This page covers two overlapping sets of books at OCPL: the Orange County works in the index that the library holds, and the Rebecca B. Wall Local History Collection, the library’s wider local history room, from county deed and will abstracts to North Carolina histories. Some books belong to both. Start with the plan of the room, or go straight to either list.
About these counts
The index counts works, not copies or editions: the editions of one book are gathered under one entry, so the library’s own catalog lists more titles than the 357 here. The Wall Collection figure is the library’s inventory of that collection as of September 2026, counted by catalog title; the Orange County works shelved there are in both counts.
The Local History Room
Find your way around the local history room
Find the books, maps, research equipment, and displays of the Rebecca B. Wall Local History Collection at the Main Library in Hillsborough. The lettered locations below match the plan; tap or hover one to see what stands there.
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Locked cabinet
Fragile items that mending would damage. Above it, a platter Rebecca Wall painted of the law office of Thomas Ruffin, an ancestor of hers, at 201 South Cameron Street, and a pastel portrait of her in her fifties.
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Gray file cabinet
Microfilm of the local newspaper and federal census returns from the 1800s; Orange County court records, vital statistics, tax lists and Confederate soldier records reaching back to the 1700s. On top, a photograph of Rebecca Wall in her twenties and a wooden model of the Burwell School.
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Research computer with microfilm reader and scanner
Read and scan the microfilm here, and search Ancestry and other research sites.
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Genealogy bookshelf, D-1
Historical records of many kinds, color-coded and labeled by county and record type, with books on how to do genealogical research.
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Genealogy bookshelf, D-2
Published family histories, biographies and genealogical journals; the colonial and higher-court records of North Carolina; lives of local figures from William Tryon to John Blackfeather.
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Genealogy bookshelf, D-3
More about Rebecca Wall.
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North Carolina history bookshelf, E-1
North Carolina histories of every kind, from the university and the State Fair to natural history and Durham’s Hayti.
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Reference bookshelf, E-2
Traditional general reference books, still valuable as comprehensive, authoritative sources.
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Framed print: the courthouse
Hope Summerell Chamberlain’s 1926 pen-and-ink rendering of the county courthouse; she was an author, artist and civic worker.
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Framed print: the 1892 county map
George W. Tate’s 1892 map of Orange County.
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Framed print: Hillsborough, County Down
Views of the Irish town the county seat is named for.
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Framed print: the Nash and Kollock School
Chamberlain’s 1926 interpretation of a late-1800s photograph of the school, which stood at 137 West Margaret Lane, the Main Library’s address today.
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Framed print: Hillsborough Military Academy
Uniform buttons from the academy, which ran from 1859 to 1861 off Barracks Road in West Hillsborough; outbuildings still stand.
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Framed print: the 1768 town plan
C. J. Sauthier’s 1768 map of the town of Hillsborough.
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Black file cabinet
Family and local histories researched, compiled and donated by patrons, with local history odds and ends. On top, a model of the county courthouse by Allen Alexander Lloyd (1914 to 2006), lifelong Hillsborough resident and keeper of the town clock, who with his wife Pauline wrote the histories of the town and of its churches that stand in this room.
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Assorted maps
Maps of the county and the town.
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Elizabeth Keckly display
Keckly was enslaved in Hillsborough by her half-brother Robert Burwell, minister of the Presbyterian church and founder of the Burwell School. A seamstress of rare skill, after her emancipation in 1855 she became dressmaker and confidante to Mary Lincoln.
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Elizabeth Keckly display, continued
The second panel of the Keckly display.
On the shelves
Orange County works at OCPL
These works connect to Orange County and are held at OCPL. Search by title, author, or description, or pick a section to browse it in call-number order. Open the catalog record for location and availability.
No call number on record: 29 works as they shelve at OCPL, in call-number order. All 357, with filters by place, theme, and material, in the search →
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Libba: The Magnificent Musical Life of Elizabeth Cotten
Veirs, Laura · 2018 · Juvenile literature
Laura Veirs's picture book biography of Elizabeth Cotten, the folk singer and guitarist who grew up near Carrboro and Chapel Hill and wrote Freight Train as a girl. Written for young readers, it was published by Chronicle Books in 2018. Topics include African American women singers and singers of the United States in juvenile literature.
Call number JBIO COTTEN VEICarrboroArts, Music & PerformanceBlack Life & Civil Rights View in OCPL catalog → -
Tony Jenzano, Astronaut Trainer: The Man Who Made the Stars Shine
Neece, Michael G. · 2020 · Juvenile literature
A picture book for children about Tony Jenzano, 1919 to 1997, the Morehead Planetarium director who trained the Mercury, Gemini and Apollo astronauts in celestial navigation at Chapel Hill. Michael G. Neece's account, published in Chapel Hill in 2020, covers astronaut training, the teaching of astronomy and the planetarium itself for young readers.
Call number JBIO JENZANO NEEChapel HillLiterature & PublishingUNC & Campus Life View in OCPL catalog → -
Stitch by Stitch
Schofield-Morrison, Connie · 2021
Connie Schofield-Morrison's 2021 account of Elizabeth Keckley, who was born into slavery, learned to sew, purchased her freedom and became dressmaker to Mary Todd Lincoln. The Orange County tie is her years of enslavement in Hillsborough as a young woman.
Call number JBIO KECKLEY SCHHillsboroughBlack Life & Civil RightsThe Burwell School and the Burwell household View in OCPL catalog → -
Chapel Hill magazine.
2006 · Periodicals
Chapel Hill Magazine began publication in the town in 2006, a general interest periodical covering community life and social life and customs in Chapel Hill along with Carrboro and Orange County. Issued in volumes with illustrations at 28 cm, it carries the county's recent decades in magazine form for local readers.
Call number PER CHAPELCarrboroEveryday Life & Traditions View in OCPL catalog → -
Bill Neal's Southern Cooking
Neal, Bill · 1985
Bill Neal's cookbook of Southern dishes, published by UNC Press in 1985. Neal was a Chapel Hill chef, and the book sets out his approach to the region's cooking. 233 pages, also issued as an electronic book.
Food, Drink & Local Culture View in OCPL catalog → -
Bloodmarked
Deonn, Tracy · 2022 · Fiction
Tracy Deonn's young adult fantasy novel set around the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Bree, an African American teenager with newly awakened powers she cannot yet control, learns that the leaders of the secret Order mean to hide the coming demon war, and she and her friends flee so that she can find her own training. Subjects include magic, secret societies, imaginary wars and psychic trauma. Published by Simon & Schuster in 2022, 561 pages.
Chapel HillBlack Life & Civil RightsUNC & Campus Life View in OCPL catalog → -
Bright and tender dark: a novel
Pearson, Joanna · 2024 · Fiction
Joanna Pearson's novel of a cold case at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Karlie Richards was a nineteen-year-old student when she was murdered; decades later her onetime roommate, divorced and in middle age, finds herself drawn back to the crime as online conspiracy theories about it multiply. A psychological thriller with a Chapel Hill setting, published by Bloomsbury in 2024, 275 pages.
Chapel HillLaw, Courts & JusticeSchools & Education View in OCPL catalog → -
Crabs and Oysters: A Savor the South Cookbook
Smith, Bill · 2015
Bill Smith's short cookbook on crabs and oysters, one of the Savor the South series of single-subject volumes from the University of North Carolina Press. Smith was the chef at Crook's Corner in Chapel Hill. An electronic edition appeared in 2015.
Food, Drink & Local Culture View in OCPL catalog → -
The Dynamic Decade
Godschalk, David R. ; Howes, Jonathan B. · 2012
David R. Godschalk and Jonathan B. Howes describe the ten-year building program that reshaped the UNC campus in Chapel Hill, when some six million square feet in new buildings went up and a million more of historic buildings were restored. Chapters treat the campus master plan, siting and design decisions, the historic north campus, the southeast and health-sciences precincts and the planned Carolina North research campus, with contributions by chancellors James Moeser and Holden Thorp. Published by UNC Press in 2012, 175 pages.
Chapel HillBuildings & PreservationGrowth, Land & Planning View in OCPL catalog → -
Hark the Sound of Tar Heel Voices
Barefoot, Daniel W. · 2008 · Histories
Daniel W. Barefoot arranges first-hand recollections of the University of North Carolina by decade, from the 'infant university' of the 1790s through the Civil War years when promise turned to despair, the rebuilding of the 1870s, the 'frosh' life of the 1880s, wartime fame in the 1940s, the controversies of the 1960s and the bicentennial of the 1990s. Thomas Wolfe's student years appear among the voices. Published by John F. Blair of Winston-Salem in 2008, 257 pages.
Libraries, Archives & Public MemoryLiterature & Publishing View in OCPL catalog → -
Hillsborough Recorder
Newspapers
The Hillsborough Recorder was the town's long running weekly newspaper, begun in 1820 by the printer Dennis Heartt, whose shop also produced many of the Hillsborough imprints of that period.
The Hillsborough Recorder begins publication, 1820 View in OCPL catalog → -
Just Listen
Dessen, Sarah · 2006 · Fiction
Sarah Dessen's young adult novel about Annabel, a sixteen-year-old whose friends have turned away from her after a party, and Owen, a classmate whose love of music helps her tell the truth about what happened. Topics include high schools, family problems, models and teenage girls. Published by Viking in 2006, 371 pages. Dessen lives in Chapel Hill.
Families, Land & GenealogyLiterature & Publishing View in OCPL catalog →
The Rebecca B. Wall Local History Collection
Browse the full Wall Collection
The wider local history collection, named for Rebecca Wall, the retired librarian whose 1986 bequest built it: genealogy, North Carolina history, and regional reference works, alongside the Orange County titles. Browse it shelf by shelf or search by title, author, subject, or description.
Native peoples 970.004, 975.6004: 12 titles as they stand on the shelf at OCPL, in call-number order. North Carolina history bookshelf, E-1: North Carolina histories of every kind, from the university and the State Fair to the state’s natural history and Durham’s Hayti.
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To Die Game: The Story of the Lowry Band, Indian Guerrillas of Reconstruction
Evans, William McKee · 1971
Henry Berry Lowry and his band of Lumbee guerrillas raided plantations and eluded posses in Robeson County through Reconstruction, after the execution of Lowry's father and brother in 1865; their fight ended in 1872, when Lowry vanished after a raid on Lumberton. W. McKee Evans tells their story in this history, published by Louisiana State University Press in 1971; 282 pages with maps and portraits.
Call number NC 970.004 EVA View in OCPL catalog → -
Tracing Ancestors Among the Five Civilized Tribes: Southeastern Indians Prior to Removal
Lennon, Rachel Mills · 2002
A research guide by Rachal Mills Lennon, a certified genealogist, for tracing Cherokee, Creek, Chickasaw, Choctaw and Seminole ancestors in the Southeast before the removals of the 1830s. It describes the federal records by topic and by tribe and adds a long bibliography. Genealogical Publishing Company, 2002, 156 pages with an index.
Call number NC 970.004 LEN View in OCPL catalog → -
The Role of Native Americans in Military Engagements: From the 17th Century to the 19th Century
2018
Seven essays, edited by Karen L. T. Ackermann, on Native peoples at war from the 1600s to the 1800s: the Lenape against Dutch and Swedish colonists, Mohawk fighting with New France, Governor Willem Kieft's war on the Wiechquaeskeck, the 1694 destruction of Oyster River plantation, the battle at Captina Creek, Andrew Jackson's campaigns and removal, and the St. Albert Mounted Rifles. First published in 2003; reprinted in 2018, 240 pages with maps.
Call number NC 970.004 ROLE View in OCPL catalog → -
American Indians in North Carolina: Geographical Interpretations
1999 Foundational
Thomas E. Ross's geographic study of American Indians in North Carolina. It examines Native peoples' history, cultural assimilation, and social and economic conditions across the state, with statistics. Published by Karo Hollow Press in 1999, eleven preliminary pages and 242 pages with illustrations and maps.
Call number NC 970.004 ROS View in OCPL catalog → -
Index to the Final Rolls of Citizens and Freedmen of the Five Civilized Tribes in Indian Territory
United States · 2003
The name index to the Dawes Commission's final rolls of the Cherokee, Chickasaw, Choctaw, Creek and Seminole nations, approved in March 1907. Roll by roll, beginning with the Choctaws by blood, names run alphabetically with the roll number and page that lead to each entry, and lists of errata and corrections come first. First printed in 1907; reprinted in 2003, 634 pages.
Call number NC 970.004 UNITED View in OCPL catalog → -
The Final Rolls of Citizens and Freedmen of the Five Civilized Tribes in Indian Territory
United States · 2003
The Dawes Rolls: the final enrollment of the Cherokee, Chickasaw, Choctaw, Creek and Seminole nations of Indian Territory, made by the Dawes Commission so that tribal land could be allotted, and approved by the Secretary of the Interior by March 4, 1907. Citizens by blood and freedmen, African Americans once enslaved in the nations and their descendants, are listed nation by nation with roll numbers. First printed in 1907; reprinted in 2003, 633 pages.
Call number NC 970.004 UNITED View in OCPL catalog → -
First on the Land: The North Carolina Indians
Wetmore, Ruth Y. · 1975
Ruth Y. Wetmore's account of North Carolina's Indian peoples from about 10,000 B.C. to 1975, written for secondary school students. It covers the Algonquians of the coast, the Iroquoian Tuscarora and Cherokee, and the Piedmont Siouans, with their daily life, beliefs and ceremonies, and the Cherokee, Lumbee, Tuscarora, Haliwa, Coharie and Waccamaw Siouan communities as they stood in the 1970s. John F. Blair published it in 1975, with maps and a bibliography.
Call number NC 970.004 WET View in OCPL catalog → -
The Saura and Keyauwee in the Land That Became Guilford, Randolph, and Rockingham
Arnett, Ethel Stephens · 1975
Before Guilford, Randolph and Rockingham counties were formed, their land was home to the Saura and the Keyauwee, two Native peoples whose history Ethel Stephens Arnett traces. The explorer John Lawson found the Keyauwee on Caraway Creek, in present Randolph County, in 1701. Published in Greensboro in 1975; 92 pages with illustrations, a bibliography and an index.
Call number NC 970.1 ARN View in OCPL catalog → -
The Cherokee Removal, 1838: An Entire Indian Nation Is Forced Out of Its Homeland
Fleischmann, Glen · 1971
Written for young readers, Glen Fleischmann's account of the Cherokee Nation's forced removal from its Southeastern homeland in 1838, the march remembered as the Trail of Tears. He describes Cherokee life and culture, the events leading up to removal, the arguments over whether it had to happen, and what it cost the people. Franklin Watts published it in 1971 as a Focus book; 88 pages with maps, facsimiles and portraits.
Call number NC 970.3 FLE View in OCPL catalog → -
Occaneechi-Saponi Descendants in the North Carolina Piedmont: the Texas Community
Hazel, Forest · 1991 Start here
Forest Hazel's 1991 study of the Occaneechi-Saponi descendants living in the Texas community of Orange County, near Mebane, tracing the families of that settlement. It concerns Occaneechi genealogy and Indians of North America in North Carolina. A starting point for anyone researching the county's Indigenous families.
Call number NC 970.4 HAZEL View in OCPL catalog → -
Red Carolinians
Milling, Chapman James · 1969
Chapman J. Milling's history of the Indian peoples of the Carolinas in the colonial period, with South Carolina at its center, first published by the University of North Carolina Press in 1940. This second edition, with a foreword by A. S. Salley, came from the University of South Carolina Press in 1969; 438 pages with illustrations, facsimiles, portraits and a bibliography of some seventeen pages.
Call number NC 970.4 MIL View in OCPL catalog → -
The American Indian in North Carolina
Rights, Douglas L. · 1947 Influential in its time
Douglas L. Rights's account of the Native peoples of North Carolina, first published by Duke University Press in 1947; 296 illustrated pages with references. His preface sets out to show how the state's Indians lived, to identify the tribes, and to trace where they moved. John F. Blair issued later editions, and a 1988 Winston-Salem printing appeared as a Wachovia Historical Society publication.
Call number NC 970.4 RIG View in OCPL catalog →
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