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Local figure

Edwin Anderson Alderman

Edwin A. Alderman, an 1882 graduate, returned to teach at UNC in 1893 and was its president from 1896 to 1900, when the trustees opened postgraduate courses to women and the Old Well's temple was built. He held segregationist views. Alderman Residence Hall, begun in 1937, took in its first women students in 1943.

Source: Names in Brick and Stone (UNC): Alderman Residence Hall

1861–1931 · Dates from the Library of Congress · On the Friends’ Local Authors roster → · Library of Congress authority record ↗

10 works about Edwin Anderson Alderman are indexed here, as are 6 works by Alderman.

Search these works Research sources View indexed works ↓
Edwin Anderson Alderman, 1912
Edwin Anderson Alderman, 1912

Life and Orange County connections

Storylines this person is part of, in date order. Each opens its own page, with its events date by date.

StorylineThe University's summer schools for teachers, 1877–19071877–1907 · 8 events · For three decades the university used its summers to train the state's teachers, though the work stopped and started. The General Assembly set up a Summer Normal School there in 1877 to train white teachers, and President Kemp Battle and the Board of Education admitted white women, though state money could not be spent on them. Its last session was in 1884. In 1894 Edwin A. Alderman opened a Summer School for Teachers and Students, and in 1900, by Battle's account, the first summer term of degree courses began. The trustees' executive committee held no summer school for teachers in 1905, but N. W. Walker revived it in 1907 and directed it for twenty-seven years.

Dated events connected with this person, in date order. See these 19 dated events in the chronology →

During their lifetime

  1. Edwin A. Alderman holds a week's institute for Orange County's white teachers State institute conductor Edwin A. Alderman held a week-long institute for the county's white teachers at Hillsborough, closing on November 1 with addresses by Alderman and State Superintendent Finger at the court house on public schools and public education. People: John W. Thompson, Benjamin C. Patton Place: Court house, HillsboroughSearch the index · Orange County Observer (Hillsborough), November 9, 1889, p. 3
  2. The Orange County Teachers' Institute meets at Hillsborough under Prof. E. A. Alderman The county Teachers' Institute opened at Hillsborough on Monday, September 21, conducted by Prof. E. A. Alderman, and ran through the week. Teachers were required by law to attend, and Alderman was to give a public address on Friday, September 25. Place: Court house, HillsboroughSearch the index · Orange County Observer (Hillsborough), September 19, 1891, p. 2 · Also: Orange County Observer (Hillsborough), September 26, 1891, p. 3
  3. Edwin Alderman leaves Greensboro to teach at the university Alderman, an 1882 graduate of the university and a founder of the State Normal in Greensboro, accepted a teaching position at UNC in 1893. Place: Chapel HillSearch the index · Names in Brick and Stone (UNC): Alderman Residence Hall
  4. The university opens a Summer School for Teachers and Students to women and men The four-week school under Edwin A. Alderman admitted both sexes for a $5 fee and enrolled seventy-five, with academic and teaching departments staffed by university professors and teachers from the State Normal and city schools. It was one of four summer schools the university ran that year. People: Dixie Lee Bryant, Edwin Anderson Alderman Place: Chapel HillSearch the index · Documenting the American South: Kemp P. Battle, History of the University of North Carolina, vol. II (1912), p. 504
  5. Edwin Alderman serves as president of the university Alderman was named president in 1896 and held the office until 1900, when he left to lead Tulane University. His inauguration, first set for University Day 1896, was put off into 1897 because of that year's heated political campaigns. Place: Chapel HillSearch the index · UNC Libraries, History on the Hill: Chronological List of Events
  6. University trustees elect Edwin A. Alderman president The university's trustees elected Professor Edwin A. Alderman president of the University of North Carolina, succeeding George T. Winston. Place: University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill · Also named: George T. WinstonSearch the index · Orange County Observer (Hillsborough), August 6, 1896, p. 2
  7. President Edwin Alderman gives South Building a stone doorway copied from Westover During his presidency Edwin Alderman added a carved stone pedimented doorway to South Building, modeled on the one at Westover, the colonial James River mansion in Virginia. With the new well temple, it was an early step toward the Colonial Revival that later ruled campus building. People: Edwin Anderson Alderman Place: South Building, UNC campus, Chapel Hill · Also named: Edwin AldermanSearch the index · NC Digital Collections: M. Ruth Little, The Town and Gown Architecture of Chapel Hill, 1795-1975 (2004), p. 43 · Also: Chapel Hill Historic District Boundary Increase and Additional Documentation, National Register
  8. Edwin Alderman is inaugurated as president in Gerrard Hall About a hundred legislators and Governor Daniel L. Russell rode a special train from Raleigh through sleet for the ceremony, where Kemp P. Battle presented Alderman and the new president spoke for an hour and a half on the university as the people's school. The lawmakers were made honorary members of the Di and Phi societies and met with school superintendents who had come to honor one of their own. People: Daniel Lindsay Russell, Kemp Plummer Battle Place: Gerrard Hall, UNC, Chapel HillSearch the index · Howard E. Covington Jr., Fire and Stone: The Making of the University of North Carolina under Presidents Edward Kidder Graham and Harry Woodburn Chase (2018), p. 31
  9. Alderman reports the university has the largest academic enrollment in the South In his first annual report, in February 1897, President Edwin A. Alderman told the trustees that the University of North Carolina had more academic students than any other institution of higher learning in the South, 63 more than the University of Virginia. Place: Chapel Hill, University of North CarolinaSearch the index · Internet Archive: North Carolina Historical Review 23 (1946), p. 219
  10. The class of 1897 gives the university a bust of Robert E. Lee On Class Day the seniors presented a bust of Lee, which President Alderman accepted with a speech of praise, and the band afterward played Dixie. People: Edwin Anderson Alderman, Robert E. Lee Place: Chapel HillSearch the index · Documenting the American South: Kemp P. Battle, History of the University of North Carolina, vol. II (1912), p. 543
  11. The university holds a memorial service for David Gaston Worth Five days after Worth died, the university held a memorial service for him in Gerrard Hall, with a prayer by the Rev. N. H. D. Wilson and talks by Dr. John Manning, Kemp P. Battle and President Edwin A. Alderman, who said a tablet in Memorial Hall would bear his name. People: David Gaston Worth, John Manning, Kemp Plummer Battle, Edwin Anderson Alderman Place: Gerrard Hall · Also named: N. H. D. Wilson · Also mentions: Memorial HallSearch the index · Documenting the American South: Kemp P. Battle, History of the University of North Carolina, vol. II (1912), p. 550
  12. Alderman reports that all but 26 of the university's 501 students are North Carolinians In his second annual report President Edwin A. Alderman noted that in 1898 only 26 of the university's 501 students came from outside the state, a larger share of home-state students, he said, than at any other American university. In 1857-58, the largest antebellum enrollment, 63 per cent of 461 students had come from North Carolina. Place: Chapel Hill, University of North CarolinaSearch the index · Internet Archive: North Carolina Historical Review 23 (1946), p. 219
Show all 18 dated events
  1. Edward Kidder Graham wins the Mangum Medal Added to the commencement orators after Horace Williams showed Alderman one of his papers, Graham won the top senior speaking prize with an address on "the economic man" that foresaw business coming to rule Southern life. He reworked the theme over the next decade into his argument for the university's service to the state. People: Edward Kidder Graham, Edwin Anderson Alderman, Henry Horace Williams Place: Memorial Hall, UNC, Chapel HillSearch the index · Howard E. Covington Jr., Fire and Stone: The Making of the University of North Carolina under Presidents Edward Kidder Graham and Harry Woodburn Chase (2018), p. 39
  2. Edward Kidder Graham returns to Chapel Hill to manage the library After a year teaching at a Charlotte private school, Graham came back at Alderman's request to run the university library, and before the year was out Alderman made him an instructor in English at $700 a year. People: Edward Kidder Graham, Edwin Anderson Alderman Place: University library, UNC, Chapel HillSearch the index · Howard E. Covington Jr., Fire and Stone: The Making of the University of North Carolina under Presidents Edward Kidder Graham and Harry Woodburn Chase (2018), p. 40
  3. The class of 1899 gives a bronze bust of Zebulon Vance and plants ivy from Lee's tomb On Class Day the seniors, led by Julian S. Carr Jr., presented a bronze bust of Vance, and that afternoon planted on the South Building a sprig of ivy from Robert E. Lee's mausoleum. People: Edwin Anderson Alderman, Robert E. Lee Place: South Building · Also named: Julian S. Carr Jr.Search the index · Documenting the American South: Kemp P. Battle, History of the University of North Carolina, vol. II (1912), p. 564
  4. President Alderman resigns to head Tulane University Offered the Tulane presidency in April 1900 at more than twice his Chapel Hill pay, Alderman resigned in May despite the trustees' pleas. The book suggests thin state funding after the 1898 campaign, when Democrats promised the church colleges not to seek more for the university, weighed on his decision. Place: UNC, Chapel HillSearch the index · Howard E. Covington Jr., Fire and Stone: The Making of the University of North Carolina under Presidents Edward Kidder Graham and Harry Woodburn Chase (2018), p. 43
  5. Edward Kidder Graham is inaugurated president in Memorial Hall A procession of about 1,400 marched to Memorial Hall, where Chief Justice Walter Clark gave Graham the oath and Governor Locke Craig presided. Graham's address cast the state university as the instrument of democracy. Three former presidents walked with him in the procession. People: Edward Kidder Graham, Edwin Anderson Alderman, Francis Preston Venable, Kemp Plummer Battle, Locke Craig, Walter Clark Place: Memorial Hall, UNC, Chapel HillSearch the index · Howard E. Covington Jr., Fire and Stone: The Making of the University of North Carolina under Presidents Edward Kidder Graham and Harry Woodburn Chase (2018), p. 89
  6. University Day marks fifty years since the 1875 reopening More than ninety representatives of American colleges joined a procession from the Alumni Building to Memorial Hall, where former commissioner of education Philander P. Claxton spoke. In his first address to the university, Governor McLean called it the head of the state's school system and asked it to help smooth religious and social divisions. People: Harry Woodburn Chase, Edwin Anderson Alderman, Francis Preston Venable, Angus W. McLean Place: Memorial Hall, UNC, Chapel Hill · Also named: Philander P. Claxton · Also mentions: Alumni BuildingSearch the index · Howard E. Covington Jr., Fire and Stone: The Making of the University of North Carolina under Presidents Edward Kidder Graham and Harry Woodburn Chase (2018), pp. 329-330 · Also: Chapel Hill Weekly, October 16, 1925, p. 4

After their death in 1931

Later events: estates and burials, and the buildings, honors and histories that remember them.

  1. The first of the new women's dormitories, later Alderman Residence Hall, opens Built in 1937 with Public Works Administration money, the university's new women's dormitory, later named for Edwin Alderman for his support of women's education, was occupied by September 1937. Two more women's dormitories, later Kenan and McIver, opened in September 1939. Place: UNC campus, Chapel Hill · Also named: Edwin AldermanSearch the index · The Daily Tar Heel, September 21, 1937, p. 1 (with January 6, 1937 and September 15, 1939) · Also: Names in Brick and Stone

People named in the same events

People named in the same dated entries as Edwin Anderson Alderman, those sharing the most entries first. Each line links one of the shared entries in the chronology, where its source is cited. A shared entry shows these people in the same event, not how well they knew each other.

Indexed works

Works about or by Edwin Anderson Alderman. Each links to the institution that holds or provides it. Background reading appears below.

By Edwin Anderson Alderman

A Napoleon death mask

Alderman, Edwin Anderson, 1861-1931 · 1895 · The students of the University

Edwin A. Alderman writes up a death mask of Napoleon I that had come to Chapel Hill, signing the piece at the end. It was detached from the North Carolina University Magazine for April 1895 and printed by the students of the University.

UNC

Address by Edwin A. Alderman ... on the life of William Hooper, "the prophet of American independence" : Guilford Battle Ground, July 4, 1894

Alderman, Edwin Anderson, 1861-1931 · 1894 · University Press

Edwin A. Alderman's Fourth of July address of 1894 at the Guilford Battle Ground, on the life of William Hooper, the North Carolina signer of the Declaration of Independence who died in 1790. The University Press at Chapel Hill printed it for the Guilford Battle Ground Company. It touches the Hooper family and state politics during the Revolution.

UNC

[Letter], 1923 December 16, University of Virginia, Charlottesville [to] Mary Graves Rees, Chapel Hill, N.C.

Alderman, Edwin Anderson, 1861-1931 · 1923

A typescript letter of December 16, 1923, written by Edwin Anderson Alderman at the University of Virginia to Mary Graves Rees in Chapel Hill, four leaves in the North Carolina Collection at UNC. With it is a handwritten letter from Eugenia Harris Holt suggesting that her father, Eugene Lewis Harris, helped design the Old Well, and the original envelope. Topics include Chapel Hill architecture and university buildings.

UNC

The university of to-day : its work and needs

Alderman, Edwin Anderson, 1861-1931 · 1900 · Dialectic and Philanthropic Societies

Edwin Anderson Alderman on the work and the needs of the university of his day, detached from the North Carolina University magazine, new series, volume 17, number 6, June 1900, and printed at Chapel Hill for the Dialectic and Philanthropic Societies.

UNC

The University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill

University of North Carolina (1793-1962). President; Alderman, Edwin Anderson, 1861-1931 · 1898 · University of North Carolina

A second printing, dated 1898, of the university's descriptive pamphlet on the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, again credited to the office of the president and to Edwin Anderson Alderman. Topics include description of the university and its students together with Chapel Hill imprints of about 1897. Published by the university.

UNC

The University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill

University of North Carolina (1793-1962). President; Alderman, Edwin Anderson, 1861-1931 · 1897 · University of North Carolina

Descriptive pamphlet on the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, issued about 1897 over the name of the president, Edwin Anderson Alderman. Topics include descriptive matter about the university and its students, along with Chapel Hill imprints of the middle 1890s.

UNC

About Edwin Anderson Alderman

Well worth a shindy : the architectural and philosophical history of the Old Well at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

Madry, Sarah Brandes · 2003 · iUniverse

Sarah Brandes Madry's history of the Old Well at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, treating both its architecture and the ideas attached to it. It takes in drinking fountains and water use in Chapel Hill and the university's history, with a chapter on Edwin Anderson Alderman, the president under whom the well took its present form in 1897, and one on water at the university. Published by iUniverse in 2003, 399 pages with illustrations.

Included because: Catalog heading in the UNC record: Alderman, Edwin Anderson, 1861-1931.

NC Cardinal UNC Durham Chapel Hill PL CH Historical Society

The inauguration of Edwin Anderson Alderman, D.C.L., President of the University of North Carolina, January 27, 1897

University of North Carolina (1793-1962) · 1897 · University of North Carolina

An account of the inauguration of Edwin Anderson Alderman as president of the University of North Carolina on January 27, 1897, including his inaugural address. The university published it at Chapel Hill and also issued it as an extra number of the University Record.

Included because: Catalog heading in the UNC record: Alderman, Edwin Anderson, 1861-1931.

UNC

Two leaders in "educational statesmanship."

1949

Paired profiles of Edwin A. Alderman and David F. Houston, issued in the United States in 1949 under a title borrowing the phrase educational statesmanship. Topics include the presidencies of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, the University of Virginia at Charlottesville and the University of Texas at Austin.

Included because: Catalog heading in the UNC record: Alderman, Edwin Anderson, 1861-1931.

UNC

Successful educators : Edwin Anderson Alderman, Ph.D., LL.D., President University of Virginia

1925 · New York Education Co.

A short biographical sketch of Edwin Anderson Alderman, who led the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill before taking the presidency of the University of Virginia. It was detached from the March 1925 issue of American education and published at Albany by the New York Education Co. It concerns college presidents in Chapel Hill and in Charlottesville.

Included because: Catalog heading in the UNC record: Alderman, Edwin Anderson, 1861-1931.

UNC

Venable, Alderman, Graham, Battle at Graham's Inauguration

1915

Four University of North Carolina presidents, Francis P. Venable, Edwin A. Alderman, Edward Kidder Graham and Kemp Plummer Battle, pose together at Graham's inauguration in this real photo postcard of 1915. Mailed to R. H. Lewis in Raleigh, it bears a short greeting from K.P.B. and an April 1915 postmark.

Included because: Catalog heading in the DPLA record: Alderman, Edwin Anderson, 1861-1931.

DPLA

Edwin Anderson Alderman

Smith, C. Alphonso (Charles Alphonso), 1864-1924 · 1909

C. Alphonso Smith, 1864 to 1924, wrote this typescript on Edwin Anderson Alderman, 1861 to 1931, and dated it July 1909. It is biography of a college president, covering his presidency at the University of North Carolina and his later presidency at the University of Virginia in Charlottesville. In the North Carolina Collection at UNC.

Included because: Catalog heading in the UNC record: Alderman, Edwin Anderson, 1861-1931.

UNC
Show 3 more about Edwin Anderson Alderman

Worth family papers,

Worth (Family) · 1844

Worth family papers, about 694 items beginning in 1844: letters, business papers and other material on family affairs, opposition to secession, North Carolina politics, fertilizer and textile businesses, Zebulon B. Vance, and federal patronage early in Woodrow Wilson's administration. Correspondents and subjects include Cornelia Phillips Spencer, Edwin A. Alderman, George T. Winston, Josephus Daniels and Robert Bingham of the Bingham School, with UNC students among them.

Included because: Catalog heading in the Duke record: Alderman, Edwin Anderson, 1861-1931.

Duke

The University record

University of North Carolina (1793-1962) · 1901 · The University

The University record was the University of North Carolina's own serial, printed at Chapel Hill, with the issue here dated 1901. An extra number was issued for February 1897 carrying the proceedings and addresses from the inauguration of Edwin A. Alderman as president, and a numbering tangle in which volume four was skipped. Useful for official university business and addresses.

Included because: Catalog heading in the UNC record: Alderman, Edwin Anderson, 1861-1931.

UNC

Inauguration of President Edwin Anderson Alderman, January 27, 1897

University of North Carolina (1793-1962) · 1897 · The University

Record of the inauguration of Edwin Anderson Alderman as president of the University of North Carolina on January 27, 1897, published at Chapel Hill as an extra number of the University Record for February of that year. The volume documents the ceremony.

Included because: Catalog heading in the UNC record: Alderman, Edwin Anderson, 1861-1931.

UNC

Places in this person’s story

Buildings, schools, churches and other sites named in the dated events on this page, the most often named first. The map shows the 3 with a known location.

Map tiles © OpenStreetMap contributors. Site locations from the N.C. State Historic Preservation Office survey, Open Orange, Orange County GIS, OpenStreetMap and a few other published sources named on each site’s page; town and community pins show approximate locations.

  • Memorial Hall University buildings and grounds · Chapel Hill · 3 events here
  • Gerrard Hall University buildings and grounds · Chapel Hill · 2 events here
  • South Building University buildings and grounds · Chapel Hill · 2 events here
  • University Summer School University schools and programs · Chapel Hill · 2 events here
  • UNC Libraries University schools and programs · Chapel Hill · 1 event here

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Picture: Edwin Anderson Alderman, 1912. Public domain. Photograph by Rufus Holsinger; mcgregor.lib.virginia.edu; via Wikimedia Commons

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