Chronology

September across every year, Civil rights era: 13 dated entries from the full dataset. Back to the highlights →

1. Civil rights era · 1945–1975
2. 1947–1968 Occoneechee Speedway, HillsboroughStoryline · Hillsborough

   Bill France and four partners chartered a company in September 1947 to build a one-mile dirt oval by the old Occoneechee Farm, and it opened in June 1948. The track held a race in NASCAR's first Strictly Stock season in 1949, was renamed Orange Speedway in 1954, and closed after Richard Petty won its last race on September 15, 1968.

3. September 12, 1949 Principal C. A. McDougle opens Lincoln High School's year under its new nameSchool year opening · Chapel Hill

   The Chapel Hill Weekly reported that Lincoln High School, the town's school for Black students, would open at 8:30 a.m. on Monday, September 12, 1949, as announced by Principal C. A. McDougle. The faculty list printed with the notice includes elementary teacher Mrs. Lucille R. McDougle and high school teacher Reginald D. Smith.

4. September 1951 State says Chapel Hill's new tuberculosis hospital will take Black and white patientsLaw or policy · Chapel Hill

   A State Medical Care Commission spokesman said the $1,100,000 tuberculosis hospital under construction at Chapel Hill would treat Black and white patients. He noted that federal rules barred discrimination in federally aided hospitals but still allowed patients to be segregated.

5. September 1952 North Carolina Memorial Hospital opensFounding or opening · Chapel Hill

   North Carolina Memorial Hospital opened in September 1952 with the admission of its first patients, as the core of the new University Medical Center. Its opening allowed the UNC School of Medicine to grow from a two-year program into a four-year school.

6. September 1, 1955 Hilliard Caldwell writes the Negro Community news column for the Chapel Hill News LeaderNewspaper column · Chapel Hill

   Caldwell was named as correspondent at the head of the column, which carried news of Black Chapel Hill and asked Lincoln High School graduates to send in their college addresses for the next week's issue.

7. September 19, 1955 First Black undergraduates enter UNCChapel Hill

   LeRoy and Ralph Frasier and John Lewis Brandon, all of Durham, became UNC's first Black undergraduates when they began classes on September 19, 1955. A three-judge federal court in Greensboro had ordered the university on September 10 to process their applications, and they registered in the General College.

8. September 20, 1958 The Ackland Art Museum opensInstitutional milestone · Chapel Hill

   UNC dedicated the William Hayes Ackland Memorial Art Center on September 20, 1958, the morning after a preview for faculty. Ackland had left his bequest to Duke, which refused it, and nine years of litigation sent it to Chapel Hill; the Georgian building held galleries, an art library, classrooms, studios and offices.

9. September 21, 1958 Binkley Baptist Church organizesDated milestone · Chapel Hill

   Fifty-six charter members established the congregation, initially worshiping on campus.

10. September 1, 1964–February 15, 1966 Paul F. Sharp serves as chief administrator of UNC at Chapel HillUniversity leadership · Chapel Hill

    Sharp was chief administrative officer of the university at Chapel Hill from September 1, 1964 to February 15, 1966. His records document the state's speaker ban law and programs in medical education, and he left to become president of Drake University.

11. September 15, 1968 Final race at Orange SpeedwayHillsborough

    Richard Petty won by seven laps in the last NASCAR Grand National race at Orange Speedway near Hillsborough, as the Occoneechee track had been called since 1954. The track closed after the race.

12. September 1972 New Hope Improvement Association sues to stop the Eubanks Road landfillProtest · Eubanks Road, Chapel Hill

    Opponents of the landfill formed the New Hope Improvement Association, which drew about 500 members, and filed a lawsuit in late September 1972. The suit was denied in early October.

13. September 14, 1972 Chapel Hill aldermen voted to buy the Eubanks Road site for the county landfillLand acquisition · Chapel Hill

    Three months after the Chestnut Ridge site was abandoned, the Chapel Hill Board of Aldermen voted unanimously to buy a 200-acre tract on Eubanks Road for $235,000. An unlined landfill was then built on about 80 acres of it, next to the Black Rogers-Eubanks neighborhood.

14. September 1974 The Carolina Gay Association formsProtest or organizing · Chapel Hill

    Students who had met weekly since February 1974 as the Gay Awareness Rap Group won recognition from UNC's Dean of Student Affairs in early September 1974 and took the name Carolina Gay Association. The group met in Craige dormitory and in 1976 sponsored the first Southeastern Gay Conference.

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.