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Orange County Indexed

Chronology

Key events from Orange County history: 100 highlights to start, then the full chronology of 9,006 dated events and 77 storylines, each connected to the index. A storyline gathers many dated events into one history, such as the Regulator crisis. Browse all 77 storylines. Every entry names its source. See all 667 sources.

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6 dated events match your filters.

Paisley-Rice Log House, National Register nomination (OR0015).Open the sourceAll sources

Searched the full chronology of 9,006 dated events and 77 storylines, not only the highlights. Showing 1–6.Back to highlights

Entries

  1. Antebellum and Civil War · 1800–1865

  2. Appointment, election or service · Hawfields and Cross Roads Presbyterian churches, then western Orange County (now Alamance County) William D. Paisley becomes pastor of the Hawfields and Cross Roads churches

    After serving the Union and Buffalo churches in Guilford County, Paisley took charge of the Hawfields and Cross Roads Presbyterian churches near present Mebane in 1801 and stayed until 1818. The Hawfields church historian credits him with organizing the first camp meeting in North Carolina there during the Great Revival.

  3. Property or economic transaction · Paisley-Rice Log House, west side of SR 1346 near the Alamance County line, north of Mebane William D. Paisley buys the farm where the Paisley-Rice log house stands

    The Presbyterian minister William D. Paisley bought a 200-acre tract from James Davis in February 1801. Local tradition and the nomination hold that he built the dovetailed log house on this land in the early 1800s.

  4. Property or economic transaction · Paisley-Rice Log House, west side of SR 1346 near the Alamance County line, north of Mebane William D. Paisley sells his Orange County farm to Elijah Pickard

    Paisley left the Hawfields in 1818 to head the Greensborough Academy and in September 1819 sold the log house farm to Elijah Pickard. The chain of title is unclear for some years after the sale.

  5. Property or economic transaction · Paisley-Rice Log House, west side of SR 1346 near the Alamance County line, north of Mebane John A. Pettigrew sells the former Paisley farm to Lemuel Pettigrew

    By 1835 the log house tract had passed to John A. Pettigrew, who sold it that year to Lemuel Pettigrew. Lemuel later sold it to (John) Elkins Pettigrew, a small farmer whose farm the 1860 census valued at $500.

  6. Reconstruction and the New South · 1866–1899

  7. Property or economic transaction · Paisley-Rice Log House, west side of SR 1346 near the Alamance County line, north of Mebane Robert K. Rice buys the Pettigrew log house farm

    Elkins Pettigrew sold the farm to his son-in-law Robert K. Rice, husband of his daughter Martha, for $375 in 1869. Rice improved the place, which the 1880 census valued at $1,500, and it stayed in the Rice family for more than a century.

  8. Early twentieth century · 1900–1944

  9. Property or economic transaction · Paisley-Rice Log House, west side of SR 1346 near the Alamance County line, north of Mebane The Rice farm is divided in the settlement of Robert Rice's estate

    In 1927 the 130-acre farm long tied to the log house was split in settling Robert Rice's estate. The house kept a 65-acre share, later owned by his grandson Joseph A. Rice.

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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 4, 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