Filters · 2 active
Libraries, Archives & Public Memory, Antebellum and Civil War: 6 dated entries from the full dataset. Back to the highlights →
- Antebellum and Civil War · 1800–1865
-
The Franklin Library Society is organized in Hillsborough and chartered by the General Assembly
The Franklin Library Society was established in Hillsborough on February 7, 1822, for the promotion of learning and cultivation of virtue. The General Assembly incorporated it that December, giving it the power to hold property, sue and be sued, and make its own bylaws.
-
The House of Commons postpones the Franklin Library Society's request for a book lottery
Hillsborough's Franklin Library Society asked the General Assembly for leave to raise up to three thousand dollars by lottery to buy useful books for its library. The petition, signed December 14, 1825 by the society's officers including librarian Thomas C. Palmer, was read in the House of Commons on December 23 and indefinitely postponed.
-
David L. Swain moves to Chapel Hill as university president
Chosen to succeed the late Joseph Caldwell, former governor David L. Swain moved to Chapel Hill in January 1836 to become president and professor of national and constitutional law. He stayed at the university for the rest of his life, the longest term of any of its presidents.
-
David L. Swain organizes the Historical Society of the University of North Carolina
In January 1844 President David L. Swain announced the Historical Society of the University of North Carolina, with himself as president and the whole faculty as its executive committee. It set out to copy colonial records in British repositories and to collect North Carolina books, newspapers and papers at the university.
-
James Strayhorn's will names sixteen enslaved people
James Strayhorn’s will identifies sixteen people he enslaved.
Subject: Blackwood Farm
-
The university dismisses Benjamin S. Hedrick over his Free Soil views
In 1856 faculty member Benjamin S. Hedrick admitted and defended in the newspapers his preference for the Free Soil party. President David L. Swain disapproved of his speaking out, and the trustees' executive committee dismissed Hedrick; Swain objected only that the committee had taken authority belonging to the full board.
The other dated entries wait behind a subject, a place, an era, a month, or the All dated entries switch, and each storyline’s page carries its own component entries. Dates come from the sources named on the cards and from the index’s event pages; where sources disagree, the card follows the county records. Entries marked approximate or needing research say so on the card; the rest were checked against the source named on it. Each card’s “Correct this” link opens the contact form with the entry already named. Suggest an event →
Compiled and maintained by the Friends of the Orange County Public Library from county records, the sources named on each card, and the index’s event pages. Last updated September 14, 2026.
