Charles Spurgeon Hudson was born in Alexander County, North Carolina, on August 2, 1886. Hudson moved with his family to Wilkesboro (Wilkes County) by 1910, where he found a job in a pool hall. For over forty years Hudson worked as a shoe salesman at the Absher & Blackburn department store, later a Belk’s department store, in North Wilkesboro. He died in Chicago on July 27, 1972.