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Orange County Indexed

Chronology

Key events from Orange County history: 100 highlights to start, then the full chronology of 7,811 dated events and 63 storylines, each connected to the index. A storyline gathers many dated events into one history, such as the Regulator crisis.

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Searched the full chronology of 7,811 dated events and 63 storylines, not only the highlights. Showing 5,001–5,200 of 7,874, 200 to a page.Back to highlights

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198 dated events and 2 storylines
1942Early twentieth century
  1. Early twentieth century · 1900–1944
  2. A. L. Stanback succeeds E. C. Hester as principal of Hillsborough's high school for Black students

    Appointment, election or service · Central High School (now Hillsborough Elementary), 402 North Nash Street, Hillsborough

    Albert Leon Stanback, a teacher at the Hillsboro High School for Negroes, replaced its first principal, E. C. Hester, in 1942. The school took the name Central High School the next year, and Stanback later pushed for the Cedar Grove consolidated school to take the lower grades.

    People: A. L. Stanback

    Subject: Central High and Central Elementary, Hillsborough

  3. Akers is named dean of the School of Library Science, UNC's first woman dean

    Appointment, election or service · University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill

    Akers, director of the school since 1935, was named dean, the first woman dean at UNC-Chapel Hill. She held the post until 1954.

  4. Beta Theta Pi and other fraternity houses quarter Navy trainees

    Construction or physical change · Beta Theta Pi Fraternity House, 114 South Columbia Street, Chapel Hill

    While the university served as a naval training center, many fraternity houses, the Beta house among them, were used to lodge midshipmen, which held back chapter growth until the war ended.

    Subject: Beta Theta Pi Fraternity House

  5. Coates trains as a civil defense instructor and Popular Government issues a defense number

    Appointment, election or service · Institute of Government, Chapel Hill

    Called to a War Department school in Texas in the summer of 1942, Coates returned to run civil defense training through the Institute, and that fall Popular Government published a 'Defense Issue' on espionage, water system protection, gas attacks and air raid warnings. In 1945 an Army Service Forces colonel credited the Institute with the plan for joining local and state forces with federal ones to defend the state.

    Subject: Institute of Government

  6. Douglas and Frances Hill buy the Cabe-Pratt-Harris House and add a large rear wing

    Construction or physical change · Cabe-Pratt-Harris House (Riverbend Farm), off Pleasant Green Road near the Eno River

    The Hills bought the house and about 180 acres from the Harris family in 1942 and soon added a rear wing, removing the old boxed stair to the loft. The farm's later name, Riverbend Farm, dates from the twentieth century.

  7. Geologist Joseph Hyde Pratt, first chairman of the Chapel Hill Planning Board, is buried in the Old Chapel Hill Cemetery

    Life event · Old Chapel Hill Cemetery, South Road (NC 54) and Country Club Road, Chapel Hill

    Joseph Hyde Pratt (1870-1942), professor of geology and the first chairman of the Chapel Hill Planning Board, was buried in the cemetery.

    Subject: Old Chapel Hill Cemetery

  8. Guion Griffis Johnson leads home-front work in Chapel Hill and Orange County

    Appointment, election or service · Chapel Hill

    During World War II Johnson chaired the Community Service Committee of the Chapel Hill War Price and Rationing Board, was public relations officer for the Orange County Office of Civil Defense, and collected war records for Orange County.

  9. James C. McFarling gives up dairying on the Bennett-McFarling farm on Erwin Road

    Closing or ending · Bennett-McFarling House, 101 Erwin Road, Chapel Hill

    McFarling, given the farm by an uncle, raised cotton on 170 acres and ran an 80-cow dairy with his wife Alice at the Triple-A farmhouse at 101 Erwin Road until he quit the dairy business in 1942. A milk house and cotton house were still standing in 1992.

  10. James Collins buys the closed Black Presbyterian church and its lot

    Property or economic transaction · Presbyterian Church for Colored People, Orange Street, Hillsborough

    About fourteen years after the congregation disbanded, James Collins bought the church building and land on Orange Street.

  11. James J. Freeland builds his first house at US 70 and Faucette Mill Road

    Construction or physical change · US 70 at Faucette Mill Road, Hillsborough

    Three years after marrying Maxine Hayes, Freeland built the family's first home where Highway 70 crosses Faucette Mill Road, next to land that became the Fairview subdivision the following year.

    People: James J. Freeland

  12. Jim Tatum coaches UNC football for a single season

    Appointment, election or service · Chapel Hill

    Tatum was UNC's head football coach for one year in 1942. He then joined the navy and learned the split-T formation as an assistant to its founder, Don Faurot, at Iowa Pre-Flight.

  13. Lucy Morgan starts the health education program at the School of Public Health

    Founding or opening · School of Public Health, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill

    Three young women on State Board of Health fellowships enrolled in health education at Chapel Hill in the fall of 1942, and Rosenau asked for Dr. Lucy S. Morgan, a Public Health Service educator then working in Fayetteville, to build the curriculum. With twenty W. K. Kellogg Foundation scholarships, the first class of public health educators numbered twenty-five in the spring of 1943.

    People: M. J. (Milton Joseph) Rosenau

    Subject: UNC School of Public Health

  14. Maurice Julian opens The College Shop, a men's clothing store

    Founding or opening · The College Shop, 140 East Franklin Street, Chapel Hill

    Julian moved into the space Durham Dairy Products had left at 140 East Franklin and opened a men's clothing store he called The College Shop.

    People: Maurice Julian

  15. Orange County farmers bring in more than a hundred beef cattle

    Construction or physical change · Orange County

    Over a hundred beef cows and heifers arrived in the county in 1942, and purebred bulls were placed as well. Fourteen 4-H boys bought Hereford heifers, and the Farmers Exchange Market bought the State Fair's first-place Hereford bull.

  16. The Carolina Theatre is built on East Franklin Street to a Williamsburg design by Archie Davis

    Construction or physical change · 108 East Franklin Street, Chapel Hill

    The new two-story brick theatre at 108 East Franklin Street, with a steep roof, dormers and brick pediments and arches, was the one building in the 100 block of East Franklin to follow the Williamsburg plan.

    People: Archie Royal Davis

    Subject: Carolina Theatre (1942)

  17. The Institute of Government becomes part of the university

    Law, policy or court · Chapel Hill

    The Institute of Government, begun as a separate body, was made part of the university in 1942.

    Subject: Institute of Government

  18. The Janitors' Association reorganizes as a CIO union local

    Protest or organizing · Chapel Hill

    The Janitors' Association became Local 403-P of the State, County and Municipal Workers of America, a CIO union. Minutes of July 2, 1942 name pay as the most important matter, and laundry worker Rebecca Clark became a shop steward.

    People: Rebecca Clark

  19. The Methodist church annex on Franklin Street becomes a recreation center

    Construction or physical change · Methodist Church Annex, East Franklin Street, Chapel Hill

    The former Methodist church, kept as an annex when the new church went up in 1926, was converted into a recreation center.

  20. The Navy and the university jointly build a gymnasium for women students

    Construction or physical change · Women's gymnasium, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill

    The gym replaced space women lost when the Navy took over campus buildings for wartime training. Their playing field went to military training and was not replaced.

  21. The Paul Riley Store is built on Eno Street

    Construction or physical change · Paul Riley Store, 907 Eno Street, West Hillsborough

    A one-story brick store with a stepped parapet and inset entrance went up at 907 Eno Street, carrying the West End commercial style farther west. A longtime resident recalled it, with the nearby Methodist church, as a center of childhood life in West Hillsborough.

  22. The old Carolina Theatre is renamed The Village

    Naming or commemoration · Village Theatre, Sorrell building, north side of East Franklin Street, Chapel Hill

    With the new Carolina Theatre open on the south side of the street, the 1927 house on the north side took the name The Village.

    Subject: Varsity Theatre (the first Carolina Theatre)

  23. UNC starts a pre-induction curriculum for students bound for the service

    Founding or opening · University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill

    The university set up a course of study for all students entering military service; it later grew into the College for War Training.

  24. Wilbur Kutz opens The Varsity, a clothing store with a basement soda fountain

    Founding or opening · The Varsity, north side of East Franklin Street, Chapel Hill

    Kutz's clothing store on the north side of East Franklin had a soda fountain downstairs that drew a crowd.

  25. William Picard Jacocks retires to Chapel Hill

    Chapel Hill

    After about thirty years of public health work for the Rockefeller Foundation, much of it against hookworm in India and Ceylon, Jacocks retired and moved back to Chapel Hill, where he was active in alumni affairs.

  26. Woodward Byars serves as Orange County's home demonstration agent

    Appointment, election or service · Orange County

    In 1942 Miss Woodward Byars was Orange County's home demonstration agent, alongside farm agent Don S. Matheson and assistant agent Joe N. Howard. She handled publicity for edible soybeans, worked the wartime programs through the home demonstration clubs and wrote on the new crop for the county papers.

    Subject: Home demonstration clubs

  27. Thirty-nine neighborhood meetings in Orange County choose wartime neighborhood leaders

    Protest or organizing · Orange County

    During the week of January 12, 1942, thirty-nine meetings explained the neighborhood plan and picked leaders, drawing 1,677 people in all, about 43 a meeting. Discussion covered bonds and stamps, more food, nutrition, machinery repair, scrap iron and a camp survey; a typical neighborhood of 45 white families got five leaders.

  28. Eleanor Roosevelt speaks at Memorial Hall to close a post-war planning conference

    Publication, speech or performance · Chapel Hill

    Eleanor Roosevelt spoke in Memorial Hall at UNC to a capacity audience of about 2,000 people, closing a two-day conference on post-war planning sponsored by the Carolina Political Union and the International Student Service. She warned the audience that there was no going back to normalcy.

    People: Frank Porter Graham

    Subject: Memorial Hall

  29. Neighborhood leader training starts the Victory Garden program in Orange County

    Health or relief action · Orange County

    In the week of February 2, 1942, a training meeting was held in each of Orange County's 39 neighborhoods, where 163 of the 272 leaders made family lists, split the families among themselves and took instructions for the Victory Garden campaign. Leaders called on their neighbors that month with a garden leaflet and went back in March to leave a poster with each family that had planted.

  30. German, Italian and Japanese aliens re-register at the Chapel Hill post office

    Law, policy or court · Chapel Hill post office

    All German, Italian and Japanese aliens over 14 living in Chapel Hill had to re-register, with three photographs, at the post office. Postmaster William S. Hogan and Assistant Postmaster Strowd ran the registration, following the procedure of one held there in 1940.

  31. Three farm machinery repair meetings in Orange County draw 160 people

    Protest or organizing · Orange County

    As part of the wartime push to keep farm equipment working, Orange County held three machinery meetings on February 26 and 27, 1942, with 160 attending. Neighborhood leaders handed out a repair checklist that farmers filled in and took to their dealers.

  32. The Orange County Public Library bookmobile makes stops in Chapel Hill

    Chapel Hill

    In late February 1942 the Chapel Hill Weekly announced that the county bookmobile, with librarian Ernestine Grafton in charge, would park in front of the Texaco station from noon to 2 p.m. for browsers and borrowers. That spring the bookmobile offered a $5 prize to the school collecting the most waste paper, with the proceeds buying children's books, and a state aid increase let the library order books on readers' requests.

    Subject: Orange County Public Library

  33. Orange County's Black farm neighborhoods are mapped and elect their own neighborhood leaders

    Protest or organizing · Orange County

    In March 1942 the neighborhood plan was carried to Black rural families: Black neighborhoods were laid out, leaders were elected and family lists drawn up. The report's map shows 27 Black neighborhoods, worked by county agent M. C. Burt and home agent Ruby Crews.

  34. Orange County counts 272 wartime neighborhood leaders

    Statistic or record · Orange County

    On April 1, 1942, Orange County's neighborhood-leader system had 117 white men, 78 white women, 54 Black men and 23 Black women serving as leaders, 272 in all.

  35. Orange County is picked as one of four counties in the nation to test the neighborhood-leader plan

    Award or honor · Orange County

    On April 18, 1942, the federal and state extension services invited Orange County to show how well neighborhood leaders could reach every rural family with wartime programs, and the next day the agents met the chairman of the county defense council. The county's letter to farm families credited the choice to their response to the earlier scrap iron, Victory Garden and machinery repair drives.

  36. Orange County's neighborhood leaders meet at the Hillsborough courthouse to launch the wartime test

    Protest or organizing · Orange County Courthouse, Hillsborough

    The county-wide training meeting on the afternoon of April 28, 1942, drew 265 people, among them 149 of the 195 white and 66 of the 77 Black neighborhood leaders. A. H. Graham, general chairman of Orange County defense, spoke after a chorus from the Black high school sang; other speakers took up war bonds, the Farmers Exchange's "Buy a Bond Pig" offer, salvage, gardens and edible soybeans, which the crowd tasted afterward.

    People: Alexander H. "Sandy" Graham · Don S. Matheson

  37. Neighborhood leaders ask Orange County farm families to pledge a pig or an acre for war bonds

    Property or economic transaction · Orange County

    In the same canvass, leaders took pledges under the "Buy a Bond Pig" and "Buy a Bond Acre" plans, in which a family promised the sale price of a pig or an acre of crops toward war bonds and stamps; the Farmers Mutual Exchange Livestock Market supplied pigs to families who could feed them out. In the June survey 58 percent of white families and 30 percent of Black families had bought or pledged bonds and stamps.

    Subject: Farmers Mutual Exchange

  38. Neighborhood leaders introduce edible soybeans to Orange County farm families

    Health or relief action · Orange County

    On their scrap calls, leaders gave a half-pound package of edible soybean seed to each family that agreed to collect scrap and sent others to stores stocking the seed, promoting the bean as a protein food that could take the place of meat. By the June survey the program had reached 96 percent of 269 families, and 78 percent had planted it.

  39. Neighborhood leaders run a scrap metal and rubber drive across rural Orange County

    Protest or organizing · Orange County

    From April 29 to May 9, 1942, leaders called on farm families asking them to gather scrap iron, old rubber, rags and worn-out bags for the county war fund, listed pickup points for WPA trucks and hauled some scrap to dealers themselves. Of 269 families surveyed in June, 93 percent had heard the appeal and 76 percent had turned in scrap or had it ready.

  40. The Chapel Hill Weekly prints a special edition for the farm war campaign, sent to every rural family

    Publication, speech or performance · Chapel Hill

    On May 8, 1942, the Chapel Hill Weekly put out a special edition backing the county's neighborhood-leader campaign, and a sample copy went to every rural family in Orange County. Stories in the county's papers that spring covered the leaders, edible soybeans, scrap and war bonds; the Mebane Enterprise printed the leaders' names on April 30.

    Subject: The Chapel Hill Weekly

  41. The Navy B-1 Band lives in the Community Center

    Property or economic transaction · Chapel Hill

    With the community center unfinished for lack of funds, the town lent it on May 22, 1942 to the Navy as quarters for the B-1 Band, the Black musicians of the Pre-Flight School. The Navy, not the band, finished and equipped the building, and the band lived there from that summer until the town regained it on October 24, 1945.

    Subject: Hargraves Community Center · Navy Pre-Flight School

  42. Governor Broughton welcomes guests at the commissioning of the Navy Pre-Flight School

    Publication, speech or performance · Chapel Hill

    The dinner program for the commissioning of the Naval Aviation Pre-Flight School at Chapel Hill on May 23, 1942 has Governor J. Melville Broughton offering the welcome, and Josephus Daniels giving greetings to the Navy Department representatives and to Commander O. O. Kessing. The school trained 18,700 pre-flight cadets before it was decommissioned on October 15, 1945.

    Part of The Navy Pre-Flight School at Chapel Hill, 1942–1945 · 13 events

    People: Josephus Daniels · Oliver Owen Kessing

    Subject: Navy Pre-Flight School

  43. Navy Pre-Flight School operates at UNC

    Storyline · 13 events · Chapel Hill

    Commissioned at UNC in May 1942, the U.S. Navy Pre-Flight School trained 18,700 cadets before it was decommissioned on October 15, 1945. Cadets ate in Lenoir Hall and drilled in a Navy-built armory that opened in 1943. George H. W. Bush trained there as a cadet, Gerald Ford taught there, and Ted Williams played on its baseball team.

    Part of The Navy Pre-Flight School at Chapel Hill, 1942–1945 · 13 events

    People: Ted Williams

    Subject: Navy Pre-Flight School

  44. Orange County home demonstration clubs take up the whole wheat and enriched bread program

    Health or relief action · Orange County

    During May 1942 every home demonstration club in Orange County worked on the whole wheat and enriched bread program, which Lee County ran through its neighborhood leaders. Of the 183 surveyed Orange families who bought wheat bread or flour that month and had not already used it, 9 percent bought whole wheat or enriched bread or flour for the first time.

    Subject: Home demonstration clubs

  45. Orange County rural families pledge $50,000 in war bonds and stamps for

    Statistic or record · Orange County

    The spring 1942 canvass ended with the county's rural families pledged to buy $50,000 worth of war bonds and stamps during the year, and 200 families signed up to raise a "Bond Pig."

  46. A wartime munitions plant opens in the former Mill No. 7

    Founding or opening · Carrboro

    National Munitions Corporation converted the empty Mill No. 7 on Roberson Street into a shell-loading plant that pressed tetryl pellets for Navy anti-aircraft ammunition, growing from about 126 workers to more than 500; an explosion hit its pellet houses on September 6, 1942.

  47. The Naval ROTC moves out of Woollen Gym and Lenoir Hall into Swain Hall

    Construction or physical change · Swain Hall, UNC campus, Chapel Hill

    By university decision the Naval ROTC left its quarters in Woollen Gymnasium and the basement of Lenoir Hall during June 1 to 9, 1942, and moved into Swain Hall, which its commander thought below the Navy's minimum standard.

    Subject: Swain Hall · Woollen Gymnasium

  48. The federal extension service publishes its report on the Orange and Lee County neighborhood-leader test

    Publication, speech or performance · Orange County

    In June 1942 the U.S. Department of Agriculture issued Extension Service Circular 387, prepared by Barnard Joy and J. P. Leagans, tracing step by step how Orange and Lee counties had organized neighborhood leaders and what the June survey found. It concluded that trained leaders chosen by their neighbors could carry wartime messages quickly to nearly every rural family.

  49. Chapel Hill aldermen elect Robert W. Madry mayor

    Chapel Hill

    The board of aldermen unanimously elected Robert W. Madry, director of the University news bureau and an alderman, as mayor to succeed John M. Foushee, who had moved out of town after ten years as mayor. The Weekly believed no one in the University's service had headed the town government before.

  50. The Navy B-1 Band serves at Chapel Hill

    Appointment, election or service · Chapel Hill

    The B-1 Band, 44 Black musicians sworn in at Raleigh on May 27, 1942 as the first African Americans to serve in the Navy at general rank, played for the Navy Pre-Flight School at UNC from July 1942 to April 1944. Barred from campus housing, they lived in the new Black community center on Roberson Street, now the Hargraves Center.

    Part of The Navy Pre-Flight School at Chapel Hill, 1942–1945 · 13 events

    Subject: Hargraves Community Center · Navy Pre-Flight School

  51. University laundry workers reject a piece-work plan and demand a wage increase

    Protest or organizing · University Laundry, Chapel Hill

    Meeting by shifts, the laundry workers turned down the university's offer of piece rates with no assured raise. Their union wrote that it would take the matter to President Graham within a week if nothing changed.

    People: Rebecca Clark

  52. Chapel Hill High School burns

    Disaster or outbreak · Chapel Hill

    Fire destroyed the Chapel Hill high school building on South Columbia Street, then the Pittsboro highway, early on Saturday, August 8, 1942. The school board arranged to hold grades 10 to 12 in rooms at the Baptist church and the ninth grade at the elementary school, and wartime material shortages delayed a new building for years.

    Subject: Chapel Hill High School

  53. Archie Royal Davis's plans for the Naval Armory are settled and building begins

    Construction or physical change · NROTC Naval Armory, 221 South Columbia Street, Chapel Hill

    After weeks of argument with consulting architect Arthur C. Nash, Durham architect Archie Royal Davis had his design for a Georgian Revival armory approved in mid-September 1942; R. K. Stewart and Son began building it late that year for about $41,000, meant as a temporary building to be replaced after the war.

    People: Arthur Cleveland Nash · Archie Royal Davis

  54. The Navy Pre-Flight School's armory is completed near the campus tennis courts

    Construction or physical change · Navy Pre-Flight Armory, near the tennis courts, UNC campus, Chapel Hill

    A semi-prefabricated armory and rifle range designed by Archie Royal Davis for the Pre-Flight School was finished near the tennis courts, a short walk from Navy Hall. It was a separate building from the NROTC Armory.

    People: Archie Royal Davis

    Subject: Navy Pre-Flight School

  55. UNC's General Faculty names John M. Booker to chair a committee on University government

    Chapel Hill

    The General Faculty authorized a committee, chaired by English professor John M. Booker, to study faculty government and write a uniform set of principles for the powers and duties of the University's divisions. Reporting in sections over eight years, its work became the 1950 Faculty Legislation on University Government.

  56. A regimental review in Kenan Stadium honors Commander Kessing as he leaves for the Pacific

    Kenan Stadium, Chapel Hill

    With Admiral Halsey asking for him in the southwest Pacific, Commander O. O. Kessing was ordered to sea duty, and the Pre-Flight School held a regimental review in his honor in Kenan Stadium. Lieutenant Commander John P. Graff succeeded him in command.

    People: R. B. House

    Subject: Kenan Stadium · Navy Pre-Flight School

  57. John P. Graff takes command of the Navy Pre-Flight School

    Appointment, election or service · Navy Pre-Flight School, UNC campus, Chapel Hill

    When Commander O. O. Kessing was sent to sea in November 1942, his executive officer John P. Graff was placed in command and promoted to commander. Graff, recalled from retirement, had been the first line officer to arrive in the spring of 1942.

    People: Oliver Owen Kessing

    Subject: Navy Pre-Flight School

  58. Kenneth Tanner lends West House to the Carolina Volunteer Training Corps

    Property or economic transaction · West House, near Swain Hall, Chapel Hill

    Tanner gave the student officer-training corps the use of West House as its headquarters for the rest of the war. The corps then had 125 students in eight companies under Lt. Col. W. A. Raborg.

  59. Fire destroys Orange Grove School

    Disaster or outbreak · Orange Grove

    Fire destroyed Orange Grove School in December 1942. On December 6, 1943 the county board sought a $16,000 insurance settlement, and at the Orange Grove committee's request classes went on in the old Orange Grove building rather than moving to Hillsboro.

  60. A Freewill Baptist church meets in a former store on South Nash Street

    Founding or opening · 219 South Nash Street, Hillsborough

    A small frame building at 219 South Nash Street, shown as a store on the 1911 and 1924 Sanborn maps and later a hot dog stand and a house, appears as the Freewill Baptist Church on the 1943 map. It keeps a small square steeple in its front gable.

  61. Black shank disease first strikes tobacco in Orange County

    Disaster or outbreak · Orange County

    A new tobacco disease, black shank, appeared first in 1943 and spread quickly through the tobacco belt. The book ranks it with wilt for damage and notes a partly resistant seed.

  62. Daphne Athas graduates from UNC

    Life event · Chapel Hill

    Athas graduated from the university in 1943 after studying writing with Betty Smith and Phillips Russell.

    People: Betty Smith · Phillips Russell

  63. Dr. H. W. Moore restores the Hasell-Nash House with architect Archie Royal Davis

    Construction or physical change · Hasell-Nash House, 116 West Queen Street, Hillsborough

    Dr. H. W. Moore restored the Federal-style Hasell-Nash House on West Queen Street with the help of architect Archie Royal Davis, who extended the rear of the two side wings around 1943.

    People: Archie Royal Davis

    Subject: Hasell-Nash House

  64. Elizabeth Janet Gray wins the Newbery Medal

    Award or honor · Philadelphia

    Gray received the 1943 John Newbery Medal for Adam of the Road, a story of 13th-century England, a decade after she left Chapel Hill. She was then living in the Germantown section of Philadelphia.

  65. Engineer Thomas C. Atwood dies, ending the firm of Atwood and Weeks

    Life event · Chapel Hill

    Atwood's death in 1943 closed the partnership that had carried out much of the university's building since the 1920s.

    People: Thomas C. Atwood

  66. Fairview is platted as a neighborhood for Black families north of US 70

    Construction or physical change · Fairview, Hillsborough

    The first of Hillsborough's mid-century African American subdivisions was laid out in 1943 along roads that were already there, with twenty-five-foot lots meant to be bought in combination. Local builder James J. Freeland, who owned land in Fairview, built many of its houses.

    People: James J. Freeland

  67. Guion Griffis Johnson lectures in the Navy V-12 program at the University

    Publication, speech or performance · Chapel Hill

    Johnson taught as a lecturer in the Naval V-12 program at the University of North Carolina in 1943–1944.

  68. Kessing Pool opens behind Woollen Gymnasium for Pre-Flight swimming training

    Kessing Pool, Chapel Hill

    An outdoor pool behind Woollen Gymnasium opened in 1943 for the Navy Pre-Flight School's aquatic training and was named for Oliver Owen Kessing, the school's first commanding officer. Thousands of servicemen trained in it, among them Gerald Ford and George H. W. Bush.

    Subject: Navy Pre-Flight School · Woollen Gymnasium

  69. Pre-meteorology and aviation training units arrive at UNC

    Founding or opening · University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill

    In the first half of 1943 the university took in pre-meteorology and aviation training units, adding to the Navy programs already on campus.

  70. Rachel Crook opens a fish and produce market on West Franklin Street

    Founding or opening · Rachel Crook's Fish & Produce Market, West Franklin Street, Chapel Hill

    Crook made an old service station, lately a chicken house, into a fish and produce market.

  71. Robert Rhinehart buys the Hill Bakery from Mrs. William Neal

    Property or economic transaction · Hill Bakery, East Franklin Street, Chapel Hill

    Rhinehart bought the bakery that William Brumfield Neal's widow had run since his death in 1935.

  72. St. Mary's School closes as its pupils are merged into the Hillsborough schools

    Closing or ending · St. Mary's School, east side of SR 1548 north of SR 1002, Orange County

    Consolidation with the Hillsborough schools closed St. Mary's School in 1943.

    Subject: St. Mary's School

  73. The 1844 Orange County Courthouse is rehabilitated

    Construction or physical change · Old Orange County Courthouse, 104 East King Street, Hillsborough

    The county rehabilitated its courthouse of about 1844 in 1943 and later added an annex, but the building stayed too small, and a new courthouse was finished just south of it in 1954.

    Subject: Orange County Courthouse, Hillsborough

  74. The Black women's clubs pay off the last of the Efland Home's debt

    Property or economic transaction · North Carolina Industrial Home for Colored Girls (Efland Home), 201 Redman Crossing, Efland

    Four years after the home closed, the North Carolina Federation of Colored Women's Clubs cleared its remaining debt on the Efland reformatory in 1943, the year the legislature voted $25,000 for a state-run training school for Black girls.

    Subject: North Carolina Industrial Home for Colored Girls (Efland Home)

  75. The Farmers Mutual Exchange builds a slaughterhouse on Occoneechee Farm

    Construction or physical change · Occoneechee Farm, Hillsborough

    In summer 1943 the Exchange put up an abattoir next to the Hillsborough livestock market on Occoneechee Farm. Farmers could bring cattle and hogs for slaughter at cost and collect the meat the next day.

    Subject: Occoneechee Farm · Farmers Mutual Exchange

  76. The General Assembly passes a resolution commending the Institute of Government

    Award or honor · General Assembly, Raleigh

    Peyton Abbott, a Winston-Salem lawyer who moved into the Institute building on December 1, 1942, led its coverage of the 1943 session, winning a seat at the press table and a copy of every bill. Before adjourning, the legislature passed a joint resolution praising the Institute's service to it.

    People: Albert Coates

    Subject: Institute of Government

  77. The Hillsborough High School for Negroes takes the name Central High School

    Naming or commemoration · West Union and North Nash streets, Hillsborough

    Under principal A. L. Stanback, the school for Black students in Hillsborough changed its name to Central High School in 1943.

    People: A. L. Stanback

    Subject: Central High and Central Elementary, Hillsborough

  78. The McLartys sell the Berry Brick House to Mr. and Mrs. F. Ross Porter

    Property or economic transaction · Berry Brick House, 208 West Queen Street, Hillsborough

    In 1943 F. S. McLarty and his wife, who had bought the Berry Brick House in 1936 and added dormers, sold it to Mr. and Mrs. F. Ross Porter.

    Subject: Berry Brick House

  79. William Meade Prince becomes head of the university's art department

    Appointment, election or service · Chapel Hill

    William Meade Prince took charge of the University of North Carolina's art department during World War II, while also making posters and drawings for wartime causes.

  80. The Naval ROTC moves into its new armory on South Columbia Street

    Founding or opening · NROTC Naval Armory, 221 South Columbia Street, Chapel Hill

    The NROTC took over its new armory in January 1943, with classrooms in use by January 7 and a drill hall whose mezzanine served as a ship's bridge for drills. It is the first NROTC unit's building in North Carolina and has housed ROTC training ever since.

  81. The NROTC holds its annual dance to open the new armory

    Naming or commemoration · NROTC Naval Armory, 221 South Columbia Street, Chapel Hill

    The Naval ROTC dedicated its armory with its annual Navy dance on the drill deck, with the Navy B-1 Band, the Black enlisted musicians stationed with the Pre-Flight School, named as the band. The drill deck stayed a favorite dance floor through the war.

  82. Person and Caswell sign a tri-county library contract with Orange

    Founding or opening · Confederate Memorial Library, Hillsborough

    On March 29, 1943 the Person and Caswell library boards signed a contract forming a tri-county library arrangement with Orange, already in effect, which used state aid to serve all three counties by bookmobile, with its Orange office in the Confederate Memorial Library. Chatham dropped out of the earlier arrangement, which from 1941 had joined Person, Orange and Chatham.

    Subject: Orange County Public Library

  83. Navy Hall opens as the Pre-Flight School's visitors' entrance and cadet lounge

    Founding or opening · Navy Hall (later Jackson Hall), UNC campus, Chapel Hill

    Designed by Archie Royal Davis and first drawn as a temporary office and hostess building, Navy Hall opened in March 1943 with offices for the Pre-Flight School and recreation rooms for cadets; the public was invited in on March 21.

    People: Archie Royal Davis

    Subject: Navy Pre-Flight School

  84. The Pre-Flight School marks its first anniversary with a review in Kenan Stadium

    Naming or commemoration · Kenan Stadium, Chapel Hill

    The school celebrated the first anniversary of its commissioning with a regimental review in Kenan Stadium. Commander Graff gave the Silver Star to Cadet Anthony E. Kujawinski for gallantry in combat, and Dean Francis F. Bradshaw brought the university's greetings.

    People: Francis Foster Bradshaw

    Subject: Kenan Stadium · Navy Pre-Flight School

  85. President Frank Porter Graham dedicates the remodeled Forest Theatre

    Naming or commemoration · Forest Theatre, Battle Park, Chapel Hill

    President Frank Porter Graham dedicated the rebuilt Forest Theatre at the opening of the Playmakers' A Midsummer Night's Dream in May 1943. The Daily Tar Heel set that opening for Friday, May 14; Henderson's chronology gives May 19.

    People: Frank Porter Graham

    Subject: Battle Park · Forest Theatre

  86. Governor Broughton speaks at a Pre-Flight School graduation in Kenan Stadium

    Publication, speech or performance · Kenan Stadium, Chapel Hill

    Broughton and UNC president Frank Porter Graham both spoke at Navy Pre-Flight School graduation exercises in Kenan Stadium on June 2, 1943.

    Part of The Navy Pre-Flight School at Chapel Hill, 1942–1945 · 13 events

    People: Frank Porter Graham

    Subject: Kenan Stadium · Navy Pre-Flight School

  87. The Navy V-12 program opens at UNC with about 1,300 men

    Founding or opening · University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill

    The Navy's V-12 college program, which paid for future officers to finish degrees, began at UNC with an entering class of about 1,300, straining dormitory and dining space already taken up by the Pre-Flight School. It absorbed the Naval ROTC until 1945.

  88. CIO Local 403 demands vacations for janitors and equal pay for women campus workers

    Protest or organizing · University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill

    The union protested a ruling that cut vacations for hourly janitors and asked for ten days of sick leave for laundry workers. It also asked that women in campus buildings be paid the same as men for nearly the same work.

  89. A Tree Grows in Brooklyn, written in Chapel Hill, is published

    Publication, speech or performance · North Street, Chapel Hill

    Smith wrote the novel in a one-room house on North Street in Chapel Hill, rising about half past five and working against the chimney wall to keep warm. Harper published it on 17 August 1943 and it sold more than 150,000 copies within two weeks.

  90. The Burke grave plot is given to the State of North Carolina

    Property or economic transaction · Thomas Burke grave, Tyaquin, near Hillsborough

    The university chapter of the Sons of the American Revolution gave the state the small plot holding Governor Thomas Burke's grave. The chapter had cared for the site since students found it in 1923 and was raising money for a monument.

    Subject: Thomas Burke’s grave (Tyaquin)

  91. Chapel Hill High School moves into the old Hume house on West Franklin Street

    Founding or opening · Hume house, West Franklin Street, Chapel Hill

    After fourteen months of classes in the Baptist church following the 1942 fire, the high school moved into the former Hume house, once the Hogan house and the Zeta Beta Tau house, owned by Caesar Cone. It held the principal's office, the library and four classrooms, with larger classes in the elementary school basement.

    Subject: Chapel Hill High School

  92. Reader's Digest profiles Albert Coates and the Institute of Government

    Publication, speech or performance · Institute of Government, Chapel Hill

    Roving editor J. P. McEvoy visited Chapel Hill that summer, and his article, titled 'Don't Shoot Your Sheriff: Teach Him,' ran in the October issue. It brought Coates speaking invitations from several states and an offer from founder DeWitt Wallace to pay him to tour the country, which Coates declined.

    Subject: Institute of Government

  93. A one-story brick store is built at 109 East King Street

    Construction or physical change · 109 East King Street, Hillsborough

    A three-bay brick commercial building with a central entrance between large multi-light display windows was put up at 109 East King Street around 1944.

  94. Charles S. Mangum Jr. sells the old Mangum house on East Rosemary Street to Betty Smith

    315 East Rosemary Street, Chapel Hill

    Charles S. Mangum Jr. inherited the old Mangum house at East Rosemary and Hillsborough streets from his aunt, Mary Elizabeth Mangum Wilson, who died in 1944, and sold it that year to the novelist Betty Smith.

    People: Betty Smith

  95. Coates publishes his first history of the Institute of Government, paid for by DeWitt Wallace

    Publication, speech or performance · Institute of Government, Chapel Hill

    In place of a speaking tour, Coates wrote a 76-page account of how the Institute grew out of his law classroom, issued under the Popular Government name in the National University Extension Association's studies series. Wallace paid for 30,000 copies for national distribution, and on the advice of Louis R. Wilson and W. T. Couch, Coates took out the profanity before it went to press.

    People: William T. Couch · Louis Round Wilson

    Subject: Institute of Government

  96. Governor Broughton asks the Institute of Government to help towns plan for after the war

    Appointment, election or service · Institute of Government, Chapel Hill

    As Allied armies advanced across Europe, Broughton called on the short-staffed Institute to help plan for life in North Carolina's towns and cities once the war ended. State payments for this work and for civil defense training steadied the Institute's budget.

    People: Albert Coates

    Subject: Institute of Government

  97. John N. Couch chairs the university botany department

    Chapel Hill

    John N. Couch succeeded his teacher William C. Coker as chairman of the botany department in 1944 and led it until 1960. He was given a Kenan professorship in 1945.

    People: William Chambers Coker

  98. Len Hearn buys the East Main Street building his family grocery rents

    Property or economic transaction · Hearn's Grocery, 102 East Main Street, Carrboro

    After John Hearn died his son Len ran the store as L. D. Hearn, bought the building in 1944 and extended the back three times. It became L. D. Hearn & Son in the 1950s and, under grandson James, Hearn's Grocery.

  99. Polio and vaccination

    Storyline · 11 events · Orange County

    Polio closed the county’s schools in 1944 and 1948, the University pool in 1950 and two UNC football games in 1952, and the county’s polio chapter bought iron lungs. The first Salk vaccinations reached first and second graders in 1955, and more than 25,000 residents took the Sabin oral vaccine on one Sunday in 1964.

  100. Pritchard's drugstore on East Franklin Street closes after its owner dies

    Closing or ending · Pritchard's drugstore, East Franklin Street, Chapel Hill

    James Manning Pritchard died and his drugstore shut. Rachel Crook sold pecans in the empty store for a short while before the North Carolina Cafeteria, formerly on Fraternity Row, bought the building and moved in.

    People: James Manning Pritchard

  101. Samuel Selden becomes acting head of Dramatic Art and director of the Playmakers

    Appointment, election or service · University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill

    After Koch's death in August 1944, Samuel Selden took over as acting head of the Department of Dramatic Art and director of the Playmakers.

    People: Samuel Selden · Frederick H. Koch

    Subject: Carolina Playmakers

  102. The B'nai B'rith Hillel Foundation buys a lot on Cameron Avenue

    Property or economic transaction · Chapel Hill

    The North Carolina B'nai B'rith Hillel Foundation bought a lot on Cameron Avenue in Chapel Hill and later built a house there where a rabbi held services for students and townspeople.

  103. W. B. Thompson sells the Chapel Hill News, which becomes the News of Orange County

    Property or economic transaction · Orange County

    W. B. Thompson, who had published the Chapel Hill News since its start, sold it in 1944 to J. Roy Parker. The paper was renamed the News of Orange County.

    Subject: The News of Orange County

  104. The Scuttlebutt, a Navy canteen, opens on the UNC campus

    Founding or opening · South Columbia Street, UNC campus, Chapel Hill

    The Scuttlebutt, a canteen built as an extension of the Book Exchange for the Navy and Marine trainees on campus, opened on the morning of January 11, 1944, after months of delay over a sugar contract. Pete Pulley managed it, and at first only trainees with Swain Hall meal tickets could buy there.

    Subject: The Scuttlebutt

  105. Orange County FSA honors 15 Black farm ownership borrowers

    Award or honor · Hillsborough

    The county Farm Security Administration office awarded certificates of merit to 15 Black farm ownership borrowers, former tenants it had helped to buy farms. By March 1944 the county had 22 approved tenant-purchase loans.

    People: Robert Hughes

  106. The Navy B-1 Band leaves Chapel Hill for service in Hawaii

    Closing or ending · Chapel Hill

    The B-1 Band, the first Black Navy unit whose members held a rating above messman, cook or steward, was sent from Chapel Hill to Hawaii after nearly two years of playing across the campus and town.

  107. Vic and Rebecca Huggins run Huggins Hardware on East Franklin Street

    Founding or opening · East Franklin Street, Chapel Hill

    The Hugginses bought the University Hardware Company and opened Huggins Hardware on March 22, 1944, adding kitchenware and general merchandise to the keys, paint and tools. They sold the store in 1968.

  108. Rev. Joe Brooks is a Ridge Road leader in the Black farm families' wartime food drive

    Orange County

    Black neighborhood, 4-H and home demonstration club leaders across Orange County pooled efforts to produce and conserve more food for their families and the war effort in 1944. Rev. Joe Brooks was one of the leaders named for the Ridge Road neighborhood.

    Subject: Home demonstration clubs

  109. Hillsborough well-baby clinics are held separately for Black and white babies

    Health or relief action · Hillsborough

    The Junior Service League and the district health department held two well-baby clinics each month in Hillsborough, one for Black babies and one for white babies, focused on preventive care.

    Part of Public health in rural Orange County · 28 events

  110. Quakers organize the Chapel Hill Monthly Meeting of Friends

    Founding or opening · Chapel Hill

    The Chapel Hill Monthly Meeting was organized, the first Friends meeting in Orange County since the old Eno Meeting was laid down about a century earlier. It had no building and had bought a lot on Highway 54.

    People: Dudley Dewitt Carroll · Richard Junius Mendenhall Hobbs

  111. District health officer reports the season's typhoid cases

    Disaster or outbreak · Orange County

    Dr. William P. Richardson, district health officer, reported two confirmed cases of typhoid fever in the district in the past two months, one in Chatham County and one in Person County, with a suspected case in Person County and indirect reports of two cases in Orange County that health officials had not been able to confirm.

  112. Mrs. E. G. Danziger buys Henrietta Smedes's house on Hillsborough Street

    Property or economic transaction · 211 Hillsborough Street, Chapel Hill

    The Danzigers, Austrian refugees whose candy and pastry shop was on Franklin Street, bought the 1919 house at 211 Hillsborough Street from Henrietta Smedes, who had retired from the university staff. That September they advertised their Forest Hills house for sale.

  113. Wartime day nursery opens for the children of Black working mothers in Chapel Hill and Carrboro

    Founding or opening · Chapel Hill

    A federally funded day nursery for Black children opened at the Orange County Training School, caring for thirty children aged two to six from 7:15 a.m. to 6:30 p.m. while their mothers worked. Parents paid for food, and by October 1944 two nursery schools were running, one in the Masonic building on the edge of Carrboro and one on Brooks Street.

    Subject: Orange County Training School / Lincoln High School

  114. The Chapel Hill Baptist Church dedicates its paid-off building

    Naming or commemoration · Chapel Hill Baptist Church, Chapel Hill

    Twenty years after moving in, the congregation held a dedication service for its church, now fully paid for and redecorated. Howell read a short form of his history at the service; the church then had over six hundred members and no debt.

    People: A. C. Howell

    Subject: University Baptist Church

  115. Frederick Koch dies and is buried in the old Chapel Hill Cemetery

    Life event · Old Chapel Hill Cemetery

    Koch, who taught dramatic literature and playwriting at UNC for twenty-six years and organized the Carolina Playmakers, died on August 16, 1944 and was buried in the old Chapel Hill Cemetery. Samuel Selden succeeded him as chair of the Department of Dramatic Art and director of the Playmakers.

    People: Samuel Selden

    Subject: Old Chapel Hill Cemetery · Carolina Playmakers

  116. Orange County schools stay closed until after September 18 during the polio epidemic

    Disaster or outbreak · Orange County

    On the recommendation of the State Health Officer and Governor Broughton, the State Board of Education kept all North Carolina public schools closed until after September 18 because of the infantile paralysis epidemic. Orange County schools, which Superintendent R. H. Claytor had planned to open September 14, were held back with the rest, though teachers still reported on September 14.

    People: R. H. Claytor

  117. Orange County's Black home demonstration clubs hold their first dress contest in Hillsboro

    Competition or sporting achievement · Hillsborough

    Women from every Black home demonstration club in the county modeled thirty-six dresses, suits and accessories they had made at the Hillsboro high school auditorium. By 1946 the clubs met monthly in rural communities including White Oak Grove, Jordan Grove, Cool Springs, Cedar Grove, Harmony, Ridge Road, St. Mary's, Sartin and Carr.

    Subject: Home demonstration clubs

  118. O. David Garvin becomes health officer of the district covering Orange County

    Appointment, election or service · Orange County

    Garvin came to the district in 1944 on assignment from the North Carolina State Board of Health and the Public Health Service during the war emergency, after a year and a half in Scotland and Richmond counties. A later account of his resignation gave his starting date as September 4, 1944.

  119. Jeter and Ethel Neville buy a corner lot at Cobb and Broad streets in Carrboro

    Property or economic transaction · Jeter and Ethel Neville House, 107 Cobb Street, Carrboro

    On September 13, 1944, Jeter and Ethel Neville bought a small lot at the northwest corner of Cobb and Broad streets, in the Lloyd-Broad section of the Black Northside neighborhood, from Guilford Realty and Insurance Company. Jeter Neville was a janitor at Northside Elementary School.

    Subject: Jeter and Ethel Neville House

  120. Smith Furniture Company opens on West King Street in Hillsborough

    Founding or opening · 126 West King Street, Hillsborough

    Smith Furniture Company opened in the building formerly occupied by the Scott store, selling furniture, stoves and rugs. R. J. Smith ran it as proprietor, and it was still selling G-E appliances and heaters on West King Street in the 1960s.

  121. A granite monument is dedicated at Governor Thomas Burke's grave

    Naming or commemoration · Thomas Burke grave, Latta plantation, near Hillsborough

    The Sons of the American Revolution and the Lloyd Memorial Association dedicated a memorial monolith at Burke's grave on the Latta plantation northeast of Hillsborough and presented it to the state. Governor J. Melville Broughton and Archibald Henderson were among the speakers.

    People: J. Melville Broughton · Archibald Henderson

    Subject: Thomas Burke’s grave (Tyaquin)

  122. James Freeland opens the Fairview Bowling Alley in Hillsborough

    Founding or opening · Fairview, Hillsborough

    James Freeland opened the Fairview Bowling Alley in a building he put up himself, casting the cinder blocks and laying the concrete floor. It opened with three duckpin alleys and room for a tenpin lane.

    People: James J. Freeland

    Subject: Fairview Bowling Alley

  123. Home demonstration clubs report the year's work at Achievement Day in Hillsboro

    Statistic or record · Hillsborough

    At the county home demonstration clubs' Achievement Day at the courthouse, the home agent reported that women had canned an average of 350 quarts and that 94 percent made their own clothes, and that the women's curb market in Chapel Hill had taken in $30,280.68 over the past year. Clubs from Caldwell, Carr, Cedar Grove, Efland, New Hope, Orange Grove, St. Mary's, Schley and Murphy had made 699 garments and 744 other articles for the Red Cross.

    Subject: Home demonstration clubs · Orange County Courthouse, Hillsborough

  124. The county school board sells the closed Harvey's Chapel schoolhouse

    Property or economic transaction · Harvey's Chapel community, about three miles from Hillsborough

    The Orange County Board of Education approved the sale of the Harvey's Chapel schoolhouse, a school for Black children about three miles from Hillsboro. It had closed several years before, its pupils sent to the Hillsboro school, and Mary E. Breeze bought the building.

  125. The Playmakers present the 100th program in their experimental series of new plays

    Statistic or record · Smith Hall (Playmakers Theatre), Cameron Avenue, UNC campus, Chapel Hill

    On December 12, 1944 the Playmakers gave the 100th program in their Experimental Series, the evenings where student plays were staged and the audience then talked back to the author.

    Subject: Carolina Playmakers · Smith Hall (Playmakers Theatre)

  126. Commissioners' chairman Collier Cobb Jr. lays a county revaluation plan before the Chapel Hill aldermen

    Chapel Hill

    Collier Cobb Jr., chairman of the Orange County commissioners, told the Chapel Hill aldermen the county would raise the tax valuation of plainly under-valued property for 1945, naming Franklin Street business property, suburban lots selling far above farm-land values and some northern tobacco land.

  127. Nelson Callahan and Morris Timmons open the Village Printshop next to the Porthole

    Founding or opening · 7 Fraternity Row, Chapel Hill

    The Village Printshop opened at 7 Fraternity Row, next door to the Porthole, run by Nelson Callahan, who had worked at the Orange Printshop since 1928, and Morris Timmons, operator of the Porthole. It did job printing by letterpress and offset.

  128. Civil rights era · 1945–1975
  129. A Negro library committee was already running library service for Black readers in Orange County

    Statistic or record · Orange County

    The committee met in September 1945 under chairman Mrs. M. D. McPherson, reported over a hundred new books received and 800 books circulated during the summer, and was assembling book kits for rural areas. Miss Annie Cameron was named as one of the people who started the library for Black residents of the county.

    People: Marinda D. McPherson

    Subject: Orange County Public Library

  130. A brick Colonial Revival office building is built at 115 East King Street

    Construction or physical change · 115 East King Street, Hillsborough

    A one-story Flemish-bond brick office building with a slate roof and a large central display window was built at 115 East King Street around 1945.

  131. A row of Colonial-style stores fills the 300 and 400 blocks of West Franklin Street

    Construction or physical change · 300 and 400 blocks of West Franklin Street, Chapel Hill

    As downtown pushed west after the war, an unbroken row of Williamsburg-inspired shops went up along West Franklin Street, many designed by Archie Davis.

    People: Archie Royal Davis

  132. A. H. Poe buys Ben Strowd's Pure Oil station on West Franklin Street for his DeSoto dealership

    Property or economic transaction · Pure Oil Service Station, West Franklin Street, Chapel Hill

    Poe bought the Pure Oil service station from Ben Strowd and moved his DeSoto car agency into it.

  133. Andy Griffith plays his first role, in The Gondoliers at Memorial Hall

    Memorial Hall, Chapel Hill

    Andy Griffith, who had arrived at Carolina in July 1944, auditioned on a whim and made his stage debut in a Carolina Playmakers production of Gilbert and Sullivan's The Gondoliers at Memorial Hall.

    Subject: Memorial Hall · Carolina Playmakers

  134. Black mason John Wesley Campbell and his sons build the stone Neville House in Carrboro

    Construction or physical change · Jeter and Ethel Neville House, 107 Cobb Street, Carrboro

    John Wesley Campbell and his sons, with Jeter Neville and mason Earnest Farrar, built the Nevilles' one-and-a-half-story bungalow of granite fieldstone trimmed in red brick, with an arcaded porch and a star and crescent moon set in stone beside the front windows. Campbell's son Handy said the stones came by army truck from Chatham County; the house is the least altered of Campbell's five 1940s stone buildings in Northside.

    People: John Wesley Campbell

    Subject: Jeter and Ethel Neville House

  135. Carl Snavely returns to coach UNC football

    Appointment, election or service · Chapel Hill

    Snavely came back to Chapel Hill in 1945 after being assured that his program would have the full support of the administration. His 1946 to 1949 teams, built around Charlie Justice and returning servicemen, won two Southern Conference championships and played in three bowl games.

    People: Charlie Justice

  136. Classics professor J. P. Harland builds the first postwar house in Laurel Hill

    Construction or physical change · Harland House, 608 Laurel Hill Road, Laurel Hill, Chapel Hill

    His shingled Colonial Revival cottage on Laurel Hill Road has an attached garage wing turned to face the street. Earlier Laurel Hill houses kept their garages at the far end of the driveway, so the nomination reads the wing as a sign of the car's new place in the suburb.

  137. Fitch Lumber moves its Mebane business to Carrboro after the Mebane branch burns

    Property or economic transaction · Fitch Lumber Company, Carrboro

    A. B. Fitch and all of the firm's Mebane operations came to Carrboro, and the Lloyd Street plant was enlarged around the same time.

  138. Four Orange County farmers run hybrid corn demonstrations

    Statistic or record · Orange County

    Four farmers ran corn demonstrations in 1945 on Experiment Station lines, using hybrid seed, shallow cultivation, close spacing and heavy nitrogen. The results showed yields could be more than doubled.

  139. George Livas becomes sole owner of the Carolina Coffee Shop

    Property or economic transaction · Carolina Coffee Shop, Chapel Hill

    George Livas's partnership with James Gust ended and Livas became sole owner of the Carolina Coffee Shop, which he ran until his death in 1956.

  140. Hesslein and Company buys the Belle-Vue mill, ending local ownership

    Property or economic transaction · Hillsborough

    Belle-Vue Manufacturing Company had been run from Hillsborough since 1904, lately under L. E. Beard. In 1945 Hesslein and Company bought it and spent over half a million dollars on new machinery and on baths for the mill village houses.

    Subject: Bellevue Mill

  141. Homemont is platted as a Black neighborhood north of Hillsborough

    Construction or physical change · Homemont, Hillsborough

    Laid out in 1945 with gently curving streets and evenly spaced lots on Torain and Lawndale streets, Homemont filled mostly in the 1950s and 1960s with small Minimal Traditional houses, several of exposed concrete block, built by more than one builder for sale or rent. Next to a trash dump, it had no paved streets until the 1970s.

  142. John Scott Trotter sells the Hill House on West Franklin Street to the Baptist church

    Property or economic transaction · Hill House, West Franklin Street, Chapel Hill

    Trotter sold the Hill House, next to the Baptist church, to the congregation, which went on renting out its apartments. In 1958 the town's first public library opened in one of its rooms.

  143. John Wesley Campbell builds a fieldstone house for a pastor on North Graham Street

    Construction or physical change · 214 North Graham Street, Northside, Chapel Hill

    John Wesley Campbell designed and built a large fieldstone house at 214 North Graham Street in Northside for a local pastor, finished in 1945 and one of the first houses on the street. It is the largest of his four stone houses in the neighborhood, with a broad arched corner porch and a stone end chimney.

    Part of Historic Black neighborhoods of Chapel Hill and Carrboro · 58 events

    People: John Wesley Campbell

  144. Laurel Hill Road is extended south beyond the 1927 plat

    Construction or physical change · Laurel Hill Road, Laurel Hill, Chapel Hill

    On the 1927 plat the road stopped at the south edge of 603 Laurel Hill Road. The extension carried it south toward the line later taken by the 15-501 Bypass and opened lots for postwar houses.

  145. Mason Alfred Barbee builds his own house on Jones Ferry Road

    Construction or physical change · Jones Ferry Road, Carrboro

    After working at the Carrboro munitions plant during the war, the African American mason Alfred Barbee spent three years building his own house on Jones Ferry Road near the Strayhorn family homes, using his carpentry as well as his masonry skills.

    People: Alfred David Barbee Sr.

  146. Morehead creates the foundation behind his Chapel Hill gifts

    Founding or opening · Chapel Hill

    In 1945 Morehead created the Morehead Foundation to pay for the Morehead Building on the campus at Chapel Hill and to establish the scholarship that carries his name.

    Subject: Morehead Planetarium

  147. Only 950 Orange County farmers have electricity

    Statistic or record · Orange County

    A dozen years after the county's pioneering rural power line, only 950 Orange County farmers had electric service in 1945.

  148. R. B. House becomes the first chancellor at Chapel Hill

    Appointment, election or service · Chapel Hill

    North Carolina created chancellorships for its three campuses in 1945, and President Frank Porter Graham turned to House, who had been executive secretary from 1926 and dean of administration from 1934. House held the post until 1957, the longest chancellorship at Chapel Hill.

    People: Frank Porter Graham

  149. The Fellowship of Southern Churchmen runs its headquarters from Chapel Hill

    Chapel Hill

    The Fellowship of Southern Churchmen, an interracial group of Southern church people founded in 1934, kept its headquarters in Chapel Hill while Nelle Morton was general secretary from 1945 to 1949, working on race relations, labor conditions and the rural South.

    Part of Chapel Hill freedom movement, 1960–1964 · 35 events

    People: Charles M. Jones · Anne Queen

  150. The State Eugenics Board begins a county-wide study of mental illness and disability in Orange County

    Statistic or record · Orange County

    The North Carolina Eugenics Board chose Orange, a county of about 24,000 people that it judged typical of the state, to measure how many residents had been labeled mentally ill or mentally deficient, with an eye to its sterilization program. Field secretary George H. Lawrence gathered the records of the board, state hospitals, Caswell Training School, the draft board, school group tests and the county welfare and health departments.

  151. The Wesley Foundation takes up Methodist student work at Chapel Hill

    Founding or opening · Chapel Hill Methodist Church, Chapel Hill

    Student work had lapsed for lack of money in 1931. After a committee of the Wesley Foundation Commission and the church drew up a plan, the commission raised its grant in December 1944, and Roy Everett came as the foundation's first director in the summer of 1945.

    Subject: University United Methodist Church

  152. The former Alberta mill reopens as Carrboro Woolen Mills

    Founding or opening · Carrboro

    After fifteen idle years the modernized Mill No. 4 building reopened as Carrboro Woolen Mills, which ran until the early 1960s.

    Subject: Carr Mill

  153. The old campus infirmary is renamed Abernethy Hall

    Chapel Hill

    The university renamed its 1907 infirmary building Abernethy Hall in honor of Dr. Eric A. Abernethy, the university physician from 1919 to 1933. The infirmary itself moved to a new building in 1946.

    Subject: University infirmary (Abernethy Hall)

  154. Town electricity and water are extended to West Hillsborough

    Construction or physical change · West Hillsborough

    Before the town took over in the late 1940s, the mills supplied power and water to their workers, cutting electricity to the houses during the day so the machinery could run, which left families without refrigeration.

  155. UNC begins marking Hinton James Day each February 12

    Naming or commemoration · Chapel Hill

    The university started Hinton James Day in 1945, during the sesquicentennial of its first student's arrival. It falls on February 12 and now also honors other Carolina firsts, including Sallie Walker Stockard and Henry Owl.

    People: Henry Owl · Sallie Walker Stockard

  156. UNC establishes its Communication Center

    Founding or opening · Chapel Hill

    The university set up a Communication Center at Chapel Hill in 1945. Departments of radio and religion followed in 1947.

  157. Newspaper describes the work of Orange County's public health nurses

    Publication, speech or performance · Orange County

    A News of Orange County piece described the county public health nurses' duties: school inspections, immunization against diphtheria and smallpox, well-baby clinics twice a month, a monthly maternity clinic, tuberculosis and venereal disease clinics, orthopedic referrals, and the wartime maternity and infant care program for servicemen's wives.

  158. The Saturday Evening Post profiles Coates as 'The Ugly Duckling at Chapel Hill'

    Publication, speech or performance · Institute of Government, Chapel Hill

    Warner Olivier's article cast Coates as the law school's misfit who had overcome objections to build an Institute admired around the country. It opened with a photograph of Albert and Gladys Coates in front of the Institute building.

    People: Gladys Hall Coates

    Subject: Institute of Government

  159. Black laundry workers take complaints of racial pay discrimination to the Fair Employment Practice Committee

    Protest or organizing · University Laundry, Chapel Hill

    Press operators Bessie Hargraves and Etta Guthrie said white folders earned more because of race. At President Graham's request the personnel officer investigated, and his memo denied that race set the pay.

    People: Frank Porter Graham

  160. Black rural school districts more than double their Red Cross gifts

    Orange County

    A Red Cross drive among the county's rural Black residents, run through the rural schools by A. L. Stanback and county agent M. C. Burt, closed with $472.55 from 428 people, against $224 the year before. Ridge Road district, with Mrs. A. A. Burt as principal, gave $36.32.

    People: A. L. Stanback · Joe Bethel Brooks

  161. The Farmers Exchange opens its Carrboro branch

    Founding or opening · Carrboro

    The cooperative's Carrboro unit opened in March 1945, joining its Hillsborough branch. In the year to June 1952 the two branches bought $303,096 in produce and sold $1,149,392 in supplies.

    Subject: Farmers Mutual Exchange

  162. Bowling alley owner James Freeland knocks out a Black man who asked to bowl

    Violence or armed conflict · Fairview Bowling Alley, Hillsborough

    Lorenzo Thompson, a Black man, came into the Fairview Bowling Alley late at night, said he had bowled up north and would not leave when told he could not bowl. Owner James Freeland knocked him unconscious and dragged him outside, and Thompson needed stitches.

    People: James J. Freeland

    Subject: Fairview Bowling Alley

  163. James Freeland opens a barbecue pit behind his Fairview Bowling Alley

    Founding or opening · Fairview Bowling Alley, Hillsborough

    James Freeland opened a barbecue pit behind the Fairview Bowling Alley and began serving barbecue every day. As with the alley, he built most of it himself.

    People: James J. Freeland

    Subject: Fairview Bowling Alley

  164. The Terrace View supper club opens on the Greensboro road west of Chapel Hill

    Founding or opening · NC 54 (Greensboro highway) about five miles west of Chapel Hill, now 2509 Reeves Road

    The Terrace View, a dining and dancing club about five miles out the Greensboro road, was "christened" on Saturday, May 26, 1945 with a private ATO fraternity party held partly on its roof garden. By December it was open to the public every night, for couples only.

    Subject: Terrace View supper club

  165. Coates deeds the Institute of Government building to the university

    Property or economic transaction · Institute of Government building, East Franklin Street, Chapel Hill

    After the legislature appropriated $44,000 to pay off the rest of the mortgage, Coates transferred title to the Institute property to the University of North Carolina. This completed the 1941 merger plan, under which the university would take the building once it was clear of debt.

    Subject: Institute of Government

  166. The Latta Cooperative Dairy opens its milk plant in Hillsborough

    Founding or opening · Hillsborough

    Organized in 1944, the Latta Cooperative Dairy built a small 500-gallon plant in Hillsborough that began work in June 1945. It bought milk from about thirty nearby farmers and ran routes in Hillsborough, Mebane and Durham.

  167. Chapel Hill celebrates the end of the war with Japan on Franklin Street

    Naming or commemoration · Franklin Street, Chapel Hill

    As the news spread that evening, townspeople, students and Pre-Flight School cadets filled Franklin Street while the campus bells rang and the fire siren sounded. Revelers draped the trees with toilet paper and lit a bonfire in the central block, and a policeman who tried to put it out was pushed aside.

    Subject: Navy Pre-Flight School

  168. The National Munitions plant in Mill No. 7 closes

    Closing or ending · Mill No. 7, Carrboro

    The shell-loading plant that National Munitions Corporation had run in Mill No. 7 since 1942 closed in August 1945. At its peak it employed 1,600 people, many of them former mill hands assembling anti-aircraft rounds, and it won the Army-Navy E award for production three times.

  169. The eugenics study counts Orange County draft rejections on mental grounds

    Statistic or record · Orange County

    Of about 6,000 Orange County men aged 18 to 38 registered for the draft by August 1945, 2,431 were accepted and 1,460 rejected; 622 of the rejections, 42.3 percent, were for a mental condition, and 357 of those were classed as mental deficiency. Lawrence warned that 133 of the 357 had simply failed the minimum intelligence standard, a category he said often stood in for illiteracy.

  170. William T. Couch leaves the University of North Carolina Press

    Appointment, election or service · Chapel Hill

    Couch resigned in August 1945, after thirteen years as director, to lead the University of Chicago Press.

  171. UNC holds a farewell assembly for the Navy Pre-Flight School

    Closing or ending · University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill

    As the war ended the university held a formal assembly to say goodbye to the Pre-Flight School; Chancellor R. B. House had told the Navy that any peacetime Navy program should fold into the NROTC and the regular degree.

    People: R. B. House

    Subject: Navy Pre-Flight School

  172. The Negro Community Center opens for community use

    Founding or opening · Chapel Hill

    After the Navy Pre-Flight School wound down, the community center returned to town control on October 24, 1945 and opened to Black residents of Chapel Hill and Carrboro. By December a nursery school filled the basement, and an all-Black board chaired by Hubert Roberson ran the building under the Town Recreation Commission.

    Subject: Hargraves Community Center

  173. Navy officers move into the NROTC Armory as the V-12 program ends

    Construction or physical change · NROTC Naval Armory, 221 South Columbia Street, Chapel Hill

    With the Pre-Flight and V-12 programs closed and remaining V-12 men absorbed into an enlarged NROTC, the Navy officers who had worked in Navy Hall moved their offices to the NROTC Armory.

  174. An old house said to contain part of the Nunn Tavern is moved across Kenan Street for the bus station

    Construction or physical change · 405 West Franklin Street, at Kenan Street, Chapel Hill

    To clear the lot for the new bus station, a large two-story house was hauled across Kenan Street to 405 West Franklin, where W. W. McCauley later lived. Bryant traces the house to a section of the Nunn Tavern of about 1776, which had already been moved to this lot in 1923 when the Baptist church was built at Franklin and Columbia.

  175. Black and white health education students from North Carolina College and UNC train together

    Health or relief action · Orange-Person-Chatham District Health Department field training center; Chapel Hill

    From 1945 UNC faculty taught a public health education program for Black students at North Carolina College for Negroes in Durham. Lucy Morgan brought the two groups together in a journal club that met in Durham and Chapel Hill, sent them to field work together and held joint open houses, at times drawing the window shades in Chapel Hill; a 1946 photograph shows both groups at the Orange-Person-Chatham district's field training center.

  176. Carolina Coach Company builds a Williamsburg-style bus station on West Franklin Street

    Construction or physical change · 311 West Franklin Street, Chapel Hill

    The bus station at 311 West Franklin Street had a pedimented portico, a cupola with a weathervane and other Colonial details.

  177. Central High School adds a twelfth grade

    Statistic or record · West Union and North Nash streets, Hillsborough

    Central High School, the county's high school for Black students in Hillsborough, added a twelfth grade for the 1946-47 school year. By 1949-50 it served 443 elementary and 206 high school students.

    People: A. L. Stanback

    Subject: Central High and Central Elementary, Hillsborough

  178. Charles Crisp Oliver builds an auto and tractor repair shop at the Cedar Grove crossroads

    Construction or physical change · 5206 Efland-Cedar Grove Road, Cedar Grove

    Oliver put up a one-story concrete block garage with a stepped parapet on the lot where his father, T. L. Oliver, had kept a blacksmith shop early in the century.

  179. Charlie Justice chooses Carolina and begins four seasons at Chapel Hill

    Life event · Chapel Hill

    Justice was one of the most sought after players in the country after playing for the Bainbridge Navy team, and he chose Chapel Hill over South Carolina and Duke. He played tailback for Carl Snavely from 1946 to 1949, gaining 170 yards on 17 carries against Virginia in his freshman season.

    People: Carl Snavely

  180. Commerce dean Dudley D. Carroll builds a small brick house on Laurel Hill Road for an in-law

    Construction or physical change · 102 Laurel Hill Road, Laurel Hill, Chapel Hill

    The one-story side-gabled house has a traditional form with a large transom and sidelights at the door. English professor Blyden Jackson later owned it.

    People: Blyden Jackson

  181. Henry W. Lewis joins the Institute of Government faculty

    Chapel Hill

    After his discharge from the Army, Lewis joined the small faculty of the Institute of Government at Chapel Hill, where he worked mainly on election law and the property tax.

    People: Henry Wilkins Lewis

    Subject: Institute of Government

  182. Johnson-Strowd-Ward opens a furniture store on West Franklin Street

    Founding or opening · Johnson-Strowd-Ward, West Franklin Street, Chapel Hill

    The furniture firm began in one of A. H. Poe's car showrooms and in 1947 moved further west on West Franklin into a building put up for it.

  183. Katherine Kennedy Carmichael succeeds Inez Koonce Stacy as dean of women

    Appointment, election or service · Chapel Hill

    Carmichael, who held a Vanderbilt doctorate in British literature, became dean of women at Chapel Hill in 1946, succeeding Inez Koonce Stacy, adviser to women from 1919 and dean of women from 1942. She also taught an introductory literature course for the English department.

  184. Kenneth M. Brinkhous chairs the UNC Department of Pathology

    Appointment, election or service · Chapel Hill

    Brinkhous succeeded James B. Bullitt as chair of pathology at the UNC School of Medicine in 1946 and held the post until 1973, building a research program in thrombosis and hemostasis. His department invented the partial thromboplastin time (PTT) test used in clinical laboratories.

    People: James Bell Bullitt

    Subject: UNC School of Medicine

  185. Lee County joins the health district serving Orange

    Health or relief action · Orange County

    The district health department, begun with Person County in 1935 and joined by Chatham in 1937, added Lee County in 1946.

  186. Medical dean Isaac Hall Manning is buried in the Old Chapel Hill Cemetery

    Life event · Old Chapel Hill Cemetery, South Road (NC 54) and Country Club Road, Chapel Hill

    Isaac Hall Manning (1866-1946), the physician and medical school administrator who started Hospital Savings of North Carolina, the state's first medical insurance plan, was buried in the cemetery.

    Subject: Old Chapel Hill Cemetery

  187. Morehead gives the university a million dollars for a planetarium

    Property or economic transaction · Chapel Hill

    In 1946 Morehead presented the university with one million dollars to build a planetarium and put the proposal to the Board of Trustees. The building opened in 1949.

    Subject: Morehead Planetarium

  188. Orange County farmers seed the first ladino clover plots

    Construction or physical change · Orange County

    There was no ladino clover in the county in 1945. Half a dozen farmers planted trial plots in 1946, and the next year about 200 farmers sowed more than 1,000 acres.

  189. Principal J. M. Harris refits the Murphey School lunchroom

    Appointment, election or service · Murphey School, Old NC 10 at Murphy School Road, Hillsborough vicinity

    Mrs. J. M. Harris, principal and teacher of the fifth and sixth grades, reported new chairs, tables, curtains and cooking equipment for the lunchroom in 1946. Her teachers were Myrtle Walker, Erna Link, Mrs. Chas F. Hudson and Florence Roat, and the school had a 4-H club, a chorus and a parent-teacher association.

    Subject: Murphey School

  190. Terry Sanford revives Boys State, with William Friday among its counselors

    Founding or opening · UNC campus, Chapel Hill

    After finishing his law courses, Sanford organized the first postwar Boys State session, staffed mostly by law students as counselors. Among them were William Friday, later president of the Consolidated University, whose first university paycheck came from the job, and William Aycock, a future chancellor.

    People: William B. Aycock · William C. Friday

  191. Terry Sanford serves as assistant director of UNC's Institute of Government

    Appointment, election or service · Chapel Hill

    After the Second World War Sanford returned to Chapel Hill, completed a law degree in 1946 and served two years as assistant director of the Institute of Government before opening a law practice in Fayetteville.

    Subject: Institute of Government

  192. The Campbells build a stone bungalow for carpenter Vance Thompson on Broad Street

    Construction or physical change · 201 Broad Street, Carrboro

    Next door to the Neville House, John Wesley Campbell and his sons designed and built a fieldstone Craftsman bungalow at 201 Broad Street for carpenter Vance Thompson and his family just after World War II. Land records show it finished by 1947; a Thompson son recalls moving in in 1946, and the family kept it until 2013.

    People: John Wesley Campbell

  193. The Farmers Cooperative Dairy opens its plant in Chapel Hill

    Founding or opening · Chapel Hill

    A larger cooperative of Orange, Chatham and Durham dairymen let the contract in June 1945 for a modern plant at West Franklin and Roberson streets; it was nearly finished in February 1946 and held a public open house at the end of May 1946. It handled fluid milk and made butter, ice cream and condensed milk.

  194. The Gospel Baptist Tabernacle is organized

    Founding or opening · Gospel Baptist Tabernacle

    Willie Thompson, S. E. Elmore and W. J. Johnson organized the Gospel Baptist Tabernacle and built a 250-seat church the same year, with Elmore as first pastor.

  195. The Institute builds a Highway Patrol training camp on Raleigh Road

    Construction or physical change · Raleigh Road at Country Club Road, UNC, Chapel Hill

    Coates won approval to put a training camp on the eastern edge of the campus, on the south side of Raleigh Road at Country Club Road. State Highway Department crews brought seven wooden barracks built by the Civilian Conservation Corps from Camp Mackall near Fort Bragg and set them in a U around a drill yard, with water and sewer lines run from the university gym.

    People: Albert Coates · Terry Sanford

  196. The Pick Theatre on East Franklin Street closes

    Closing or ending · Pick Theatre, East Franklin Street, Chapel Hill

    The Pick Theatre shut its doors in 1946. Its building was later remodeled for J. B. Robbins's House of Fashion, a clothing store that ran until 1969.

  197. The Public Health Service moves its Syphilis Experimental Laboratory to the School of Public Health

    Founding or opening · School of Public Health, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill

    After the Z. Smith Reynolds Foundation dropped its venereal disease research money and Johns Hopkins closed its Laboratory of Experimental Therapeutics, the Public Health Service made Chapel Hill the main research laboratory of its Venereal Disease Division. The university agreed to put up a building for it, a second closed federal laboratory sent more staff and equipment in 1949, and Dr. Harold Magnuson's Department of Experimental Medicine grew out of the work.

    People: Edward G. McGavran

    Subject: UNC School of Public Health

  198. The county buys land from Mary Vincent for a Cedar Grove school for Black children

    Property or economic transaction · Cedar Grove

    In May 1945 board members Charlie Stanford and James Compton were asked to find a site near Vincent's Store crossroads for a Cedar Grove school for Black children. The board bought the land from Mary Vincent for $1,000 in 1946.

    Subject: Cedar Grove schools

  199. The eugenics study gives group intelligence tests to Orange County elementary pupils

    Statistic or record · Orange County public schools

    As part of the Eugenics Board study, every elementary school child in the county was to be group-tested; of the first 2,900 tested, 489 (just over 15 percent) scored below 70 and 111 scored 60 or under. Lawrence conceded the tests had been built and normed mainly on white children and might not be valid for Black pupils.

  200. The school opens a Department of Public Health Nutrition under A. Hughes Bryan

    Founding or opening · Building C, north side of MacNider Hall, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill

    Rosenau had planned the department before his death, calling nutrition the South's leading public health problem, and the General Education Board paid for it. Dr. A. Hughes Bryan set up its laboratory in Building C, a temporary structure on the north side of MacNider Hall, and the department enrolled its first M.P.H. students in 1950.

    People: M. J. (Milton Joseph) Rosenau

  201. Union Grove Methodist Church builds a stone Gothic Revival church

    Construction or physical change · Union Grove Methodist Church

    Union Grove Methodist, organized a century earlier, builds a stone church in the Gothic Revival style around 1946.

    Subject: Union Grove Methodist Church

  202. Victory Village is built to house married veterans at UNC

    Construction or physical change · Chapel Hill (UNC south campus)

    As returning veterans pushed enrollment to about 6,800, the federal government put up the prefabricated metal houses of Victory Village on 65 acres of UNC's south campus in 1946. About 350 student families lived there, and the last units were torn down in the early 1970s for the expansion of UNC Hospitals.

    Part of UNC expansion and neighborhood change · 26 events

    People: Terry Sanford · William C. Friday · William B. Aycock

    Subject: UNC Medical Center (N.C. Memorial Hospital) · Victory Village and Odum Village

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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 October 3, 2026.

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