Mildred Wells

Old-timers call her Mildred, but her newer friends and her license plate proclaims her as Millie.

Whatever you choose to call her Mildred (or Millie) Waddell-Wells, the lady, now in her early 70s, is a tireless, upbeat worker for her native community of West Southern Pines and for FirstHealth at Moore Regional Hospital.

Wells is the founder of the Black Arts Festival, revived in 1999 in memory of former Southern Pines Mayor Emanuel Douglass.
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Mildred Wells also volunteers at the hospital in Pinehurst one day a week, acting as a receptionist for the surgical patients' families.

"Mildred is very special, in that she gives 100 percent doing things to help people," says her friend and neighbor, Jean Capel.
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Mildred was the oldest girl in her family.As such, she was expected to be her mother's housekeeping and kitchen assistant.

Two younger sisters weren't expected to do as much, she says - especially the "knee baby."The three boys weren't allowed in the kitchen, so it all fell on Mildred and her mother.Mildred wouldn't dream of trying to disobey her mother, so she grew up doing a lot of cooking and other responsibilities that traditionally fell on the oldest female, although she wasn't always crazy about it.

Her parents believed in education and gave all of their six children a chance to go to college.

"The old saying from my parents was, ‘you go to some school or work.'" She says."Being the girl that I was, I hurried up and found a school to go to."

Mildred was accepted at Hampton University in Virginia.All of her parents' six children had a chance to go to college, but she couldn't stay there because her mother didn't want her living off campus.The only students allowed to live in a college dormitory were nursing students.

"I couldn't stand the sight of blood," she says.So she had to return home, then entered beauty college.

After Mildred graduated from West Southern Pines High School in 1948 (it was all-black in those segregated days), she found the pay at a beauty shop too low.She traveled to New York and worked there, finding the city exciting.

"But I still loved my home in West Southern Pines," she says.

Married in 1953

Her cousins Christine and Olivia Waddell introduced her to her future husband, Joe Waddell, when Mildred returned home for a brief visit.
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Every year, Mildred arranges for the Triple Nickels to stage a jump at the Black Arts Festival.
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Mildred converted to Catholicism, taking her instruction at what was then Our Lady of Victory Catholic Church on West Pennsylvania Avenue.
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Her mother approved her conversion, since they were going to be married, Mildred says.

The couple began to raise a family in Queens, N.Y., where he worked as a police officer after discharge from the Army in 1954.
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Mildred helped her husband in his efforts to continue his education.He earned a bachelor of science degree, cum laude, and she raised their children, Joyce, Marcus, and Martin.During the years in New York, she found time to attend business school and began working for a bank, where eventually she was promoted to loan officer.

"I did most of Joe's writing of his papers," during the early years, she says."He had to work and take care of the family.He studied for the police test and I taught the children their ABCs."

All their children were enrolled in Catholic school through the eighth grade.Mildred volunteered at their schools and led a Girl Scout troop for 15 years.When they grew up and were ready for college, all three wanted to attend black colleges in the South.They wanted to go to school and make friends among people of their own race, she says.

One of their favorite pastimes was travel.She and her husband visited entertainment spots in all the big cities in America.

Mildred worked her way up from teller at Citibank in New York to head teller, then began to train other tellers.She was eventually promoted to loan officer.The bank wanted her to earn her bachelor's degree, but about that time she decided she would retire because her husband's retirement was coming up.

"I wanted to be free to share in Joe's retirement," she says.

She and her husband worked part-time and spent the rest of their time traveling.
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In 1999, Mildred was asked to revive the Black Arts Festival, which had been a hallmark for former Mayor Emanuel Douglass, Southern Pines' first black mayor.
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"I'm glad I came back," Mildred says.

But things aren't quite the same in West Southern Pines as they were when she was growing up and finishing high school in 1948.

"It was a beautiful place when I left here," she says."Everybody would keep up their property.If somebody was sick or too old, when we were kids we were told to go rake their yard for them."

Mildred is working hard along with others to revive the community spirit that the longtime residents remember from 50 and 60 years ago.

Along the way, she also spearheaded a cemetery beautification drive for the community burial place behind what is now Southern Pines Primary School.She's also been named Outstanding Volunteer by the Civic Club and Volunteer of the Year by the Southern Pines Recreation Department for 2002.And that's just here.She had even more volunteer awards in New York.

She likes to visit her daughter in Stone Mountain, Ga., and enjoys her grandchildren.One of her sons, Martin, lives in Aberdeen, and his grandson stays with her.

And she still loves to travel.

"I want to go back to Israel at the first opportunity," she says.