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Orange County Indexed

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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8 dated events match your filters.

Searched the full chronology of 6,171 dated events and 63 storylines, not only the highlights. Showing 1–8.Back to highlights

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8 dated events
1842Antebellum and Civil War
  1. Antebellum and Civil War · 1800–1865
  2. Charles F. Deems preaches to Chapel Hill Methodists in the hall he names Bethesda

    Publication, speech or performance · Chapel Hill

    While a professor, Deems preached to the village Methodists, at their invitation, in the upper story of Jesse Hargrave's store, a former Masonic lodge room he named Bethesda. After he left the university in 1848, ministers were regularly appointed to the Chapel Hill charge.

    Subject: University United Methodist Church

  3. Chapel Hill's Presbyterians and Methodists circulate subscription papers for church buildings

    Property or economic transaction · Chapel Hill

    Swain's letter of November 1843 reported that the village Presbyterians and Methodists each had subscription papers going round to pay for churches, while the Episcopalians already had the brick walls of theirs standing. The Presbyterian church was finished in 1848 and the Methodist in 1853.

    Subject: University Presbyterian Church · University United Methodist Church

  4. Chapel Hill's Methodists dedicate their first church

    Founding or opening · Chapel Hill

    In July 1853 the Methodist congregation that became University Methodist Church dedicated its first building, at Rosemary and Henderson streets, paid for with about $5,000 that its pastor J. Milton Frost had raised around the state. The congregation had met since about 1840, with Charles F. Deems preaching in the 1840s and Frost stationed there from January 1851.

    People: Charles F. Deems

    Subject: University United Methodist Church · Old Methodist Church (Rosemary Street)

  5. Adolphus W. Mangum serves as pastor of the Chapel Hill Methodist church

    Chapel Hill

    The Methodist minister Adolphus Williamson Mangum, born at Locust Grove on the Flat River in what was then Orange County, was pastor of the Methodist church in Chapel Hill in 1858 and 1859.

    Subject: University United Methodist Church

  6. Reconstruction and the New South · 1866–1899
  7. Chapel Hill's new Methodist church is dedicated

    Founding or opening · Chapel Hill

    During the centennial commencement Bishop W. W. Duncan preached at night in the new Methodist church, a collection cleared its $800 debt, and the church was dedicated.

    Subject: University United Methodist Church

  8. Early twentieth century · 1900–1944
  9. Chapel Hill Methodists complete a Georgian Revival church by James Gamble Rogers

    Construction or physical change · 150 East Franklin Street, Chapel Hill

    Replacing their older sanctuary at 150 East Franklin Street, the Methodists finished a red brick church with white trim designed by New York architect James Gamble Rogers. Its tall steeple rises above the nearby campus and business district.

    Subject: University United Methodist Church

  10. Chapel Hill Methodists sell their parsonage and buy the Frink house

    Property or economic transaction · Rosemary Street near the Town Hall, Chapel Hill

    The Methodist church sold its parsonage to Marguerite M. Judson, mother of a university student, and bought the Frink house on Pittsboro Street as its new parsonage. By that September Mrs. Judson owned and lived in the old parsonage on Rosemary Lane near the Town Hall.

    Subject: University United Methodist Church

  11. Civil rights era · 1945–1975
  12. University Methodist Church adds a Sunday school wing

    Construction or physical change · University United Methodist Church, 150 East Franklin Street, Chapel Hill

    The congregation built an education wing on the east side of its brick church at 150 East Franklin Street in 1959.

    Subject: University United Methodist Church

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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 2, 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