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Key local figure

Joseph A. Herzenberg

Joe Herzenberg was elected to the Chapel Hill Town Council in 1987, the first openly gay elected official in North Carolina. He served until 1993, when it was revealed that he had not paid state income tax for the previous 14 years. His papers and diaries are in UNC's Southern Historical Collection.

Source: UNC Libraries, Southern Sources: LGBTQ Political Pioneer Joe Herzenberg

1941–2007 · Dates from the Library of Congress · Library of Congress authority record ↗

5 works about Joseph A. Herzenberg are indexed here, as are 3 works by Herzenberg.

Search these 5 works Research sources View indexed works ↓
Joseph A. Herzenberg, 1991
Joseph A. Herzenberg, 1991

Life and Orange County connections

Storylines this person is part of, in date order. Each has its own page.

StorylineTown elections and bond votes, 1979–19891979–1989 · 73 events · In November 1979 Chapel Hill elected Joe Nassif mayor over council members Robert Epting and Gerry Cohen and Harold Foster, returned outgoing Mayor James Wallace and two incumbents to the Town Council and added Joe Straley. Its voters approved a fire station bond but rejected a downtown parking deck and the Ridgefield open space purchase. Carrboro re-elected Mayor Robert Drakeford, Hillsborough brought back Fred Cates as mayor, and county voters defeated a $20.4 million bond package, schools included. In 1981 the new Association for a Better Carrboro took three aldermen's seats from the Carrboro Community Coalition while Mayor Drakeford won a third term, and Chapel Hill voters unseated council members Bill Thorpe and Joe Herzenberg. In 1983 Jim Porto was elected Carrboro's mayor as ABC candidates won every aldermen's seat, Chapel Hill re-elected Mayor Nassif and returned Thorpe to the council, and Hillsborough Mayor Lucius Cheshire, beaten by Frank Sheffield, resigned early. In 1985 former mayor Jim Wallace won the office back in a race he called a quasi-referendum on Rosemary Square, and in 1986 Chapel Hill voters approved $11.8 million in bonds, a new library among them. In 1987 Jonathan Howes was elected mayor, Joe Herzenberg won a council seat and Eleanor Kinnaird unseated Carrboro Mayor Jim Porto. In 1989 Howes and Kinnaird were re-elected, and Hillsborough elected Horace Johnson, by the Daily Tar Heel's account its first Black mayor. StorylineLGBTQ political firsts in Chapel Hill and Carrboro, 1980s–1990s1987–1995 · 34 events · Joe Herzenberg's election to the Chapel Hill Town Council in November 1987 made him North Carolina's first openly gay elected official. Carrboro created a domestic partnership registry in September 1994 and Chapel Hill followed in 1995, and in November 1995 Carrboro elected Mike Nelson, the state's first openly gay mayor.

Dated events connected with this person, in date order. See these 4 dated events in the chronology →

During their lifetime

  1. Joe Straley is elected to the Chapel Hill Town Council In the municipal election, newcomer Joe Straley won one of four council seats with 2,796 votes, joining James C. Wallace, R. D. Smith and Jonathan Howes and edging out Joe Herzenberg. He was sworn in for a four-year term in December. People: Joe Straley, Jonathan Howes, R. D. Smith, Joseph A. Herzenberg Place: Chapel Hill · Also named: James C. Wallace, Joe HerzenbergSearch the index · The Daily Tar Heel, November 7, 1979, p. 1
  2. Joe Herzenberg wins election to the Chapel Hill Town Council Joe Herzenberg placed third in the four-seat Town Council race at the municipal election of November 3, 1987, with 3,308 votes, behind Nancy Preston and Roosevelt Wilkerson, and said he was the first openly gay elected official in the history of North Carolina. He was sworn in at the Council's organizational meeting on December 7, 1987, with his neighbor Lightning Brown administering the oath. People: Joseph A. Herzenberg, Jonathan Howes Place: Chapel Hill · Also named: Joe Herzenberg, Nancy Preston, Roosevelt Wilkerson Jr., Lightning Brown, Roosevelt WilkersonThe Daily Tar Heel, November 4, 1987, p. 1
  3. Bill Thorpe petitions the council to name the post office plaza for local activists Council member Bill Thorpe presented a petition to rename the Franklin Street post office plaza for Charlotte Adams and Joe and Lucy Straley, an idea born at Joe Straley's memorial service. The council chose to hold a public hearing, and its naming committee proposed naming the plaza for an ideal with plaques for local peace and justice activists. People: Bill Thorpe, Joe Straley, Lucy Straley, Charlotte Adams, Diana McDuffee, Joseph A. Herzenberg Place: Peace and Justice Plaza, Chapel HillSearch the index · The Daily Tar Heel, March 29, 2006, p. 3

After their death in 2007

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

  1. Chapel Hill dedicates the Peace and Justice Plaza marker The town unveiled a granite marker at Peace and Justice Plaza, in front of the old post office on Franklin Street, naming nine local activists: Charlotte Adams, Hank Anderson, James Brittian, Joe Herzenberg, Mildred Ringwalt, Hubert Robinson, Joe Straley, Lucy Straley and Gloria Williams. The Town Council had named the plaza in 2006 and set criteria for later honorees. People: Hank Anderson, James Brittian, Mildred Ringwalt, Hubert Robinson, Joe Straley, Lucy Straley, Gloria Williams, Charlotte Adams, Joseph A. Herzenberg, Sally Greene Place: Peace and Justice Plaza, Chapel Hill · Also named: Joe Herzenberg · Also mentions: Franklin StreetSearch the index · OrangePolitics: Sally Greene, Peace and protest, justice and injustice: marking Chapel Hill's sacred space (September 19, 2009) · Also: Town of Chapel Hill

People named in the same events

People named in the same dated entries as Joseph A. Herzenberg, 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 Joseph A. Herzenberg. Each links to the institution that holds or provides it. Background reading appears below.

By Joseph A. Herzenberg

Oral history interview with Joseph A. Herzenberg, November 1, 2000: interview K-0196, Southern Oral History Program Collection (#4007)

Herzenberg, Joseph A. · 2007 · University Library, UNC-Chapel Hill

Recorded by Chris McGinnis in November 2000, this interview with Joseph A. Herzenberg (1941-2007), a longtime member of the Chapel Hill Town Council, covers his experience as a gay man in a Southern college town. He talks about an accepting family in New Jersey, his political career, gay activism and the gay liberation movement in Chapel Hill, and the town's social life as he knew it. About seventy minutes; electronic edition from the UNC library, 2007, through Documenting the American South.

NC Cardinal UNC

Oral history interview with Joe Herzenberg, November 18, 1985: Interview K-0008. Southern Oral History Program Collection (#4007)

Herzenberg, Joseph A. · 2004 · University Library, UNC-Chapel Hill

Joseph A. Herzenberg (1941-2007), later a Chapel Hill Town Council member, was interviewed by Mary Dexter in November 1985 about the Cane Creek reservoir fight. OWASA, the water and sewer utility serving Chapel Hill, proposed damming Cane Creek in rural Orange County, and residents there organized against it. Herzenberg supports the reservoir and discusses the local politics and water-supply questions behind the dispute. About an hour and a half; electronic edition from the UNC library, 2004, through Documenting the American South.

NC Cardinal UNC

Joseph A. Herzenberg papers 1883-2006.

Herzenberg, Joseph A., 1941-2007 · 1883

Twenty linear feet of papers from Joseph A. Herzenberg, 1941 to 2007, about 2,500 items dated 1883 to 2006 in the Southern Historical Collection at UNC, collection 5367. Diaries are among the formats. The work describes a historian and political activist in Chapel Hill, campaign paraphernalia and Democratic Party politics, and gay activists and gay politicians in North Carolina.

UNC

About Joseph A. Herzenberg

Rainbow Triangle Oral History Collection,

Duke University · 1998

Oral histories gathered from 1998 by the Rainbow Triangle Oral History Project, begun at Duke in 1996 to document lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender life in the Triangle and central North Carolina. Four linear feet of sound recordings, transcripts, narrator biographies, clippings, correspondence and research files. Narrators and subjects include Joe Herzenberg, the Chapel Hill town council member, and Doris A. Taylor.

Included because: Catalog heading in the Duke record: Herzenberg, Joseph A., 1941-2007.

Duke

Michael R. Nelson papers, circa 1890-2012

Nelson, Michael R., 1963- · 1890

Roughly 2,000 items in 6.5 linear feet kept as the papers of Michael R. Nelson, born 1963, dated from about 1890 to 2012, collection 70140 in the Southern Historical Collection at UNC. Topics include politics and government in Carrboro, Chapel Hill and Orange County, campaign paraphernalia, and gay activists and politicians in North Carolina, naming Joseph A. Herzenberg, 1941 to 2007.

Included because: Catalog heading in the UNC record: Herzenberg, Joseph A., 1941-2007.

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 them all.

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.

All places and the county map →

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

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Books about Joseph A. Herzenberg

Books by Joseph A. Herzenberg

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Historical records and collections

Catalog searches use the Library of Congress name heading: Herzenberg, Joseph A., 1941-2007. Historical-record searches use the person’s name and may include namesakes. Links open in a new tab.

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Picture: Joseph A. Herzenberg, 1991. Public domain. Photograph by Erik Ose; Erik Ose (photographer); via Wikimedia Commons

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