Chronology

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1. Recent decades · 1976–2026

2. June 17, 2020
   Disaster or outbreak · 3517 NC Highway 86 North, near Walnut Grove Church Road, north of Hillsborough A car crash sets fire to the Farm & Garden Center on NC 86

   Early on June 17, 2020, a speeding car hit the gas pumps at the Farm & Garden Center, a gas station, country store and produce stand on NC 86 near Walnut Grove Church Road. The car and the store caught fire and the canopy collapsed; the two young people in the car were hurt.

3. July 16, 2020
   Law, policy or court · Orange County Orange County Schools votes to open the school year online

   The Orange County Schools board voted unanimously to begin the 2020-21 year with remote-only classes for at least the first four weeks, on the recommendation of Superintendent Monique Felder.

4. July 31, 2020
   Publication, speech or performance · Carrboro North Carolina musicians release Cover Charge to benefit the Cat's Cradle

   Twenty-five North Carolina acts, among them Superchunk, the Mountain Goats, Tift Merritt and Iron and Wine, recorded cover songs for an album to raise money for the closed Carrboro club. Musician and UNC professor Florence Dore organized it, and Heath said presales were running better than expected.

5. December 3, 2021
   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.

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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.