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Orange County Indexed

Chronology

Key events from Orange County history: 100 highlights to start, then the full chronology of 6,892 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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3 dated events match your filters.

Searched the full chronology of 6,892 dated events and 63 storylines, not only the highlights. Showing 1–3.Back to highlights

Entries

  1. Reconstruction and the New South · 1866–1899

  2. Founding or opening · Chapel Hill The university's medical school reopens under Richard H. Whitehead

    After Dean T. W. Harris left in 1886, the medical school closed for three years for lack of money. It reopened in 1890 as the Medical Department under Dr. Richard H. Whitehead.

  3. Property or economic transaction · Northeast corner of Franklin and Henderson streets, Chapel Hill Dr. Richard H. Whitehead buys Robert Strange MacRae's drugstore

    Dr. R. H. Whitehead, head of the revived medical school, bought MacRae's drugstore at Franklin and Henderson streets. By 1904 Pickard and Strowd's confection and grocery store was in the building.

  4. Early twentieth century · 1900–1944

  5. Construction or physical change · Caldwell Hall The medical building, Caldwell Hall, is dedicated

    On May 8, 1912, the university opened its new medical building and named it Caldwell Hall for its first president. Dr. Richard H. Lewis presented it for the trustees, and Venable and Dean Isaac H. Manning accepted it.

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A dated event is a fact, filed on the page of the subject it belongs to: a person, a place, a theme, or a named event or history. Pages are subjects, with their own works and sources; the Place, community, or institution filter also gathers the institutions that recur in the entries without a page of their own. The page opens on the highlights; a search or any filter looks through every dated event and storyline, and each filter’s counts say how many entries choosing it would show alongside the others. A storyline is a longer history that gathers related dated events, and each storyline’s page lists its own. Counts give dated events and storylines separately. 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. The correction link under the entries opens the contact form; name the entry and its date and the Friends will check the source. 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 October 3, 2026.

Two mice reading back to back against a leaf, with the hand-lettered words Friends of the Orange County Public Library
Illustration by Caldecott Medalist Matthew Cordell, gifted to the Friends 2026