For Four Oaks Mayor Linwood Parker and other Johnston County officials, this morning's groundbreaking at a new distribution center for medical device maker Becton Dickinson was the culmination of more than just a job creation effort.

Parker and County Commissioners Chairman Wade Stewart said they remembered rabbit hunting as boys in the field where the distribution center will be built. The Guin field, as it was known then, is now well on its way to becoming the Four Oaks Business Park, but Stewart noted that BD won't be the first business conducted in the field.

"There's been a lot of things  done in the Guin field — from bootlegging to unmentionables," he said.

At the ceremony, Allen Lewis of Charlotte-based developer The Keith Corp. presented Parker with a pumpkin pie as BD executives looked on.

"Project Pumpkin Pie" was the code name for efforts to attract BD, and Lewis teased the mayor for leaking the name and other information to The News & Observer over the summer.

Becton Dickinson will break out the shiny shovels in Four Oaks this morning.

Executives with the medical-device company and state and local officials have scheduled a ground-breaking ceremony (also known as a great excuse to take a bunch of photos, shake hands and slap backs) to begin construction of its $38 million distribution center.

BD announced in July that it would build the 700,000 square-foot center, which is expected to create 187 jobs by 2014. 

Johnston County blueberries apparently helped attract a medical-device company and 187 new jobs to Four Oaks.

State and local officials announced this morning that Becton Dickinson will open a distribution center at the edge of the small town, just off Interstate 95. The company will be the first tenant in a long-delayed industrial park being built on farm land.

During a ceremony in the Four Oaks Elementary School cafeteria, Mayor Linwood Parker, seated left, noted that the courting process involved many meetings with BD officials, economic developers and others over several months.

During a recent meeting, he said that he served fresh blueberries from his wife's bushes, as well as watermelon and cantaloupe. "I think they liked them," he told the crowd of about 200 people, drawing laughs.

Medical-device maker Becton Dickinson plans to open an East Coast distribution center in the Johnston County town of Four Oaks, creating 187 jobs by 2015.

Gov. Bev Perdue made the announcement this morning during a news conference at Four Oaks Elementary School.

The publicly traded company will receive a $600,000 grant from the state's One North Carolina Fund.

The jobs will pay average annual salaries of $28,771. That's below the Johnston County average of $31,408.

State officials said today the BD jobs are high quality, particularly given the current economic climate.

"In this economic environment we are trying to create good jobs for people," said Deborah Barnes, a spokesperson for the N.C. Department of Commerce.

"Just because they're slightly below the county average does not mean it's not a good job. It's certainly not a minimum wage job."

The company expects to begin hiring in 2012.

BD will be the first tenant at a nearly 400-acre industrial park at exit 87 off I-95, just north of the intersection of I-40. Officials hope that BD will help them attract other businesses to the long-delayed park.

The company also considered sites in South Carolina and Virginia.

Becton Dickinson is reportedly sweet on JoCo.

The publicly traded medical-device maker is considering building a warehouse and distribution center in the Johnston County town of Four Oaks.

Local and state officials previously have said that an unnamed company wants to build the facility, which would create 74 jobs and give a boost to a long-delayed industrial park just off Interstate 95.

An unnamed medical device company is looking at building its distribution center for the eastern United States in Four Oaks, economic development officials said Tuesday.

If the town succeeds in luring the Fortune 500 company to the new Four Oaks Business Park along Interstate 95, it would create 74 full-time jobs, said Garnet Bass, a spokeswoman for the N.C. Rural Economic Development Center.

The center has awarded a $737,958 grant to the Town of Four Oaks to extend water and sewer service to the site of the distribution center. But Four Oaks Mayor Linwood Parker said the grant money only applies if the company picks Four Oaks. He said he doesn't expect to hear a final decision for several more weeks.

The five-day Southern Johnston Baseball Invitational youth tournaments wrap up tonight at Smithfield Community Park. The championship games are all set for 7 p.m. Playing for the titles will be:

Coach Pitch (ages 7-8)

West Raleigh vs. Four Oaks

Midget League (ages 9-10)

Rocky Mount National vs. Rocky Mount American

Little League (ages 11-12)

Rocky Mount vs. Raleigh Capitals

Internet sweepstakes businesses have been cropping up around Johnston County in the past year or so, but most towns have little power to regulate them since they lack rules governing the facilities.

Four Oaks commissioners on Monday rejected an application for an Internet sweepstakes business, making it one of the first area towns to say no to the rapidly growing industry that some liken to gambling.

Raleigh businessman Sherwood Newkirk had hoped to open an Internet sweepstakes business in the Peachtree Center shopping center on U.S. 301 South. But commissioners said they couldn’t support such a venture anywhere in town.

“It was the board’s thought that we’d prefer to have some other type of business rather than internet gambling,” Mayor Linwood Parker said.

Parker said the board was also hesitent because the N.C. General Assembly is considering legislation that could ban sweepstakes parlors or tax them heavily. He says they told Newkirk he could apply again after the state decides how to handle it. Also, Parker said, approving Newkirk’s application would open the floodgates to more sweepstakes operations.

In next week's Herald, read more about the decision, the town's legal grounds for making it and what other towns are doing about Internet sweepstakes.