Skip to content
Orange County Public Library (opens the library’s website in a new tab)

Figure in a named event

Earl Geer

Earl Geer, 16, was one of the nine Black high school students the Town of Chapel Hill's Chapel Hill Nine subcommittee identified in 2018 as the participants in the town's first sit-in, at Colonial Drug Co. on February 28, 1960. The nine were the first young people arrested in Chapel Hill for demonstrating against segregation.

Source: Town of Chapel Hill: Accept the Chapel Hill Nine Subcommittee Commemorative Marker Recommendation (File 18-0896, November 7, 2018)

Orange County Indexed has not yet linked an indexed work directly to Earl Geer. The biography and the dated events on this page provide sources about Earl Geer’s life and work. Suggest a source.

Research sources

Life and Orange County connections

Dated events connected with this person, in date order. See these 1 dated event in the chronology →

  1. The Chapel Hill Nine sit-in Nine Black young men held Chapel Hill’s first sit-in at Colonial Drug. People: Harold Foster, William Cureton, John Farrington, Earl Geer, David Mason Jr., Clarence Merritt Jr., James Merritt, Douglas Perry, Albert Williams Place: Chapel HillTown of Chapel Hill

Research sources

Sources and research tools for this person. For ready-made searches of other catalogs, see Search further. Research guide: Trace a family through historical records.

Background

Records of the time

Collections and databases

  • NC LIVE: prepared search for Earl Geer Library card Search NC LIVE for this subject and Orange County. You can change the search terms. Sign in through your North Carolina library to access the materials.
  • Ancestry Library Edition In the libraryOrange County Public Library Census, birth, death and marriage records, and more, free on the public computers at OCPL libraries

Local help

Search further

Search other catalogs and collections for this name. Results may include other people with the same name and have not been reviewed by the Friends.

Books about Earl Geer

Find copies at other libraries

Photographs, papers, and newspapers

Historical records and collections

These searches use Earl Geer’s name without birth or death dates, so results may include namesakes. Links open in a new tab.

Found a book OCPL doesn’t own? You can often borrow it through interlibrary loan at OCPL.

More to discover

Keep Reading Local

The Friends connect people with new library materials, local writers and publishers, and resources documenting Orange County.

Browse New Arrivals → Meet Local Authors → Explore Local Publishers →
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