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Chronology

Key events from Orange County history: 100 highlights to start, then the full chronology of 6,171 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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3,090 dated events and 37 storylines match your filters.

Searched the full chronology of 6,171 dated events and 63 storylines, not only the highlights. Showing 3,001–3,127 of 3,127, 200 to a page.Back to highlights

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  1. Recent decades · 1976–2026

  2. 2010s
  3. Competition or sporting achievement · Chapel Hill UNC men’s basketball wins the 2017 NCAA national championship

    UNC defeated Gonzaga, 71–65, to win the national title.

  4. Founding or opening · Chapel Hill Chapel Hill is selected for a Building Integrated Communities partnership

    The Latino Migration Project chose Chapel Hill, along with Siler City, for two years of community planning support to help the town work with foreign-born residents. Town manager Roger Stancil said the town already had policies meant to make the community inclusive.

  5. Award or honor · Chapel Hill UNC's Noteworthy Firsts program honors Karen Parker

    At a reception in Kenan Stadium, UNC honored Parker among 21 people whose names were given to need-based undergraduate awards and graduate fellowships in its Noteworthy Firsts initiative, begun by Chancellor Carol Folt in 2016.

  6. Naming or commemoration · The Rocks, Chapel Hill; Cedar Grove School, Hillsborough vicinity The Rocks in Chapel Hill and Cedar Grove School join the Study List

    Among nine central and southeastern public requests approved on October 12, 2017 were William C. Coker's house, The Rocks, in Chapel Hill and the Cedar Grove School north of Hillsborough. The same meeting placed the Hillsborough survey's Ja-Max Motor Lodge and Military Academy dining hall site on the list.

  7. Naming or commemoration · Arthur C. and Mary S.A. Nash House, Chapel Hill The Arthur C. and Mary S.A. Nash House is listed in the National Register

    On October 26, 2017 the National Park Service listed the Arthur C. and Mary S.A. Nash House in Chapel Hill in the National Register of Historic Places.

  8. Publication, speech or performance · Ackland Art Museum, Chapel Hill Patrick Dougherty builds Step Right Up at the Ackland Art Museum

    The Ackland commissioned five stickwork vessels for its front lawn, built by Dougherty with 188 volunteers from maple and gum saplings harvested in Duke Forest and on Triangle Land Conservancy land.

  9. Property or economic transaction · Wilson Library, UNC campus, Chapel Hill John Blackfeather Jeffries gives his Occaneechi collection to UNC's Southern Historical Collection

    Jeffries gave the Wilson Library about 5,000 items, including photographs of Occaneechi powwows and of the replica village's construction in Hillsborough, recordings of Occaneechi, Saponi and Tutelo songs, and the band's petition for state acknowledgment of tribal status.

  10. Publication, speech or performance · Chapel Hill University Archives publishes the names of 119 enslaved people who built and worked at the university

    Drawing on research by archivists, historians and students in Jim Leloudis's fall 2017 History 398 class, the archives listed 119 enslaved people who built and labored at the university from 1795 to 1865, including November Caldwell and David Barham.

  11. Closing or ending · Chapel Hill Horace Williams Airport closes

    UNC closed Horace Williams Airport on May 15, 2018, under a November 2017 trustees resolution, citing money lost running the field and at least $1 million in needed runway repairs. The airfield dated to 1928 and had trained Navy pre-flight cadets during World War II; the Carolina North campus once planned for the site had stalled.

  12. Naming or commemoration · Chapel Hill Chapel Hill residents walk and sing in memory of Mama Dip

    The day before Mildred Council's funeral at Chapel Hill Bible Church, William Thorpe of UNC Walk For Health led a walk through Chapel Hill in her memory, with people singing "This Little Light of Mine" from porches along the way.

  13. Publication, speech or performance · Chapel Hill Danita Mason-Hogans presents Chapel Hill's civil rights timeline to the town council

    The Historic Civil Rights Commemorations Task Force, created by Mayor Pam Hemminger in the fall of 2017, gave the council a timeline of people, places and events in the town's civil rights struggle. Mason-Hogans, one of its leaders, told the council that who tells the history matters as much as the history itself.

  14. Protest or organizing · Chapel Hill Silent Sam is toppled

    On the evening of August 20, 2018, the eve of fall classes, about 250 protesters pulled UNC's Confederate monument in McCorkle Place from its pedestal at around 9:20 p.m. The toppling followed a year of campaigning for removal after the 2017 Charlottesville rally, and campus authorities took the statue to an undisclosed location.

  15. Naming or commemoration · Dean E. Smith Center, Chapel Hill The Smith Center floor is dedicated as Roy Williams Court

    UNC announced on August 2, 2018 that it would name the Dean E. Smith Center playing floor for Williams, and the floor was dedicated on August 24.

  16. Law, policy or court · Chapel Hill The UNC Board of Governors gives Chapel Hill until November 15 to propose a 'lawful and lasting' plan for the monument

    Eight days after the toppling, the Board of Governors met for nearly two hours in closed session and adopted a resolution directing Chancellor Folt and the trustees to present by November 15 a plan offering 'a lawful and lasting path that protects public safety, preserves the monument and its history'. Thom Goolsby cast the lone no vote, and the board ordered an outside review of the University's handling of the August 20 protest. The trustees met the same day.

  17. Construction or physical change · 1609 East Franklin Street, Chapel Hill Ground is broken for the Sancar Turkish Cultural and Community Center

    Aziz and Gwen Sancar broke ground at 1609 East Franklin Street on a 1.7-acre center with a 9,700-square-foot community hall and a two-story guesthouse for Turkish students and scholars.

  18. Statistic or record · Chapel Hill Chapel Hill's Building Integrated Communities assessment documents the refugee community from Burma

    The Town of Chapel Hill's Building Integrated Communities assessment reported about 1,200 refugees living in Orange County, roughly 90 percent from Burma. Of 74 refugees surveyed through Transplanting Traditions and the Refugee Support Center, 57 were from Burma and spoke Karenic languages.

  19. Naming or commemoration · Karen Shelton Stadium, Chapel Hill UNC names its new field hockey stadium for Karen Shelton

    The university announced that its field hockey facility would be called Karen Shelton Stadium, the first UNC playing field named in honor of a woman. The team had moved in at the start of preseason that August, and the stadium holds about 1,000 spectators.

  20. Naming or commemoration · Kenan Memorial Stadium, Chapel Hill UNC moves Kenan Stadium's honor from William R. Kenan Sr. to his son

    Chancellor Carol Folt announced that, after talking with the family, the university would change the stadium plaques to remove the honor to William R. Kenan Sr., who led a white supremacist unit in the 1898 Wilmington massacre, and focus instead on the donor, William R. Kenan Jr.

  21. Law, policy or court · Chapel Hill Chapel Hill voters approve a $10 million affordable housing bond

    About 72 percent of voters approved $10 million in general obligation bonds toward the town's goal of 400 new and 300 preserved affordable units over five years, including public housing redevelopment.

  22. Competition or sporting achievement · Chapel Hill UNC field hockey wins the 2018 NCAA national championship

    UNC won the 2018 NCAA field hockey title.

  23. Law, policy or court · 450 West Franklin Street, Chapel Hill Chapel Hill's council accepts the task force plan for a Chapel Hill Nine marker

    The council voted unanimously to accept the recommendations for a marker in front of 450 West Franklin Street, where Colonial Drug stood, and sent the plans to the town manager. Mason-Hogans, a task force member, said the marker and the learning around it mattered for young people.

  24. Law, policy or court · Chapel Hill UNC trustees vote to house the monument in a new $5.3 million University History and Education Center

    At a special meeting the Board of Trustees approved a four-part plan for the Board of Governors: relocate the statue and tablets into a new free-standing building at the former Odum Village site on south campus, add a McCorkle Place gateway with plaques, and continue contextualizing campus history. The center was priced at $5.3 million with $800,000 a year to operate; Folt said police advised that the statue could not safely return to McCorkle Place.

  25. Law, policy or court · Chapel Hill The Board of Governors rejects the history center and appoints a task force with a March 15 deadline

    After a nearly three-hour closed session the Board of Governors declined the trustees' $5.3 million history center, citing cost and public safety, and named five of its members to work with Folt and the trustees on a new proposal by March 15, 2019. Folt said the plan 'hasn't satisfied anyone' and that the campus would now look at off-campus options.

  26. Law, policy or court · Chapel Hill Chapel Hill adopts a Building Integrated Communities action plan

    Following the 2018 community assessment, the town produced a 34-point plan covering public transportation, relations with law enforcement, resident leadership, housing access and communication in other languages. The town went on to translate documents into Spanish, Mandarin, Karen and Burmese and to add interpretation at meetings.

  27. Law, policy or court · Chapel Hill Chapel Hill adopts a Language Access Plan covering Karen and Burmese

    The Chapel Hill Town Council adopted a Language Access Plan in 2019, following the Building Integrated Communities process in which immigrant and refugee residents named language access as a key need. The town has since translated hundreds of documents into Karen and Burmese as well as Spanish and Mandarin.

  28. Appointment, election or service · McCorkle Place, Chapel Hill Folt orders the Silent Sam pedestal removed and announces she will step down

    Folt ordered the removal on the Monday and announced in a campuswide email that she would resign, saying the remaining parts of the monument threatened the safety of the community. The university said at 1 a.m. on Tuesday that removal had begun, and by 2:40 a.m. a crew had taken the last of the base from the quad.

  29. Naming or commemoration · 450 West Franklin Street, Chapel Hill The Chapel Hill Nine marker site is dedicated on the 59th anniversary of the sit-in

    The town dedicated the marker site at 5 p.m. in front of the West End Wine Bar, where Colonial Drug had stood, and a march to First Baptist Church followed for a community celebration. Mason-Hogans, a main proponent of the marker, spoke about the task force's work.

  30. Appointment, election or service · Chapel Hill Joal Broun is elected chair of the Chapel Hill-Carrboro school board

    The board elected Broun chair by unanimous vote after chair Margaret Samuels resigned during a recall push over the Glenwood Elementary dual language magnet decision. Mary Ann Wolf took the vice chair seat Broun had held.

  31. Closing or ending · Countywide Durham–Orange light rail project ends

    On March 27, 2019, the GoTriangle board voted unanimously to stop planning the 18-mile Durham-Orange light rail line between Chapel Hill and Durham after Duke University declined to sign needed agreements. Orange County commissioners voted unanimously on April 2 to end the county's work on it.

  32. Naming or commemoration · West Chapel Hill Historic District (Boundary Increase), Chapel Hill The West Chapel Hill Historic District is enlarged in the National Register

    On May 9, 2019 the National Park Service listed a boundary increase for the West Chapel Hill Historic District, enlarging the district in the National Register of Historic Places.

  33. Law, policy or court · Rogers-Eubanks neighborhood Chapel Hill and Carrboro created Historic Rogers Road zoning districts

    The Chapel Hill Town Council closed its public hearing on May 22, 2019 and enacted Land Use Management Ordinance amendments establishing new zoning districts for the Historic Rogers Road Neighborhood. Carrboro added Section 15-136.1 to its Land Use Ordinance on June 18, 2019, creating the HR-R and HR-CC districts expressly to carry out the Mapping Our Community's Future plan.

  34. Naming or commemoration · Dorrance Field, Chapel Hill UNC dedicates Dorrance Field at its new soccer and lacrosse stadium

    The university dedicated the field at its new soccer and lacrosse stadium to Dorrance before the women's game against Notre Dame, in his 43rd year of coaching at Carolina.

  35. Competition or sporting achievement · Chapel Hill UNC field hockey wins the 2019 NCAA national championship

    UNC won the 2019 NCAA field hockey title.

  36. Law, policy or court · Orange County The UNC System gives Silent Sam to the Sons of Confederate Veterans with a $2.5 million trust in a same-day consent judgment

    The North Carolina Division of the Sons of Confederate Veterans sued the UNC System and Board of Governors over the monument and a consent judgment was entered the same day in Orange County Superior Court. The System handed over the statue, to be kept outside the fourteen counties with a System campus, and endowed a $2.5 million charitable trust from non-state funds for its care and display. Board chair Randy Ramsey said the deal let the University 'move forward'.

  37. Appointment, election or service · Chapel Hill Chapel Hill creates a poet laureate post and names CJ Suitt the first

    The Chapel Hill Town Council voted to launch a poet laureate program, initiated by council members Rachel Schaevitz and Allen Buansi, and appointed CJ Suitt as the first. He took up the role in January 2020, and the town stretched the two-year term to three because of the pandemic.

  38. Naming or commemoration · Chapel Hill The Orange County Community Remembrance Coalition collects soil at the site of Manly McCauley's lynching

    On a Saturday morning on Carl Drive, McCauley family members, clergy and coalition members gathered at the spot where he is believed to have been hanged; elders of Hickory Grove Missionary Baptist Church blessed soil that was jarred for the family. A program with the Equal Justice Initiative followed at the church.

  39. Appointment, election or service · Chapel Hill Kevin M. Guskiewicz is named UNC-Chapel Hill's twelfth chancellor

    The UNC System Board of Governors voted to make Guskiewicz chancellor, effective that day. He had been interim chancellor since February 6, 2019, was dean of the College of Arts and Sciences from January 2016 and had taught at Chapel Hill since 1995. He marked the start with a $5 million investment for the university to study its past.

  40. 2020s
  41. Statistic or record · Orange County 2020 census counts the Hispanic or Latino population of Orange County, Carrboro and Chapel Hill

    The 2020 census counted 15,812 Hispanic or Latino residents in Orange County, 4,734 in Chapel Hill and 2,723 in Carrboro, from the 2020 redistricting data as compiled in the NC Office of State Budget and Management's LINC database.

  42. Naming or commemoration · Hamilton Hall, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill Renaming of Hamilton Hall is recommended

    After a reevaluation of Hamilton's career, the building housing UNC's History Department was recommended for a name change. Critics pointed to his white supremacist Reconstruction scholarship and to a manuscript collection gathered from white families.

  43. Appointment, election or service · Chapel Hill Tressie McMillan Cottom joins the faculty of UNC’s School of Information and Library Science

    Sociologist and author Tressie McMillan Cottom joined the UNC School of Information and Library Science as an associate professor and became a senior faculty researcher in the Center for Information, Technology and Public Life.

  44. Publication, speech or performance · Carroll Hall, Chapel Hill David Zucchino discusses Wilmington's Lie in UNC's Nelson Benton Lecture

    David Zucchino, a UNC journalism alumnus and former lecturer at the school, spoke about his book Wilmington's Lie, on the 1898 Wilmington coup, in the Carroll Hall auditorium.

  45. Naming or commemoration · Chapel Hill The Town of Chapel Hill unveils the Chapel Hill Nine marker at the Colonial Drug site

    On the sixtieth anniversary of the sit-in the town dedicated sculptor Stephen Hayes's stone-based marker at 450 West Franklin Street, naming the nine students; four of them, Dave Mason Jr., James Merritt, Douglas Perry and Albert Williams, attended the unveiling.

  46. Law, policy or court · Chapel Hill Chancellor Kevin Guskiewicz formally charges the Commission on History, Race and a Way Forward

    The commission, formed in 2019 and co-chaired by Jim Leloudis and Patricia Parker, was charged with researching the university's history with race and recommending how to reckon with it.

  47. Disaster or outbreak · Chapel Hill COVID-19 transforms Orange County

    Orange County, Chapel Hill and Carrboro declared states of emergency on March 13, 2020, and the county and its three towns ordered residents to stay home from March 27. UNC moved undergraduate classes online in August 2020 after campus clusters. The county emergency, extended more than a dozen times, expired on May 1, 2022.

  48. Health or relief action · Chapel Hill Chapel Hill-Carrboro City Schools launches Food for Students meal distribution

    CHCCS, the Town of Chapel Hill, PORCH and volunteers began handing out free meals to students as schools closed, starting from about 20 sites. By December 21, 2020 the program had distributed more than 900,000 meals from 37 sites.

  49. Law, policy or court · Orange County Orange County, Chapel Hill and Carrboro declare a COVID-19 state of emergency

    Orange County government and the Towns of Chapel Hill and Carrboro declared states of emergency to prepare for COVID-19, allowing emergency procedures and funding. The county declaration, extended more than a dozen times, stayed in force until May 1, 2022.

  50. Closing or ending · Orange County Chapel Hill-Carrboro City Schools and Orange County Schools close under a statewide order

    Governor Roy Cooper closed all North Carolina public schools for at least two weeks from Monday, March 16, 2020, shutting both Orange County districts. CHCCS then began online classes for grades 6-12 and sent learning packets home for grades K-5 at the end of March while serving meals to students.

  51. Law, policy or court · Orange County Orange County and its three towns issue a joint stay-at-home order

    Orange County, with Chapel Hill, Carrboro and Hillsborough, ordered residents to stay home except for essential needs from 6 p.m. on March 27, 2020, three days before the statewide order took effect. Set to run until April 30, it was extended to May 8 to match the state order.

  52. Health or relief action · Orange County Orange County and the towns launch a Housing Helpline for emergency rental aid

    Orange County and the Towns of Chapel Hill, Carrboro and Hillsborough opened a Housing Helpline in April 2020 to connect residents with emergency rent, utility and deposit assistance. The county's Emergency Housing Assistance program paid out $2.5 million to 1,005 residents in 2020, and an Eviction Diversion Program followed in July 2020.

  53. Health or relief action · Chapel Hill Public Library Drive-through food distribution at Chapel Hill Public Library serves 576 households

    PORCH, the Food Bank of Central and Eastern North Carolina and the Town of Chapel Hill ran a drive-through food distribution in the Chapel Hill Public Library's lower parking lot, serving 576 households, or 2,391 people, with about 40 volunteers.

  54. Life event · Chapel Hill Daphne Athas dies in Chapel Hill

    Athas died in Chapel Hill on July 28, 2020. She had long lived in Carrboro in a small cabin she built with friends and into her late 80s was a familiar sight biking across town.

  55. Naming or commemoration · Chapel Hill UNC trustees vote to remove Josephus Daniels’s name from the student stores building

    On July 29, 2020 the UNC-Chapel Hill Board of Trustees voted 11 to 2 to remove four names from campus buildings, among them Josephus Daniels. The Daniels Building became UNC Student Stores, and the names of Charles Brantley Aycock, Julian Shakespeare Carr and Thomas Ruffin Sr. were removed at the same meeting.

  56. Law, policy or court · Chapel Hill Chapel Hill-Carrboro City Schools extends online-only classes into

    The CHCCS board unanimously accepted interim Superintendent Jim Causby's recommendation to keep classes virtual through at least January 15, 2021. On December 18, 2020 the board kept remote learning in place through at least February.

  57. Appointment, election or service · Chapel Hill Mike Fox retires as UNC head baseball coach

    Fox retired after 22 seasons leading the Tar Heels, with a 948-406-1 record at UNC and seven College World Series trips. His longtime assistant Scott Forbes was named the program's 25th head coach.

  58. Disaster or outbreak · Chapel Hill UNC reopening produces a COVID-19 outbreak

    UNC-Chapel Hill began in-person classes on August 10, 2020, reported four COVID-19 clusters in residence halls, private student housing and a fraternity within days, and on August 17 announced that undergraduate classes would move online from August 19. Campus test positivity rose from 2.8 percent to 13.6 percent in one week.

  59. Award or honor · Chapel Hill Tressie McMillan Cottom wins a MacArthur Fellowship

    The MacArthur Foundation named McMillan Cottom a 2020 fellow for her work as a sociologist, writer and public scholar on race, gender, education and digital technology, including her books Lower Ed and Thick. She was an associate professor at UNC’s School of Information and Library Science.

  60. Naming or commemoration · Van Hecke-Wettach Hall, UNC School of Law, Chapel Hill UNC School of Law dedicates a portrait of Charles E. Daye

    The law school held a virtual dedication for a commissioned portrait of Professor Emeritus Charles E. Daye by the Durham artist William Paul Thomas, attended by close to 300 people. The portrait hangs on the fifth floor of Van Hecke-Wettach Hall.

  61. Protest or organizing · Chapel Hill African, African American, and Diaspora Studies faculty ask the university to take Battle's name off Battle Hall

    Faculty of the Department of African, African American, and Diaspora Studies, whose offices are in Battle Hall, petitioned to remove Kemp Plummer Battle's name, citing his enslaving of people, his support for secession and his promotion of white supremacy. The university's Commission on History, Race, and a Way Forward endorsed the request.

  62. Naming or commemoration · Chapel Hill Family and community march to remember James Cates on the 50th anniversary

    A candlelit march went from Hargraves Community Center to St. Joseph CME Church and down Franklin Street to Peace and Justice Plaza, where the Town of Chapel Hill invited residents to leave flowers and messages for the Cates family. Mayor Pam Hemminger pledged to work with the family and UNC to investigate the killing.

  63. Naming or commemoration · Chapel Hill; Carrboro Community Home Trust marks 30 years with 332 permanently affordable homes

    At its 30th anniversary the Home Trust held 332 permanently affordable homes in Chapel Hill and Carrboro, up from about 100 in 2005.

  64. Protest or organizing · Chapel Hill James Cates Remembrance Coalition proposes naming Student Stores for Cates

    A coalition of Cates's family, historian Danita Mason-Hogans and community members proposed renaming UNC's Student Stores building in his honor. The building had not been renamed as of 2024.

  65. Award or honor · Chapel Hill Stewart receives the Chapel Hill-Carrboro chamber's citizenship and service award

    The Greater Chapel Hill-Carrboro Chamber of Commerce gave Stewart its Duke Energy Citizenship and Service Award in 2021, during the county's COVID-19 vaccination campaign. She later received the Ron Levine Public Health Legacy Award in 2022 and a National Association of Counties award in 2025.

  66. Award or honor · Chapel Hill UNC-Chapel Hill awards William E. Leuchtenburg an honorary degree

    UNC-Chapel Hill conferred the honorary degree of Doctor of Humane Letters on Leuchtenburg, its Kenan professor emeritus of history, in 2021.

  67. Health or relief action · Friday Conference Center, Chapel Hill UNC Health opens a large vaccination clinic at the Friday Center

    UNC Health opened its largest appointment-only COVID-19 vaccine clinic at the Friday Conference Center in Chapel Hill, starting with people 75 and older. Staff expected about 600 patients a day in the first week and up to 1,500 a day at full capacity.

  68. Health or relief action · Orange County Health department vaccinates its first recipients at drive-through clinics

    By early January 2021 the Orange County Health Department had vaccinated about 1,000 Phase 1a personnel at drive-through clinics in Hillsborough and Chapel Hill and opened sign-ups for residents 75 and older, more than 4,200 of whom registered.

  69. Law, policy or court · Chapel Hill Chapel Hill-Carrboro City Schools students return for hybrid classes

    The CHCCS board voted unanimously on March 4, 2021 to begin hybrid in-person instruction on March 22, nearly a month before the April 19 start it had approved in February. Students attended in cohorts two days a week, and roughly half could remain fully remote.

  70. Appointment, election or service · Dean E. Smith Center, Chapel Hill Roy Williams announces his retirement at the Smith Center

    Williams, 70, announced his retirement at a Smith Center news conference after 33 seasons as a college head coach, with 903 wins and three NCAA titles at UNC.

  71. Law, policy or court · Greene Tract The three governments adopted an interlocal agreement on the future of the Greene Tract

    The agreement required Orange County, Chapel Hill and Carrboro to act jointly in hiring consultants, entering development agreements and taking public input, put the mayors, chair and managers in a working group to negotiate the ultimate uses, and stated an initial intent covering mixed use and affordable housing, a school site with recreation, a joint preserve and connectivity. A November 2021 resolution then approved the recombination plat and the conceptual plan for the 60-acre county tract and the 107-acre joint tract.

  72. Health or relief action · Rogers Road Community Center, Chapel Hill Pop-up vaccine clinic held at the Rogers Road Community Center

    The Orange County Health Department held a pop-up COVID-19 vaccine clinic at the Rogers Road Community Center for Hispanic and Asian American residents, many of whom do not speak English, after local volunteers asked for one and printed flyers in several languages.

  73. Competition or sporting achievement · Chapel Hill UNC field hockey wins the 2020 NCAA national championship

    UNC won the 2020 NCAA field hockey title. The postponed 2020 championship was played in spring 2021.

  74. Award or honor · Chapel Hill Jenny Levy is elected to the National Lacrosse Hall of Fame

    UNC announced that Levy had been chosen for the 2021 class of the National Lacrosse Hall of Fame in her 26th season at Carolina, with a record of 373 wins and 117 losses and two NCAA titles at that point.

  75. Closing or ending · Chapel Hill Crook's Corner announces its closure

    On June 9, 2021, the owners of Crook's Corner told customers the West Franklin Street restaurant was closing, saying the COVID-19 crisis had made their position untenable. Gene Hamer and chef Bill Neal opened it in 1982, Bill Smith later led the kitchen, and the James Beard Foundation named it an America's Classic in 2011.

  76. Law, policy or court · Orange County Orange County reinstates an indoor mask mandate

    As the delta variant spread, Orange County and the Towns of Chapel Hill, Carrboro and Hillsborough required masks inside buildings and businesses from 5 p.m. on August 11, 2021.

  77. Award or honor · Chapel Hill Chapel Hill-Carrboro school board honors Stanley Vickers and his family on the 60th anniversary of his court victory

    The Chapel Hill-Carrboro City Schools board passed a resolution recognizing the Vickers family's work to integrate the schools. Vickers, then in his 70s, attended and recalled eating lunch and going to gym alone as one of the first Black students at the junior high.

  78. Publication, speech or performance · Chapel Hill The history and race commission holds a public webinar on the Unsung Founders Memorial

    The Commission on History, Race and a Way Forward opened a two-part webinar series, Unsung Founders Memorial: Past and Present, with members of the Class of 2002 committee and statements from artist Do Ho Suh.

  79. Naming or commemoration · Chapel Hill Chapel Hill Public Library webinar marks the 51st anniversary of the Cates killing

    The Chapel Hill Public Library hosted a webinar in which family and friends, including state Senator Valerie Foushee, a first cousin of Cates, reflected on his life and on the failures that followed his death.

  80. Naming or commemoration · Hortense McClinton Residence Hall, UNC, Chapel Hill UNC renames Aycock Residence Hall for Hortense McClinton

    On the chancellor's recommendation the trustees voted to put McClinton's name on the residence hall that had carried Governor Charles B. Aycock's name until it was removed in July 2020. The Carr Building became the Henry Owl Building the same day.

  81. Appointment, election or service · Transplanting Traditions Community Farm, Chapel Hill Hsar Ree Ree Wei becomes executive director of Transplanting Traditions

    Founder Kelly Owensby stepped back in spring 2022 and Hsar Ree Ree Wei, who was born in a Thai refugee camp and joined the farm as a youth intern in 2012, became executive director.

  82. Statistic or record · Northside, Chapel Hill Northside land bank passes 41 properties

    By mid-2022 the initiative had bought more than 41 Northside properties with the UNC loan, and 51 families with 50 children had moved into the neighborhood through its housing work.

  83. Naming or commemoration · Dean E. Smith Center, Chapel Hill UNC names its athletics media center for Woody Durham

    UNC Athletics and the Rams Club named the media and communications center beside the Dean E. Smith Center the Woody Durham Media and Communications Center, with trustee approval, and recognized his family at halftime of the February 16 men's basketball game against Pittsburgh.

  84. Life event · Chapel Hill Walter R. Mears dies in Chapel Hill

    Walter R. Mears, the Pulitzer Prize-winning Associated Press political reporter, died at his Chapel Hill apartment on March 3, 2022. He had made his home in Chapel Hill after retiring in 2001 and had taught journalism at UNC for a time. A memorial service was held in Chapel Hill on March 24.

  85. Law, policy or court · Orange County Orange County lifts its indoor mask mandate

    Orange County and its three towns ended the indoor mask requirement on March 7, 2022. UNC-Chapel Hill lifted its campus mandate the same day, and Orange County Schools planned to make masks optional on March 10.

  86. Founding or opening · Chapel Hill Chapel Hill's new visitor welcome center opens with a recorded welcome from James Taylor

    The Chapel Hill/Orange County Visitors Bureau opened its welcome center at 308 West Franklin Street with a 10-foot LED screen showing a nine-minute video in which James Taylor talks about "Carolina in My Mind" and performs it.

  87. Law, policy or court · Chapel Hill Justice Department opens a cold-case investigation into the Cates killing

    The U.S. Department of Justice opened an investigation into the killing under the Emmett Till Unsolved Civil Rights Crime Act and its cold-case initiative for racially motivated killings before 1980. Cates's cousins Nate Davis and Valerie Foushee welcomed the review.

  88. Award or honor · Chapel Hill Danita Mason-Hogans receives a national fellowship for a critical oral history of Chapel Hill and UNC

    The Oral History Association named her one of eleven year-long fellows funded by a National Endowment for the Humanities grant. Her project is a critical oral history of Chapel Hill and the University of North Carolina.

  89. Naming or commemoration · Hortense McClinton Residence Hall, UNC, Chapel Hill Hortense McClinton Residence Hall is dedicated

    UNC dedicated Hortense McClinton Residence Hall and the Henry Owl Building in a ceremony, and the School of Social Work held a dinner for McClinton, then 103, that launched a legacy scholarship in her name.

  90. Competition or sporting achievement · Chapel Hill UNC women’s lacrosse wins the 2022 NCAA national championship

    UNC won the 2022 NCAA women’s lacrosse championship.

  91. Law, policy or court · Countywide Journey of Reconciliation convictions are vacated

    On June 17, 2022, Orange County Superior Court Judge Allen Baddour vacated the disorderly conduct convictions of Bayard Rustin, Igal Roodenko, Andrew Johnson and Joseph Felmet. The four Journey of Reconciliation riders had been arrested in Chapel Hill in April 1947 for refusing to leave the front of an interstate bus.

  92. Property or economic transaction · Chapel Hill A Blue Cross NC Foundation grant expands Building Integrated Communities

    The Blue Cross and Blue Shield of North Carolina Foundation awarded $1.55 million to the program, with further money to community partners, naming Gill as principal investigator. Chapel Hill received a separate three-year grant of $375,000 from the same foundation for its own immigrant and refugee work.

  93. Naming or commemoration · Chapel Hill UNC announces a permanent memorial to James Cates in the Pit

    Chancellor Kevin M. Guskiewicz announced that a permanent memorial to Cates would be installed in the Pit later in 2022, developed with students, faculty, staff and the Cates family, approved by the Board of Trustees and supported by the Town of Chapel Hill.

  94. Naming or commemoration · Hargraves Community Center, Chapel Hill Chapel Hill names the Hargraves Center gym for Nate Davis

    The Town Council unanimously approved naming the Northside Gym at the Hargraves Community Center for Davis, the center's director for more than three decades, and its indoor court for Fred Battle, director from 1970 to 1987.

  95. Competition or sporting achievement · Chapel Hill UNC field hockey wins the 2022 NCAA national championship

    UNC won the 2022 NCAA field hockey title.

  96. Naming or commemoration · The Pit, UNC-Chapel Hill UNC dedicates the James L. Cates Jr. Memorial in the Pit

    On the 52nd anniversary of his death, UNC dedicated a black lectern-style marker near the spot where Cates was stabbed, with an inscription from the University and the Town of Chapel Hill. Speakers included Chancellor Kevin M. Guskiewicz, Congresswoman-elect Valerie Foushee for the family, student body president Taliajah Vann and BSM president Julia Clark.

  97. Appointment, election or service · Chapel Hill Karen Shelton announces her retirement as UNC field hockey coach

    Shelton retired after 42 seasons with a record of 745 wins, 172 losses and 9 ties and 10 NCAA championships, the last won by an unbeaten 2022 team. She is the winningest coach in the sport's history.

  98. Chapel Hill Daniel Wallace gives UNC's Winter Commencement address

    Novelist and English professor Daniel Wallace was the speaker at UNC's Winter Commencement in the Dean E. Smith Center.

  99. Property or economic transaction · Chapel Hill UNC raises housekeepers' pay by 90 cents an hour

    Guskiewicz told the campus by email that housekeeping salaries would rise, with the amount set by position and experience and back pay to November 21, 2022. Housekeepers, who had asked for $20 an hour and an end to parking fees, called the raise a slap in the face and rallied outside South Building in February 2023.

  100. Appointment, election or service · Chapel Hill David Zucchino teaches International Reporting at UNC as an adjunct instructor

    Two-time Pulitzer winner David Zucchino returned to UNC as an adjunct instructor to teach a course in international reporting, run as a working newsroom.

  101. Appointment, election or service · Chapel Hill Erin Matson succeeds Karen Shelton as UNC field hockey coach

    UNC named Matson, who had graduated a month earlier after playing on four championship teams, the fifth head coach in program history and only the second since the early 1980s.

  102. Competition or sporting achievement · Dorrance Field, Chapel Hill Jenny Levy wins her 400th game at Dorrance Field

    UNC beat Boston College 16 to 5 at Dorrance Field for Levy's 400th career victory, all of them at Carolina, in her 28th season. She was the sixth head coach in any division of the sport to reach 400 wins.

  103. Award or honor · Chapel Hill UNC awards Alexander Julian an honorary Doctor of Arts

    At Spring Commencement, UNC-Chapel Hill gave Alexander Julian, a Chapel Hill native who entered with the Class of 1969 and designed the argyle basketball uniforms, an honorary Doctor of Arts, one of six honorary degrees that year.

  104. Competition or sporting achievement · Chapel Hill UNC women’s tennis wins the 2023 NCAA national championship

    UNC won the NCAA women’s team tennis championship.

  105. Protest or organizing · St. Thomas More Catholic Church, Chapel Hill Latino residents press for Spanish-language mental health care at a Chapel Hill assembly

    At a public accountability assembly at St. Thomas More Catholic Church organized by Orange County Justice United and the North Carolina Congress of Latino Organizations, residents called for more mental health services in Spanish. That month Alliance Health announced $500,000 for El Futuro's services and programs in Orange County.

  106. Violence or armed conflict · Chapel Hill Zijie Yan, a UNC professor, is killed on campus

    On August 28, 2023, Zijie Yan, an associate professor, was shot and killed in UNC's Caudill Labs, and the campus locked down for about three hours. Graduate student Tailei Qi was arrested that afternoon and charged with first-degree murder; the case had not come to trial by March 2026.

  107. Naming or commemoration · Chapel Hill UNC's Faculty Council adopts a resolution in memory of Zijie Yan

    At its first meeting of the year the Faculty Council held a moment of silence for Zijie Yan and adopted Resolution 2023-5 in his memory by unanimous consent, after it was read aloud in English and in Mandarin. The resolution was sent to his family.

  108. Construction or physical change · 107 Johnson Street, Pine Knolls, Chapel Hill EMPOWERment broke ground on PEACH apartments at the former Pine Knolls Community Center

    The nonprofit began building 10 debt-free apartments for households earning 30 percent or less of area median income at 107 Johnson Street, where Ted Parrish had run the independent Pine Knolls Community Center. It had raised $3.5 million for the project.

  109. Competition or sporting achievement · Chapel Hill UNC field hockey wins the 2023 NCAA national championship

    UNC won the 2023 NCAA field hockey title.

  110. Property or economic transaction · Wilson Library, UNC-Chapel Hill UNC Libraries endows the Jacquelyn Dowd Hall Fellowship

    An endowment from John Powell created a UNC University Libraries fellowship in Hall's name for graduate students researching the American South, with preference for projects using oral history sources.

  111. Appointment, election or service · Chapel Hill Guskiewicz leaves the Chapel Hill chancellorship

    He announced on December 8, 2023 that he would step down after nearly five years leading the campus, and January 12, 2024 was his last day. He became president of Michigan State University on March 4, 2024.

  112. Naming or commemoration · Navy Reserve Officers Training Corps (NROTC) Naval Armory at UNC-Chapel Hill, Chapel Hill The Navy ROTC Naval Armory at UNC-Chapel Hill is listed in the National Register

    On February 7, 2024 the National Park Service listed the Navy ROTC Naval Armory at UNC-Chapel Hill in Chapel Hill in the National Register of Historic Places.

  113. Chapel Hill A $10 million gift creates the O.B. Hardison Scholarship at UNC

    Stephen Israel, a 1966 graduate whose life was changed by Hardison's courses, gave $10 million for undergraduate humanities scholarships named for his former professor.

  114. Construction or physical change · Trinity Court, Chapel Hill Chapel Hill breaks ground on the Trinity Court redevelopment

    Trinity Court, 40 public housing units built in 1975 and vacated in 2018 for structural problems, is being rebuilt with Community Housing Partners as 54 affordable apartments after an April 2022 rezoning and an October 2022 tax credit award. Leasing began in winter 2026.

  115. Founding or opening · Orange County Interlibrary loan returns through UNC-Chapel Hill

    Working with UNC-Chapel Hill, the Orange County Public Library restored interlibrary loan during the 2024–25 fiscal year at no cost to patrons. The county had charged $1 plus library costs, raised the fee to $3 in October 2013 and cut it from $4 back to $3 in 2018 before the service lapsed.

  116. Appointment, election or service · Chapel Hill Anson Dorrance announces his retirement as UNC women's soccer coach

    Dorrance told his team he was retiring after 45 seasons with the women's program, days before the season opener; associate head coach Damon Nahas became interim head coach. His women's teams went 934-88-53 and won 21 NCAA titles.

  117. Naming or commemoration · The Pit, UNC-Chapel Hill Student groups hold a memorial for James Cates in the Pit

    The Southern Student Action Coalition, the Black Student Movement, the Community Justice, Abolition and Anti-Racism Collective and the UNC NAACP held a memorial at the Pit, where speakers criticized the wording and placement of the 2022 plaque.

  118. Competition or sporting achievement · Cary, North Carolina; UNC–Chapel Hill team UNC women’s soccer wins the 2024 NCAA national championship

    UNC defeated Wake Forest, 1–0, in the national final.

  119. Award or honor · Chapel Hill Kathleen DuVal wins the Bancroft Prize

    UNC historian Kathleen DuVal won the Bancroft Prize for Native Nations: A Millennium in North America. She was the Carl W. Ernst Distinguished Professor in UNC's history department.

  120. Chapel Hill William J. Barber II gives the Bobby Boyd Leadership Lecture at UNC

    William J. Barber II spoke on poverty and inequality at the UNC School of Social Work's Bobby Boyd Leadership Lecture in the Tate-Turner-Kuralt Building to nearly 300 people, with about 750 more online.

  121. Award or honor · Chapel Hill Chuck Stone receives a posthumous Pulitzer Prize special citation

    The Pulitzer Prize Board gave Stone, the former Walter Spearman Professor of journalism at UNC, a special citation for his civil rights reporting, his work as the first Black columnist at the Philadelphia Daily News and his part in founding the National Association of Black Journalists.

  122. Award or honor · Chapel Hill Kathleen DuVal wins the Pulitzer Prize for History

    UNC historian Kathleen DuVal won the 2025 Pulitzer Prize in History for Native Nations: A Millennium in North America, a history of Native American nations over a thousand years. She taught early American and American Indian history at UNC-Chapel Hill.

  123. Publication, speech or performance · Kenan Stadium, UNC-Chapel Hill Mia Hamm gives UNC's spring Commencement address in Kenan Stadium

    Former Tar Heel soccer player Mia Hamm, class of 1994, delivered the 2025 Commencement address to 6,829 graduates in Kenan Stadium.

  124. Competition or sporting achievement · Chapel Hill UNC women’s lacrosse wins the 2025 NCAA national championship

    UNC won the 2025 NCAA women’s lacrosse championship.

  125. Disaster or outbreak · Chapel Hill Tropical Storm Chantal floods Orange County

    Chantal dropped up to 10 inches of rain on Orange County on the night of July 6, 2025. Chapel Hill crews made more than 50 water rescues around Camelot Village and Eastgate Crossing, Carrboro's Weatherhill Pointe flooded, and the Eno at Hillsborough set a record crest on July 7. The county declared an emergency that day.

  126. Naming or commemoration · Caudill Laboratories, UNC-Chapel Hill A memorial garden and bench for Zijie Yan are dedicated at Caudill Labs

    Two years after his death, UNC dedicated a memorial site in the Caudill Labs courtyard with a garden, a bench made from a 250-year-old campus post oak, and a plaque in English and Mandarin. His doctoral adviser Doug Chrisey gave the first memorial lecture in his honor the same afternoon.

  127. Law, policy or court · Chapel Hill State law removes Chapel Hill's zoning control over UNC projects

    The Regulatory Reform Act of 2025 became law without the governor's signature, making UNC System projects in Orange County subject only to state rules and leaving the town a consultation role on utilities, stormwater, traffic and similar matters.

  128. Naming or commemoration · UNC-Chapel Hill Students and residents mark 55 years since the killing of James Cates

    The Carolina NAACP chapter and the Black Student Movement held a remembrance for Cates on campus, and student leaders again called the 2022 plaque's passive wording inadequate.

  129. Publication, speech or performance · Horace Williams tract, Chapel Hill UNC announces a campus extension at Carolina North

    The university announced plans for a mixed-use extension on about 230 acres around the former Horace Williams Airport, with student and workforce housing, research space and retail, calling it the largest expansion since 1793; groundbreaking is expected in summer 2027.

  130. Naming or commemoration · UNC-Chapel Hill, Chapel Hill UNC says a new residence hall will be named Jackson Hall for Blyden and Roberta Jackson

    UNC-Chapel Hill announced that one of two new residence halls, to be built on the site of the former Jackson Hall that housed undergraduate admissions, will be named Jackson Hall for Blyden and Roberta Jackson. The two halls will add about 730 beds.

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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 2, 2026.

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