Betty Smith

Life and Orange County connections

Dated events connected with this person, in date order. See these 11 dated events in the chronology →

1. between 1853 and 1858 Isaac Collier builds an I-house on East Rosemary Street Isaac Collier is thought to have built the two-story I-house at 315 East Rosemary Street between 1853 and 1858. The novelist Betty Smith, author of A Tree Grows in Brooklyn, later lived there. People: Betty Smith, Isaac J. Collier Place: 315 East Rosemary Street, Chapel Hill · Also named: Isaac CollierSearch the index · NC Digital Collections: Chapel Hill Historic Sites Survey: Final Report (1992), p. 51
2. By May 8, 1936 Betty Smith comes to Chapel Hill with the Federal Theatre Project The Federal Theater sent Smith to Chapel Hill in 1936 to work with Frederick H. Koch of the Carolina Playmakers. By early May she was one of four Federal Theatre Project playwrights there, with Grace Murphy, Herbert Meadow and Robert Finch, working with Finch on a supplement to the play catalogue of the university extension division. She stayed when the federal project expired, helped Koch compile American Folk Plays and took his classes for him in his absence. People: Frederick H. Koch Place: Chapel Hill · Also named: Robert Finch · Also mentions: Carolina PlaymakersSearch the index · Carolina Story: Betty Smith (Carolina's Literary History) · Also: Chapel Hill Weekly, May 8, 1936, p. 3
3. 1937 Betty Smith edits a collection of plays with Frederick Koch and Robert Finch Smith coedited Plays for Schools and Little Theatres with Koch and Finch in 1937 and wrote a catalog of one-act plays. People: Frederick H. Koch Place: Chapel Hill · Also named: Robert FinchSearch the index · NCpedia: Smith, Betty
4. by July 24, 1942 Betty Smith signs a Harper's contract for A Tree Grows in Brooklyn Mrs. Betty Smith signed a contract with Harper's to publish her new novel, which she had written at her home in Chapel Hill. Place: Chapel HillSearch the index · The Chapel Hill Weekly, July 24, 1942, p. 1
5. 1943 Daphne Athas graduates from UNC Athas graduated from the university in 1943 after studying writing with Betty Smith and Phillips Russell. People: Daphne Athas, Betty Smith, Phillips Russell Place: Chapel HillSearch the index · The Carolina Story: Daphne Athas (Carolina's Literary History)
6. April 19, 1943 Literary Guild chooses Betty Smith's A Tree Grows in Brooklyn Betty Smith of North Street learned by telephone from Harper and Brothers that both the Literary Guild and the Book-of-the-Month Club wanted her novel, A Tree Grows in Brooklyn; she chose the Guild for earlier publication, in July. A first printing of 150,000 copies was ordered. Place: 504 North Street, Chapel HillSearch the index · The Chapel Hill Weekly, April 23, 1943, p. 1
7. August 18, 1943 A Tree Grows in Brooklyn, written in Chapel Hill, is published Smith wrote the novel in a one-room house on North Street in Chapel Hill, rising about half past five and working against the chimney wall to keep warm. Harper published it on Wednesday, 18 August 1943 (NCpedia gives the 17th), and it sold more than 150,000 copies within two weeks. Place: North Street, Chapel HillSearch the index · NCpedia: Smith, Betty · Also: Chapel Hill Weekly, August 13, 1943, p. 4; Chapel Hill Weekly, August 27, 1943, p. 2
8. 1944, after July 29 Charles S. Mangum Jr. sells the old Mangum house on East Rosemary Street to Betty Smith Charles S. Mangum Jr. inherited the old Mangum house at East Rosemary and Hillsborough streets from his aunt, Mary Elizabeth Mangum Wilson, widow of the Methodist minister N. H. D. Wilson, who died at the house on July 29, 1944, and he sold it later that year to the novelist Betty Smith. People: Charles S. Mangum Jr., Betty Smith Place: 315 East Rosemary Street, Chapel Hill · Also named: Mary Elizabeth Mangum Wilson, N. H. D. WilsonSearch the index · The Chapel Hill Weekly, November 17, 1958, p. 3 (A Look Back at the Old Mangum Place on Rosemary Street) · Also: The News of Orange County (Hillsborough), August 3, 1944, p. 8
9. by May 7, 1964 UNC writing students publish The Young Writer at Chapel Hill A booklet of eight short stories and six poems by current and former UNC creative writing students, edited by Associate Professor Jessie Rehder, was published, with brief comments by novelists Betty Smith and John Knowles and members of the English faculty. People: Betty Smith Place: Chapel Hill · Also named: Jessie Rehder, John KnowlesSearch the index · The News of Orange County (Hillsborough), May 7, 1964, p. 20
10. May 5, 1965 MGM's Joy in the Morning, from Betty Smith's novel, has its world premiere in Chapel Hill The film made from Chapel Hill novelist Betty Smith's Joy in the Morning had its world premiere at the Carolina Theatre, shown at 7:00 and 9:30 p.m., with the film's lead actor greeting the crowd. Smith told the Daily Tar Heel she had asked MGM to hold the premiere in Chapel Hill, where she had lived for 23 years; the lead actor was greeted the day before by a crowd of about 500 at Raleigh-Durham Airport. People: Betty Smith Place: Carolina Theatre, Franklin Street, Chapel HillSearch the index · The Daily Tar Heel, May 6, 1965, p. 1
11. January 21, 1972 Betty Smith is buried in the Chapel Hill Memorial Cemetery Smith died on January 17, 1972, at a convalescent home in Shelton, Connecticut. Her funeral mass at St. Thomas More Church in Chapel Hill was set for January 21, and she was buried in the Chapel Hill Memorial Cemetery. Place: Chapel Hill · Also mentions: Chapel Hill Memorial Cemetery, St. Thomas More ChurchSearch the index · NCpedia: Smith, Betty · Also: The Daily Tar Heel, January 19, 1972, p. 1