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Local figure

Edwin Sidney Lanier

Edwin Sidney Lanier (1901–1983) was born near Metter, Georgia, and came to UNC as a student in 1921. He later directed the university's student aid office from 1934 and its records and registration from 1945, both until 1961. In 1949 he unseated Mayor Robert W. Madry and served three terms as mayor of Chapel Hill, leaving in 1954 for the Orange County Board of Commissioners.

Source: NCpedia: Lanier, Edwin Sidney

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

Life and Orange County connections

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

  1. Edwin S. Lanier unseats Mayor Madry in the Chapel Hill election In a town election that drew 1,442 of 1,726 registered voters, Edwin S. Lanier defeated Mayor Robert W. Madry by 811 votes to 589, ending Madry's seven years as mayor. People: Edwin Sidney LanierSearch the index · Chapel Hill Weekly: "Edwin S. Lanier Elected Mayor" (May 6, 1949), p. 1
  2. Hubert Robinson and Paul Wager are elected to the Chapel Hill Board of Aldermen Robinson led the five candidates with 571 votes and Wager followed with 560; Kenneth Putnam took the third seat. The Weekly noted Robinson was the second Black person elected to public office in Chapel Hill, the first since Reconstruction, and it was Wager's first run for office. People: Hubert Robinson, Edwin Sidney LanierSearch the index · DigitalNC: The Chapel Hill Weekly, May 8, 1953, p. 1 (Robinson Gets Largest Vote; Other Winners: Wager, Putnam)
  3. Chapel Hill aldermen elect Oliver K. Cornwell mayor After Mayor Edwin S. Lanier won the Democratic nomination for county commissioner, the Board of Aldermen chose one of its own members, Oliver K. Cornwell, as mayor and elected Rogers Wade to his seat. People: Edwin Sidney LanierSearch the index · DigitalNC: The Chapel Hill Weekly, November 26, 1954, page 1 (Aldermen Elect Oliver Cornwell As Mayor)
  4. The General Assembly bans Sunday racing in Orange County After protests by the Rev. C. H. Reckard and other Orange County clergy, the legislature passed Senator Edwin S. Lanier's bill banning racing in the county on Sundays, with Rep. John W. Umstead's amendment barring races after 6 p.m. on other days. The bill passed on May 8, 1957, though Sunday races were being advertised again at Orange Speedway by 1961. People: Edwin Sidney LanierSearch the index · NC State Historic Preservation Office: National Register nomination, Occoneechee Speedway (OR1542, 2002), section 8, p. 20; with The Chapel Hill Weekly, May 10, 1957, p. 1 (Legislature Passes Lanier's Bill to Ban Sunday Racing in Orange County)

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 and OpenStreetMap; town and community pins mark the middle of their mapped buildings.

All places and the county map →

Named with them in the chronology

People named in the same dated entries as Edwin Sidney Lanier, 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.

Background on Occoneechee Speedway, Hillsborough

These works give background on Occoneechee Speedway, Hillsborough, the wider story this person is part of. Each links to the institution that holds or provides it.

Occoneechee-Orange Speedway

Sanseverino, Edward P. · 1995

Edward P. Sanseverino's 1995 account of the Occoneechee-Orange Speedway, the stock car track outside Hillsborough that ran in the middle decades of the twentieth century. Topics include automobile racing and racetracks in North Carolina and Hillsborough in the twentieth century.

Jock Lauterer photographic collection, circa 1964-1968.

Lauterer, Jock · 1964

Photographs made by Jock Lauterer in and around Chapel Hill from about 1964 to 1968, some 3,522 items in the North Carolina Collection at UNC. Subjects include the Speaker Ban Law, Ku Klux Klan activity in North Carolina, Tar Heel basketball and football, the Jubilee festival, the Old Well, and visitors including Lyndon Johnson, Hubert Humphrey, Bob Hope and Jayne Mansfield.

UNC

Occoneechee Speedway/Orange Speedway (Chapel Hill Historical Society vertical file)

Clippings and promotional materials on the Occoneechee Speedway near Hillsborough, the dirt racetrack later renamed Orange Speedway. An undated folder from box 31 of the Chapel Hill Historical Society's Vertical File Collection, Carrboro and Orange County series.

Research sources

Resources picked for this person, each with a note on what it holds. For ready-made searches of other catalogs, see Search further.

Collections and databases

  • NC LIVE: prepared search for Edwin Sidney Lanier Library card An advanced search of the state’s shared databases already scoped to Orange County’s places and this subject; edit it freely, and sign in through your North Carolina library to read
  • 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

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Books about Edwin Sidney Lanier

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Photographs, papers, and newspapers

Historical records and collections

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