June 14, 2013
Among visitors to Edenton during the Little Rascals prosecution was Margaret Leong, a Chapel Hill poet who worked with preschool children. In her book “Magical Child Molestation Trials: Edenton’s Children Accuse” (1993) she recounted this instructive episode:
“Edenton’s citizens (are neither blind nor) deaf – a fact I learned my first morning there, when I slipped on a downtown sidewalk and turned my ankle. In no time at all, several kind people helped me into a taxi. That evening, a mile away in an Italian restaurant, at least three strangers came over to ask how my ankle was.
“Thus I must conclude that the observational skills of the good people of Edenton are on a par with folks in other small towns. And if not one Edentonian saw a hint of even one sex crime out of (the alleged) 450, then perhaps no crimes were committed.”