WWII Vet Turns 100 On Nation’s 250th Birthday

By Emily Weaver
Daily Record of Dunn

DUNN, N.C. – Sherrill Allen Pope is turning 100 years old on the day America will celebrate its 250th anniversary July 4 and his family has big plans. A special honor is set for Pope at the Dunn Area History Museum on Saturday morning to be followed by a big family party before Pope basks under the glow of countless fireworks set to adorn the nation’s sky that night.

“We have a really big family, so lots of kids, grandkids and great grankids and the whole works,” Andrew Pope said of the planned birthday party for his father.

“He is very excited,” he added. “He’s still super cognitive. He’s got it together. He’s not your average 100-year-old for sure.”

Sherrill Pope stood at the front of Dunn’s City Council chambers June 23, assisted only by a cane, as he listened to a special proclamation from Dunn Mayor William P. Elmore Jr.

“I’ve had the pleasure to present proclamations throughout my term as mayor for many, many people, but this is one of the most special ones I’ve ever been able to do,” Elmore said as he prepared to read the proclamation honoring Pope at a council meeting. “… This gentleman, here, was born on July 4, 100 years ago. He will celebrate his birthday July 4 here in Dunn and he has been a lifelong friend to me since I’ve known him.”

Elmore was a small boy when he first met Sherrill Pope, who owned a small storage facility in Dunn with his wife, behind the old Daily Record print shop.

“… It was full of camouflage clothing that they sold, and as a young boy, Marshall, one of his sons, and I would play in there in those piles of clothes and just dig through them,” Elmore said, with a grin. “Mrs. Pope was (often) in there, pulling out (different garments), looking for size 36 or 32 or whatever she needed to sell that day.”

Elmore’s memory of a beloved Sherrill Pope goes back a long time, but Sherrill Pope’s time goes back even longer.

Dunn’s own Independence Day centenarian was born in 1926 – on the 150th anniversary of the United States of America’s Declaration of Independence. In the years that followed, he survived the Great Depression; the adoption of the “Star Spangled-Banner” as America’s national anthem, the New Deal that offered Depression relief; the end of prohibition; the birth of a minimum wage (set at 25 cents per hour); and – at the age of 15 – an attack at Pearl Harbor that dragged his country into World War II.

Sherrill Pope was drafted into the United States Army three years later, in 1944, and entered the war as it was winding down.

“Pope served honorably for two years as a combat engineer in the European Theater during the Second World War in General George S. Patton’ s Third Army,” Elmore noted in his proclamation.

“When he got there, the fighting was pretty much over,” Andrew Pope recalled. “He was in charge of some German prisoners and they were doing cleanup, body disposal, fixing bridges, fixing roads and stuff like that.”

After the war, Sherrill Pope returned home and married Annie Lois Neighbors in 1948. The two were married for 57 years before Annie Pope died in 2005. The two had seven sons, one daughter, several grandchildren, several more great grandchildren and a love for each other that never died.

“She’s the one that got him into ministry. She’s like, ‘You better straighten up or I’m leaving,’ so he straightened up,” Andrew Pope said with a laugh.

In 1955, Sherrill Pope was ordained as a minister with the pentecostal denomination headquartered in Falcon. In the years that followed, he led congregations through trying times that included the Vietnam War, a “hippie counterculture,” the Civil Rights movement and the assassinations of President John F. Kennedy and Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

“To provide for his young family, Pope worked at the Coca-Cola bottling plant, served as a minister and worked at a local flea market,” Elmore said in his proclamation.

Sherrill Pope still works at local flea markets, the mayor added. “If you want to track him down on a Saturday afternoon, he’ll be at the Circle in Newton Grove selling camouflage clothing still,” Elmore said.

In addition to his other jobs, Pope served as chaplain for Dunn Emergency Services “where he comforted both first responders and impacted citizens after traumatic events,” Elmore noted in his proclamation.

Elmore recognized Sherrill Pope as a “pillar of the Dunn community for his exemplary, devout and patriotic life well lived and its positive impact on others.”

Sherrill Pope accepted the framed plaque with a smile and a twinkle in his eyes. He’s lived through eight wars, a global pandemic, the rise of technology and instant communication. He’s watched his fellow countrymen achieve incredible feats that included walking on the moon and the Carolina Hurricanes winning two Stanley Cups and, on Saturday, he’ll achieve a great feat of his own on a birthday he shares with America.