Chronology

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1. Recent decades · 1976–2026

2. 1982
   Founding or opening · Chapel Hill Louis Rubin and Shannon Ravenel start the press that became Algonquin Books of Chapel Hill

   Rubin, then a UNC English professor, and editor Shannon Ravenel formed Bright Leaf Press, Inc., working from a garage at Rubin's home with money for a first printing of 1,500 copies. As Algonquin Books of Chapel Hill it went on to publish Clyde Edgerton, Dori Sanders and Jill McCorkle.

3. 1990
   Property or economic transaction · Chapel Hill Louis Rubin hands Algonquin Books to Shannon Ravenel and Robert Rubin

   A year after Workman Publishing of New York bought Algonquin, Rubin turned control over to his son Robert and to Shannon Ravenel, who moved the St. Louis office to Chapel Hill.

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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.