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.
The twelve most recently published of the 357 Orange County works at OCPL, each with its description and call number. All 357, with filters by place, theme, and material, in the search →
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Cross & Sampson
Patterson, James · 2026 · Fiction
An Alex Cross thriller by James Patterson with Chapel Hill among its settings alongside Washington, D.C. Bombings, a kidnapping, a missing-persons investigation, terrorism and fathers and sons are its subjects; the Sampson of the title is Cross's longtime partner John Sampson. Published by Little, Brown in 2026.
Call number F PATTERSOChapel HillBlack Life & Civil RightsLaw, Courts & Justice View in OCPL catalog → -
Forged in the Spirit
Haines, Nancy Learned · 2026 · Histories
Nancy Learned Haines tells the story of the Quaker families who left Pennsylvania around 1750 for the Eno River valley near Hillsborough, where they farmed, traded and built a school, and asks how a community committed to peace fared through the unrest of the colonial years. Published by Pleasant Green Books in 2026, 122 pages with bibliography and index. Subjects include Quakers in North Carolina and the history of Hillsborough, Orange County and the Eno River valley.
Call number NC 289.6 HAINESEno RiverChurches & FaithEno & Environment View in OCPL catalog → -
Dark Tales of the Eno River
Cook, David · 2025 · Histories
David Cook collects the grim side of the Eno River's past in Orange and Durham counties: ghost stories, crimes, train wrecks and accidents, including the hanging of rebels near the river in 1771, a sawmill accident said to have started a run of hauntings, and a dance one Valentine's Day that ended badly. Published by The History Press in 2025, 141 pages with illustrations.
Call number 133.109 COOKDurham County (neighboring)Eno & EnvironmentEveryday Life & Traditions View in OCPL catalog → -
Freedom's Howl
Heyes, Eileen · 2025 · Fiction
A picture book set in the Eno River valley of Orange County in 1776. Four red wolf pups are born in a woodland den and spend their first summer and fall learning to hunt and howl with their family, while nearby a young widow, Sally Few, keeps her household going as the Revolution unsettles the countryside. Eileen Heyes wrote the story, published in 2025 by the North Carolina Office of Archives and History with color illustrations and maps, 42 pages.
Call number JF HEYESEno RiverColonial Orange CountyEno & Environment View in OCPL catalog → -
Oathbound
Deonn, Tracy · 2025 · Fiction
Third novel in Tracy Deonn's Legendborn series, young adult fantasy that began with a Black first-year student at UNC-Chapel Hill discovering a secret society descended from King Arthur's knights. In this 2025 installment Bree, cut off from the Order and from her ancestral magic, makes a pact with the Shadow King to sharpen her powers and shield her friends while the divided Round Table fights demons. Deonn is a North Carolina author. 650 pages; for readers 14 and up.
Call number YA F DEONNBlack Life & Civil RightsLiterature & Publishing View in OCPL catalog → -
Tar Heel Bred
Whisnant, Scott · 2025 · Humor
Scott Whisnant's memoir of a life measured out in North Carolina basketball seasons. A former sportswriter, Whisnant writes for readers raised in ACC country who learned the fight song early and treated the conference tournament in Greensboro as the high point of the year, recalling family, friends and the personal milestones that fell alongside Tar Heel games. Subjects include humor and anecdotes as well as the team's history. Published by Bearface Publishing in 2025, 318 pages with photographs.
Call number BIO WHISNANT WHIChapel HillCarolina SportsFamilies, Land & Genealogy View in OCPL catalog → -
Vignettes
Shetley, Frances Lloyd · 2025 · Biography
Frances Lloyd Shetley's self-published collection of short recollections, issued in 2025, drawn from the author's own life in Calvander and Carrboro. Calvander is the crossroads community northwest of Carrboro.
Call number BIO SHETLEY SHECalvander View in OCPL catalog → -
Bean Woman
Wynters, Criss · 2024 · Juvenile literature
Criss Wynters's children's book retelling an Occaneechi folk story, published in 2024. Its Orange County connection is the Occaneechi Band of the Saponi Nation, based in the northern part of the county.
Call number J 398.208 WYNTERSEveryday Life & TraditionsIndigenous Peoples & Archaeology 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 → -
Clover Garden
Simpson, Bland · 2024 · Biography
Bland Simpson's memoir of country life in the Clover Garden community of Orange County, in the North Carolina Piedmont, published by UNC Press in 2024. Short chapters take in cabin life, neighbors like the Binghams and Mr. Stacy, hounds, owls and turkeys, an auction, Merritt's and Lewis Allen's store, the sculptor of White Cross School, Maple View, Saxapahaw, the Devil's Tramping Ground, storms and snows, and a carol for Cane Creek. 182 pages with illustrations.
Call number BIO SIMPSON SIMNorth Carolina (statewide)Eno & EnvironmentEveryday Life & Traditions View in OCPL catalog → -
Observations of an accidental farmer--and a mindful reader
Kavros, Harry · 2024 · Biography
Harry Kavros's 2024 collection of essays and anecdotes about taking up farm life near Hillsborough, from the landscape to keeping chickens and other animals, alongside reflections on the South and on the writers who shaped his reading: Thoreau, Emerson, Aldo Leopold, Annie Dillard and Frederick Law Olmsted. Sections run from an introduction through 'The landscape', 'Chickens and other beasts' and 'The South' to an epilogue and appendix. First Paul Dry Books edition, Philadelphia.
Call number 814.54 KAVROSHillsboroughEno & EnvironmentFarms & Rural Life View in OCPL catalog → -
A Really Strange and Wonderful Time
Maxwell, Tom · 2024
Tom Maxwell's 2024 account of Chapel Hill's alternative rock scene in the 1990s, set against North Carolina's longer musical history. Maxwell writes as a musician who played in that scene, and the book follows the bands, clubs and labels that drew national attention to the town. Subjects include alternative rock music, Chapel Hill, 1991-2000, history and criticism. Published by Hachette, 310 pages with plates.
Call number 780.903 MAXWELLChapel HillArts, Music & PerformanceThe Cat’s Cradle and the “Chapel Hill sound” of the 1990s 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.
United States history 973: 23 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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The Cherokee Indians and Those Who Came After: Notes for A History of the People Who Settled Western North Carolina
Browder, Nathaniel C. · 1980
Nathaniel C. Browder's notes toward a history of the Cherokee and the settlers who followed them into far western North Carolina, centered on Cherokee County, with census material, Cherokee genealogy and the Trail of Tears removal of 1838 and 1839. First issued at Hayesville in 1973 as a draft history of Cherokee County from 1835 to 1860, it was later reissued under its present subtitle; this 1980 printing has 414 pages and an index.
Call number NC 970 BRO View in OCPL catalog → -
Chatham County, N.C., Miscellaneous Land Records
Dunaway, Stewart E. · 2017
Stewart Dunaway's photographic edition of Chatham County's miscellaneous land papers, the loose documents kept in two boxes at the State Archives in Raleigh. Each item appears as an image with a short transcript, ejectment suits are among the court papers, and indexes are included. Volume 1 spans 1778 to 1938 and volume 2 1788 to 1938. Chatham was formed from Orange County in 1771 and lies directly south of it. Self-published in 2017.
Call number NC 971.19 DUNAWAY View in OCPL catalog → -
Chatham County, N.C., Miscellaneous Land Records
Dunaway, Stewart E. · 2017
Two volumes of images of Chatham County land papers, 1778 to 1938, which Stewart Dunaway photographed from the miscellaneous land files of the State Archives and paired with brief transcripts and indexes. Ejectments and other court matters over land appear among them. Chatham County was created from Orange in 1771 and borders it on the south. Issued by the compiler in February 2017.
Call number NC 971.19 DUNAWAY View in OCPL catalog → -
Randolph County, N.C., Ejectments
Dunaway, Stewart E. · 2009
Ejectments, the suits brought to recover possession of land, fill this first volume of Stewart Dunaway's Randolph County series, covering 1792 to 1844. It reproduces as photographs, each with a short transcript, the oldest of the three boxes of Randolph ejectment papers in the State Archives, and indexes follow. Issued by the compiler beginning in 2017.
Call number NC 971.76 DUNAWAY View in OCPL catalog → -
Randolph County, N.C., Miscellaneous Land Records (1782-1929)
Dunaway, Stewart E. · 2015
Photographs of one box of loose Randolph County land papers in the State Archives, 1782 to 1929, each with a short transcript, compiled by Stewart Dunaway with an index. The box holds processioning returns, boundary disputes, divisions of land among heirs and many survey plats, among them a plat of the Johnstonville town lots showing names and a plat and report for enlarging the prison. Issued by the compiler in 2017; 436 pages.
Call number NC 971.76 DUNAWAY View in OCPL catalog → -
Indian Wars in North Carolina, 1663-1763
Lee, Enoch Lawrence · 1963
A century of warfare between colonists and the Indian nations of North Carolina, traced by E. Lawrence Lee from early conflicts after 1663 through the Tuscarora War and the Barnwell and Moore expeditions, the Yamassee and Cheraw wars, the decline of the coastal peoples, the Catawbas of the Piedmont, and the French and Indian War and Cherokee War in the west. Published by the Carolina Charter Tercentenary Commission in 1963, 94 pages with maps.
Call number 973.049 LEE View in OCPL catalog → -
Indian Wars in North Carolina, 1663-1763
Lee, Enoch Lawrence · 2011 Foundational
E. Lawrence Lee's account of a century of fighting between colonists and Indian nations in North Carolina: early clashes to 1711, the Tuscarora War and the Barnwell and Moore expeditions, the Yamassee and Cheraw wars, the Catawbas of the Piedmont, the Cherokees of the mountains, and the French and Indian and Cherokee wars. First published in 1963 for the Carolina Charter Tercentenary Commission; this 2011 reprint has 105 pages with maps.
Call number NC 973.049 LEE View in OCPL catalog → -
Native Carolinians: The Indians of North Carolina
Perdue, Theda · 2010 Start here
A short history of North Carolina's Native peoples by Theda Perdue, first published by the state's Division of Archives and History in 1985 and revised with Christopher Arris Oakley in 2010. The 1985 text moved from Native life before European contact and relations with whites to the Cherokee, the Lumbee and Native Carolinians of the present; the revision has 101 pages with maps, portraits and an index.
Call number NC 973.049 PERDUE View in OCPL catalog → -
Set Fair for Roanoke: Voyages and Colonies, 1584-1606
Quinn, David B. · 1985
David Beers Quinn's account of the voyages Sir Walter Raleigh sent to the Carolina coast from 1584 and of the Roanoke colonies they planted, summing up close to fifty years of his research. Quinn argues that many of the lost colonists lived on among the Indians until they were killed in the early 1600s. Published in 1985 by UNC Press for North Carolina's committee marking America's four hundredth anniversary; 467 pages with illustrations and maps.
Call number NC 973.1 QUI View in OCPL catalog → -
The First Colonists: Documents on the Planting of the First English Settlements in North America, 1584-1590
1982
Contemporary accounts of the Roanoke voyages and colonies of 1584 to 1590, England's first attempts at settlement in North America, edited by the Irish historian David B. Quinn and Alison M. Quinn, who supply an introduction. This 1982 Division of Archives and History edition revises their 1973 'Virginia Voyages from Hakluyt' and has indexes and a folded plate.
Call number NC 973.17 QUI View in OCPL catalog → -
Frustrated Patriots: North Carolina and the War of 1812
Lemmon, Sarah McCulloh · 1973
Sarah McCulloh Lemmon's history of North Carolina in the War of 1812, including the British raid on Ocracoke and Portsmouth in July 1813. Published by the University of North Carolina Press in 1973; 223 pages with maps, a bibliography and an index. Lemmon, who took her doctorate at Chapel Hill, taught history at Meredith College in Raleigh for some thirty-five years.
Call number NC 973.524 LEM View in OCPL catalog → -
North Carolina and the War of 1812
Lemmon, Sarah McCulloh · 1971
In 1971 the State Department of Archives and History published Sarah McCulloh Lemmon's short account of the state's part in the War of 1812: 54 pages with illustrations, a map and portraits. It includes the General Calvin Jones Grand March, a piano piece by J. F. Gonecke, and the first edition came with a small phonograph record. Lemmon also wrote a fuller study, 'Frustrated Patriots' (1973). The pamphlet was reissued in 2000.
Call number NC 973.524 LEM View in OCPL catalog →
Research help, online and in the room
