EASTOVER — No reason for frayed nerves or nail-biting Tuesday evening for Charles McLaurin, the only mayor this community has known.
It was just another election.
Just another day.
“I’ve never put out a campaign poster,” McLaurin, 81, said on election eve. “I’ve never had one printed.”
There’s no need for McLaurin to try and convince anyone he’s the best candidate to preside over the little town east of Fayetteville in what once was called Flea Hill, and where you’ll find sprawling pastures, farmland and a picturesque landscape.
Just about everybody knows Charles McLaurin, and Charles McLaurin knows just about everybody who calls Eastover home. If he tells you he’ll do something, he will. If he tells you he’ll be somewhere, you’ll find him there. You’ll find Charles McLaurin and his wife, Shirley, sitting in the pew on Sunday mornings at Lebanon Baptist Church, and Charles McLaurin teaching a Sunday school class, too.
“I was born and raised here, and I love my community,” McLaurin said. “And I love the people out here. I am blessed.”
‘We keep it simple’
McLaurin has been the Eastover mayor since the town incorporated July 26, 2007. The 7-member town board meets at 7 p.m. on the second Tuesday of each month in the Eastover Community Center on School Street, and you won’t see any political posing and posturing or snipping and sniping or board members trying to one-up each other.
“We keep it simple,” said McLaurin, who is chairman of the Cumberland County Mayors Coalition, which is comprised of mayors from Fayetteville, Eastover, Falcon, Godwin, Hope Mills, Linden, Spring Lake, Stedman, and Wade, and meets quarterly to discuss issues concerning Cumberland County.
Charles McLaurin spent part of his Tuesday morning heading over to the Eastover Central Recreation Center to cast his votes, and then it was back to his brick home near the Eastover water tower.
“The rest of the day I’ll do some busy work around the house,” he said, “and work in my shop behind the house.”
Shirley McLaurin prepared some vittles before heading off to a meeting of the Eastover Volunteer Fire Department, where she serves on the board of directors, and then the couple settled in for a look-see on election returns.
“We used to go to the community building,” Charles McLaurin said. “We don’t do anything now. We just listen to the returns on TV, if they give them on these small municipalities. I’m not gonna lose any sleep over it.”
No need when you don’t have an opponent.
Today, Charles McLaurin is the mayor heading into his 10th term, which McLaurin says will be his last two-year term, and he has no plans to change his mind.
“I don’t want to get too old and get senile,” he said.
He didn’t plan to run this time, but Shirley McLaurin persuaded him.
“He was going to give it up this year,” she said. “I said, ‘No, you need to make it 20 years.”
Charles McLaurin will tell you it’s hard to say no to a wife who bakes the “best chicken pot pie I’ve ever had.”
Epilogue
No political hoopla Tuesday night when the Cumberland County Board of Elections reports from the three Eastover precincts that Charles McLaurin retained his gavel. No victory party with flowing champagne.
“Nothing,” Shirley McLaurin said. “We’ve just done everything every time he got elected. Nothing.”
It was just another election.
Just another day for Charles McLaurin and those good folks along the sprawling pastures, farmland and picturesque landscape of Eastover, and the place they love calling home.
Bill Kirby Jr. can be reached at billkirby49@gmail.com or 910-624-1961.
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