood.
In New York, Lewis played the piano in local restaurants, where singers of Broadway plays gathered after their shows. For two years, Lewis worked with the Social Security Administration in Hopkinsville, KY. Upon his return to Yadkinville, he became part of the Yadkin County Historical Society, where he worked with local historians Frances (Harding) Casstevens, Dr. Allen Paul Speer, Julia Ann (Spillman) Koontz, Andrew L. Mackie, and others.
Justice Richmond Pearson and His Students at Richmond Hill, 1848-1873, two volumes Yadkin County Graduates of the University of North Carolina, 1795-1995 Virginia Drive: East Main Street of Old Yadkinville Neighbors of West Main Street, Yadkinville, 2 volumes. As a family historian and genealogist, he compiled these books: Timothy Williams Folks Wouldn’t You Like to Have Known Them: Shallow Ford Families The Thomas L. Clingman family The Perfect Couple: Archie and Louise (Haywood) Davis He helped George Hudspeth compile books on the Hudspeth, Brandon families and a memoir of growing up in Yadkinville Hiram Taylor family He was a consultant on The Lanier and Williams Families of Panther Creek. As an architectural historian, he helped research and compiled Historical Architecture of Yadkin County, North Carolina (1987).
Sometimes the words in his books reminded readers about seeing local history from the seat of Lewis on his bicycle. He rode his bicycle from Yadkinville to and from places like Myrtle Beach, Statesville, Winston-Salem, and Roaring Gap. He often took the backroads and stayed with friends.
He picked wild fruits in the woods for his meals and bathed in local streams. He loved to ride his bicycle past buildings with interesting architecture and stop to study them. He also wrote articles for The Daily Tar Heel (Chapel Hill) The Yadkin Ripple (Yadkinville) and The Winston-Salem Journal.
Lewis was a member of the Yadkin Valley Chapter, North Carolina Society of the Sons of the American Revolution. He helped new men and women trace their ancestry, so that they could join their own Patriotic societies. He even helped complete nominations for membership in the Society of the Cincinnati.
He was considered an eccentric by people who did not know him. To the people who did, he was a superb conversationalist, who showed an amazing memory of the people, places, and events of times past. These memories stayed with him until he died.
Local historians are glad that he put most of his research into print. He will be missed. He is survived by cousins Helen (Cox) Shore and her daughter, Ann Marie (Cox) Farthing, of Sedge Garden, Forsyth County, and Benjamin Shore (Lucinda) of Yadkinville, and his father’s second family in Louisiana.
In addition to his family, Lewis is survived by close friends and colleagues in the Yadkin County Historical Society. A Celebration of Life will be held at 3:00PM, Saturday, February 9, 2019 at Gentry Family Chapel in Yadkinville with Dr. Bill Johnson officiating. Burial will follow at Deep Creek Baptist Church cemetery.
Lewis will be buried with his Shore ancestors at Deep Creek Baptist Church, Old Sage Road, Yadkinville, NC. In lieu of flowers, memorials may be sent to the Yadkin County Historical Society, PO Box 1250, Yadkinville, NC 27055, or to the organization of one’s choice. The estate of Lewis is grateful for the support of Yadkin County Department of Social Services and their staff; Yadkin County Clerk of Court and her staff; Yadkinville Police Department and their staff; the assisted living on Burke Mill Road, Carillon Assisted Living and Memory Care of Clemmons, and Mountain Valley Hospice of Yadkinville.
The Yadkin County Historical Society requests that people who knew Lewis send their stories, memories, photographs, or donations to the Yadkin County Historical Society, PO Box 1250, Yadkinville, NC 27055. Gentry Family Funeral Service in Yadkinville is serving the Brumfield family.
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