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Local figure

Kenneth Jones

Kenneth Jones, whom the Chapel Hill Weekly called a leading Black citizen of the town, spoke with Col. Joseph Hyde Pratt and Negro Civic League president Charles Craig at a May 1940 mass meeting at the Black Methodist church, where pledges were taken to build Chapel Hill's Negro Community Center.

Source: DigitalNC: Chapel Hill Weekly, May 17, 1940, p. 1

Orange County Indexed has not yet linked an indexed work directly to Kenneth Jones. The biography and the dated events on this page provide sources about Kenneth Jones’ life and work.

Search works on The Hargraves Center and Chapel Hill’s Negro Community Center Research sources View background reading ↓

Life and Orange County connections

Dated events connected with this person, in date order. See these 13 dated events in the chronology →

  1. Black residents hold a mass meeting to back the Negro Community Center At a mass meeting at the Black Methodist church, after songs by the Black high school's boys' and girls' choruses, Col. Joseph Hyde Pratt, Negro Civic League president Charles Craig and Kenneth Jones spoke and Hubert Robinson presided, and pledge cards for gifts of money or work were handed out. Pratt said the stone center, expected to cost $12,000 to $16,000, would be paid one-fourth locally, with Black residents giving the labor, and three-fourths by the WPA. People: Hubert Robinson, Joseph Hyde Pratt, Charles C. Craig, Kenneth JonesThe Chapel Hill Weekly, May 17, 1940, p. 1
  2. Orange County men register for the first peacetime draft On October 16 men aged 21 through 35 registered under the selective service law, with election officials and unpaid volunteers as registrars. In Chapel Hill 1,868 signed up: 966 University students at Woollen Gymnasium, 331 at the Town Hall, 203 at the elementary school and 368 at the Black Elks Lodge; Carrboro counted 275, and the south end of the county under C. P. Hinshaw 2,287. More than 3,800 registered across the county, about 3,000 of whom belonged to Orange. People: Francis Foster Bradshaw, Clarence P. Hinshaw, Kenneth JonesThe Chapel Hill Weekly, October 18, 1940, p. 1
  3. Chapel Hill aldermen hold a hearing and find police mistreatment charges not sustained At a hearing attended by Recorder's Court Judge H. A. Whitfield, a group of white citizens and a group of Black citizens including Rev. J. H. Jones and Rev. C. T. Boyd, the aldermen read the complainants' affidavits and the officers' denials. In a statement published with all the affidavits, the board said it could not commend an officer's striking of a prisoner but found the charges not sustained, voiced confidence in Chief Sloan and the police, and rejected the Tar Heel's criticism of the Recorder's Court. People: Robert W. Madry, William T. Sloan, Henry A. Whitfield, Kenneth JonesSearch the index · The Chapel Hill Weekly, December 11, 1942, p. 5
  4. The Chapel Hill school board and its Black advisory committee agree to hire an attendance officer Meeting at the Orange County Training School, the board and its committee of Kenneth Jones, Thomas Oldham and Adolphus Clark discussed Black children kept out of school in spite of the compulsory attendance law. The committee urged enforcement, and the board decided to employ an attendance officer and ask the aldermen for the money. People: Kenneth JonesThe Chapel Hill Weekly, August 20, 1943, p. 1
  5. Black citizens of Chapel Hill organize their own Third War Loan campaign Black residents met at the Orange County Training School to plan an appeal to the Black population to buy War Bonds, with H. M. Holmes, Kenneth Jones and Eugene White as their committee. At the bond rally in Memorial Hall on September 14, where a section was reserved for Black people, Jones spoke for the Black community, saying they were doing the very best they could. People: Harold M. Holmes, Kenneth JonesThe Chapel Hill Weekly, September 10, 1943, p. 1
  6. The aldermen and school board hire an attendance officer for the Orange County Training School At a joint meeting the aldermen and the school board decided to employ an attendance officer for the Orange County Training School after principal H. M. Holmes reported 276 absences in the high school and 835 in the elementary grades, with truancy behind 36 per cent of the lost elementary days. The $300 cost was split between the school board, the town and, by request, Carrboro, and the school's four-member Black advisory committee came to support the plan. People: Harold M. Holmes, Kenneth JonesThe Chapel Hill Weekly, November 19, 1943, p. 1
  7. Kenneth Jones speaks at the Orange County Training School V-E Day assembly Kenneth Jones, a notary public and funeral director, was the guest speaker when the Orange County Training School marked V-E Day at a morning assembly. He spoke on the need for peace among individuals and nations.Search the index · DigitalNC: Lincoln High School student newspaper (Chapel Hill), May 1945, p. 1
  8. Chapel Hill's Black community holds a week's drive for its Community Center and nursery school With all government money for its nursery school withdrawn, Chapel Hill's Black community held Community Center and Nursery School Week to pay for the school, more auditorium chairs and painting, closing with a rally where Chancellor R. B. House spoke. The week raised $643.47, well short of the goal. People: R. B. House, Kenneth JonesThe News of Orange County (Hillsborough), July 11, 1946, p. 7
  9. Chapel Hill opens a joint fund drive for its recreation center, Black community center and nursery Civic groups opened a $5,000 campaign led by Roy Barham to carry the white Recreation Center, the Black Community Center and the Black nursery school through 1947. The town gave $300 each to the two centers, which counted 27,304 and 8,651 visits during the year. People: R. D. Smith, Kenneth JonesThe News of Orange County (Hillsborough), December 5, 1946, p. 1
  10. Kenneth Jones heads the Community Chest drive among Chapel Hill's Black residents In Chapel Hill's fall 1948 Community Chest drive, run from headquarters in the Strowd Motor Company building, Kenneth Jones headed the canvass among the town's Black residents. The Chest supported eight service groups, among them the Negro Community Center. People: Collier Cobb Jr.Search the index · The News of Orange County (Hillsborough), October 14, 1948, p. 1
  11. Chapel Hill's Community Chest drive passes its $13,500 goal Chapel Hill's Community Chest drive went over its $13,500 goal, with about $14,000 given or pledged by November 18. The residential canvass raised the number of givers by a quarter, the business division doubled its givers, and the division in the Black community, led by Kenneth Jones and Edwin Caldwell, tripled its contributors and doubled its total. The Chest supported the Scouts, the white Recreation Center, the Negro Community Center and Day Nursery, the Mary Pratt Children's Library and the Humane Society. People: Kenneth JonesSearch the index · The News of Orange County (Hillsborough), November 23, 1950, p. 1
  12. Chapel Hill names Mrs. O. David Garvin and Grey Culbreth to its school board Meeting with the aldermen, the holdover school board members chose Mrs. O. David Garvin and Grey Culbreth for six-year terms in place of Dr. E. W. Knight and Mrs. R. H. Wettach. All votes but one went to the two; the other went to Black businessman Kenneth Jones, one of several nominees suggested by the Black civic club and the PTA. People: Kenneth JonesSearch the index · The News of Orange County (Hillsborough), June 28, 1951, p. 1
Show all 13 dated events
  1. Kenneth Jones leads the March of Dimes canvass in Chapel Hill's Black community For the January 1952 March of Dimes in Chapel Hill and Carrboro, held after the county polio chapter's hardest year, Kenneth Jones chaired the canvass in the Black community. He led the same division again in the campaign announced in December 1953. People: E. Carrington SmithSearch the index · The News of Orange County (Hillsborough), January 17, 1952, p. 1

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 2 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.

All places and the county map →

People named in the same events

People named in the same dated entries as Kenneth Jones, 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.

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Background on The Hargraves Center and Chapel Hill’s Negro Community Center

Background reading on The Hargraves Center and Chapel Hill’s Negro Community Center. These works cover the broader subject and may not discuss Kenneth Jones. Follow a link to find a copy or view the material.

Oral history interview with Fred Battle, January 3, 2001: interview K-0525, Southern Oral History Program Collection (#4007)

Battle, Fred · 2006 · University Library, UNC-Chapel Hill

Fred Battle grew up in Chapel Hill under segregation and describes that world in a Southern Oral History Program interview recorded January 3, 2001, by Bob Gilgor. He portrays the Black community of his youth as centered on the church and on Lincoln High School, recalls his schooling there, and tells of his college years in Greensboro and the civil rights demonstrations he joined there. Published online in 2006 by the UNC-Chapel Hill Library in Documenting the American South.

NC Cardinal UNC

Welcome to Coker Arboretum of the North Carolina Botanical Garden, the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

North Carolina Botanical Garden · 2000 · The Botanical Garden

Visitor guide to the Coker Arboretum on the University of North Carolina campus in Chapel Hill, issued by the North Carolina Botanical Garden in 2000. It covers the arboretum's history and William Chambers Coker, the botanist it is named for, who died in 1953. A short orientation piece for people walking the grounds.

UNC

Orange County, 1752-1952, edited by Hugh Lefler and Paul Wager

Lefler, Hugh Talmage,; Wager, Paul W. · 1953

Hugh Lefler and Paul Wager edited this history of Orange County covering 1752 to 1952, published in 1953 for the county's two hundredth year in 389 pages with illustrations, portraits and maps.

NC Cardinal

William T. Alexander oral history interview 2, 1992 April 25

Alexander, William Tasse, 1904-1992 · 1992

William T. Alexander (1904 to 1992), in the second of three interviews, describes his schooling in Mecklenburg County, Charlotte and Chapel Hill in the 1910s and 1920s, beginning at the one-room Mallard Creek School. Rural education, corporal punishment, getting children to school, amusements, student life at UNC and the botanist William Chambers Coker come up. About 64 minutes, April 1992, tied to the William Tasse Alexander Family Papers, MS0256.

DPLA

Recording with Dr. Paul Wager, 1973 (Chapel Hill Historical Society cassette)

1973

Dr. Paul Wager, recorded on cassette in 1973 for the Chapel Hill Historical Society. Part of the society's CHHS.012 Audiovisual Materials Collection.

CH Historical Society

H.R. Totten papers, 1912-1973.

Totten, H. R. (Henry Roland), 1892-1974 · 1912

Eight linear feet and about 5,000 items make up the H. R. Totten papers, 1912 to 1973, in the Southern Historical Collection at UNC, collection 3843. Maps are among the material. Subjects include botanical gardens and arboretums in North Carolina, the Highlands Biological Station, medicinal plants and mushroom culture, the Department of Botany at Chapel Hill and William Chambers Coker, and the American Expeditionary Forces in France.

UNC
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William Chambers Coker papers, 1884-1956 (bulk 1914-1950).

Coker, William Chambers, 1872-1953 · 1884

Botanist William Chambers Coker (1872-1953) left papers running 1884 to 1956, the bulk between 1914 and 1950: about 29,000 items in 36.5 linear feet, part of the Southern Historical Collection at UNC, collection 3220. Topics include mycology and the teaching of botany, the Coker Arboretum, the Highlands Biological Station, the Elisha Mitchell Scientific Society and the Garden Club of North Carolina, along with family social life in North Carolina.

UNC

William Lanier Hunt papers, 1880s-1996.

Hunt, William Lanier · 1884

Papers of the horticulturist William Lanier Hunt, dated from the 1880s to 1996, about 40,000 items in 130 linear feet, part of the Southern Historical Collection at UNC, collection 5286. Topics include southern gardens and garden design, horticultural societies and teaching, the North Carolina Botanical Garden and its foundation, photographs of flowers, and the botanist William Chambers Coker at Chapel Hill.

UNC

Louis and Mildred Graves papers, 1814 ; 1876-1992.

Graves, Louis, 1883-1965 · 1814

Louis Graves (1883-1965) and Mildred Moses Graves left roughly 7,700 items in eleven linear feet, a single 1814 document and then a run from 1876 to 1992, in the Southern Historical Collection at UNC, collection 4010. Graves edited the Chapel Hill Weekly, and topics include North Carolina newspapers and their editors alongside family photographs, travel diaries and the social life of the Graves and Moses families.

UNC

Research sources

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  • NC LIVE: prepared search for Kenneth Jones 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.
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