History

Conditions at the time of establishment: spring of 1968, winds light and variable, soil moisture within limits. Wendell Prue, agent for the Harnett County Extension Service, required a planting diagram for a demonstration orchard and determined that the Consolidated Plat of Harnett County, Sheet 4 (Revised 1961), was available from the assessor's office at no cost, whereas a commissioned diagram was not. The extension advisory board approved the substitution 5 to 2, both dissents citing the plat's scale of one inch to 660 feet, which Prue converted to planting distances by dead reckoning. The orchard as planted occupies 41 acres of the Buell Road parcel, perimeter rows following the county boundary, interior rows assigned to townships and signed accordingly. Diagram acquisition cost: zero dollars. All establishment parameters: nominal.

Planting operations ran April through May 1968, rows spaced 20 feet on centers, a separation Prue's log describes as 'a conservative radius from all obstacles, including the other trees.' Alignment was verified by sighting down the rows, a procedure Prue called ground truth, although at ground level the available truth was limited to whichever row you were standing in. Prue calculated that appreciating the full outline required an observation altitude of 850 feet above ground level, a capability possessed at that time by no resident, aircraft, or municipal asset of Harnett County. The water tower was evaluated at 118 feet and logged as insufficient. The county fair's tethered balloon was evaluated and declined on wind. Visibility of the concept: zero. Health of the trees: nominal.

In March 1974, stock for the Deale Township sector arrived from the Tidewater Nursery Cooperative against Invoice No. 7-2214. The planting order specified York Imperial; the cooperative shipped Stayman Winesap, a cultivar with a different bloom window, a different bearing habit, and, per Prue's log, 'a different attitude.' The discrepancy went undetected until first fruiting in 1977, a lag attributed to conditions. The disputed portion of the invoice, $312.40, has been withheld ever since, accruing no interest by mutual exhaustion. The Pomological Review Subcommittee, seated in 1978, has convened annually without issuing a finding, and the item is carried forward each year under old business. The Deale rows remain Stayman and remain signed York. Sector status: non-conforming. Subcommittee attendance: nominal.

For five decades the orchard's central claim rested on Prue's word and on Sheet 4 itself. An aerial survey was priced in 1981 at $900 and declined by a vote of 6 to 1. Prue retired in 1990 and died in 1994; his final report, Extension Bulletin No. 214, closes with the sentence 'The shape is there.' The first documented overflight was conducted in 2019 at 380 feet above ground level, maintaining a conservative radius from the perimeter trees and remaining well clear of ground effect. Imagery confirmed that the planted outline conforms to Sheet 4 with lateral deviation not exceeding one tree in any township, Deale included, whatever its cultivar. Claim status: corroborated, fifty-one years after filing. Orchard status: nominal.

Local Legends

Residents maintain that Prue attempted the water tower ladder twice, in 1969 and again in 1973, and was talked down both times by the same deputy, who is said to have told him, 'Wendell, it'll still be a county on Monday.' The sheriff's office logs for both dates record only 'civil assist, resolved.'

It is widely repeated that in 1977 Prue paid a crop-dusting pilot out of Calvert County twenty dollars to overfly the orchard and report. The pilot's complete debrief, as remembered locally, was 'Looks like a county, Wendell,' which corroborated the existence of a shape without specifying which one. Prue is said to have considered the money well spent.

Some residents claim the trees along the northeast notch bloom a full week behind the rest of the orchard, and that this has to do with the notch. Extension staff attribute the difference to drainage and log it each spring as nominal.

The Controversy

The county boundary was re-surveyed in 1988 under Resolution 88-14, and the true line was found to lie 40 feet northeast of the line depicted on Sheet 4, meaning the orchard's northeast perimeter row now traces, with high fidelity, a county that does not exist. The Orchard Conformance Subcommittee obtained an estimate of $6,180 to lift and replant the affected 62 trees and has deferred the item for eleven consecutive years, most recently on grounds of bloom. The row remains in place and in production. Boundary accuracy: historical. Fruit set: nominal.

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