Schools and academies
The Bingham School was the select classical and mathematical school William James Bingham opened at the Oaks, twelve miles southwest of Hillsborough, in November 1844. It stayed there until December 1864, when his sons William and Robert moved it near Mebane's Station, and Robert Bingham took it to Asheville in 1891.
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.
People named in events about this site, ordered by number of mentions. Each example links to an entry with a source citation.
Books, articles, records, and images about Bingham School. Each has been reviewed for relevance; materials held at OCPL appear first.
Robert I. Curtis on the Bingham School and classical education in North Carolina between 1793 and 1873, an article of about fifty pages with illustrations, a map and portraits at 26 cm, published in 1996. The school was an Orange County institution tied to the Bingham family.
Included because: The site is named in the title, catalog subjects, or description.
Court record from 1898 in the case of Bingham School against P.L. Gray and others before the Supreme Court of North Carolina, printed as a statement of case and transcript of record, ii and 127 pages at 23 cm. The Bingham family, the Orange County school and the Bingham Military School at Asheville all figure in it.
Included because: The site is named in the title, catalog subjects, or description.
A newspaper piece on the Bingham School reprinted as a broadside in 1884, taken from the Raleigh Register of April 23 and headed with the Latin tag about a sound mind in a sound body. It reports the school approaching its centennial year, and it concerns secondary education at the Bingham School in Orange County. The sheet measures 24 by 20 centimeters.
Included because: The site is named in the title, catalog subjects, or description.
Diary kept in 1886 by Charlton P. Brooke, a student at the Bingham School in Orange County, N.C. Its pages hold autographs, lists of the school's faculty and officers, notes on daily life at the school, and the writer's remarks on the poorer white residents of the surrounding countryside. One manuscript volume. Subjects include the Bingham School's history and Orange County social conditions.
Included because: The site is named in the title, catalog subjects, or description.
An autograph album from 1882 containing signatures of students at the Bingham School in Orange County, including Johnnie H. B. Tomlinson, 1862 to 1925. One unpaged volume measuring 13 by 20 centimeters, in the North Carolina Collection at UNC.
Included because: The site is named in the title, catalog subjects, or description.
Papers of A. R. Black, 1823 to 1889, running from 1729 to 1929 with the bulk between 1848 and 1868: 160 items in half a linear foot in the Southern Historical Collection at UNC. Subjects include the Bingham School in Orange County, nineteenth century school notebooks and arithmetic exercises, estate law, and economic conditions in New Hanover and Sampson counties.
Included because: The site is named in the title, catalog subjects, or description.
Barracks at the Bingham School in Mebane, on a card published by the Piedmont Supply Company.
Included because: The site is named in the title, catalog subjects, or description.
A photographic postcard of the residence of Colonel Gray at the Bingham School in Mebane.
Included because: The site is named in the title, catalog subjects, or description.
Catalogues of the Bingham School from its Mebaneville years, with imprints from 1866 through 1890. Each volume lists the curriculum and registers the students of the Orange County school. Volumes of 19 to 27 centimeters with illustrations; the title varies slightly from issue to issue.
Included because: Published by or for this institution.
Annual catalogues of the Bingham School, the private academy in Orange County, listing courses and the students enrolled each session. Issued in volumes with illustrations and portraits; the supplied date is 1956. Registers of this kind are standard sources for school and family historians tracing students who attended.
Included because: Published by or for this institution.
Another run of Bingham School session catalogues, this one titled for the session just ended and the announcements for the next, from 1949. Volumes of 16 to 21 centimeters with illustrations and portraits. Each issue sets out the curriculum of the Orange County school and registers its students.
Included because: Published by or for this institution.
Recruiting booklet from Bingham School, the private school in Orange County near Mebane, published in 1910: a word to parents about their boy, with the sentence begun on the cover completed page by page as reasons to enroll him. Signed at the end by Preston Lewis Gray, president of the school. Fourteen pages with illustrations in a small oblong format.
Included because: Published by or for this institution.
Promotional booklet from the Bingham School in Orange County, gathering testimonials from students, parents and others about the quality of its teaching and the way the school was run; the latest testimonials date from 1907. Twenty unnumbered pages with illustrations in a small 9 by 16 cm format.
Included because: Published by or for this institution.
Small promotional pamphlet for the Bingham School, the private boys' school in Orange County near Mebane, setting out reasons a parent should send a son there. Signed by Preston Lewis Gray on the last page and printed by Edwards & Broughton in Raleigh, around 1899. Ten unnumbered pages, 9 by 16 centimeters.
Included because: Published by or for this institution.
Issued under the school's fuller name, The William Bingham School, Orange Co., North Carolina, this run of catalogues from the 1890s carries the curriculum and the student register of the Orange County academy. Volumes with illustrations, 21 centimeters, printed at Raleigh. The surviving issues are dated 1896 and 1897.
Included because: Published by or for this institution.
The Binghamite was the student magazine of the Bingham School, brought out by its Kalisthenic and Polemic Societies and printed at the school in Orange County. Volumes of 28 to 29 centimeters, recorded from 1893, with an earlier issue dated 1887. Topics include private schools in the county and literary societies, the student bodies that produced it.
Included because: Published by or for this institution.
Form letter from R. Bingham concerning the Bingham School, dated September 6, 1882 at Mebaneville, North Carolina, and addressed Dear sir. The family's boarding school was then in Orange County. A single printed sheet, 26 by 21 cm.
Included because: Published by or for this institution.
Single sheet printed by the Bingham School in 1880, when the academy stood near Mebane in Orange County, headed with its founding date of 1793. It concerns the students' conduct of life, setting out expectations for the boys' behavior. One of several Bingham School circulars in this bibliography.
Included because: Published by or for this institution.
A single printed sheet giving the order of exercises for the Bingham School commencement of Friday, April 23, 1880. Bingham School was the private academy in Orange County near Mebane. Printed by the school in 1880, one unnumbered page measuring 21 by 13 centimeters.
Included because: Published by or for this institution.
Single-sheet circular that Robert Bingham issued for the Bingham School on May 31, 1879, measuring 27 by 21 cm and printed at Mebane. W. B. Lynch is named with Bingham and the school, which stood in Orange County.
Included because: Published by or for this institution.
Single-sheet circular from the Bingham School dated May 8, 1879, issued by Robert Bingham, whose family ran the boarding school then located at Mebane in Orange County. The work describes its content as school rules and examinations, so it is a notice about how the school was conducted. One unnumbered page, 26 by 20 centimeters, and an 1879 Mebane imprint.
Included because: Published by or for this institution.
Broadside advertising the Bingham School at Mebaneville, announcing that its 166th session would open on 10 January 1877 under Major Robert Bingham as superintendent, with a fuller circular available on request. The school, founded in 1793, was an Orange County secondary school. A single sheet measuring 28 by 21 centimeters, printed in 1876.
Included because: Published by or for this institution.
One printed sheet of three pages, issued in 1872 to advertise the Bingham School and giving its post office as Mebaneville in Orange County. A prospectus sheet, folded once to 21 by 13 centimeters, shorter than the school's full catalogues.
Included because: Published by or for this institution.
Single printed sheet from W. Bingham addressed to the patrons and former pupils of the Bingham School, the Orange County academy, dated 1870 and entered as a probable Mebane imprint. Topics include the religious life of the school's students. One unnumbered page, 22 by 14 centimeters.
Included because: Published by or for this institution.
Two-page circular from the Bingham School at Mebanesville, printed about 1864, one of the school's wartime printings from Orange County. A small sheet, 21 by 13 centimeters, issued by the school itself in the later years of the Civil War.
Included because: Published by or for this institution.
Single printed sheet from the Bingham School, then at Mebaneville in Orange County, dated 1849. It sets out article 21 of the school's rules, granting free tuition to ministers' sons, and proposes a new article 22 offering loans to boys unable to pay tuition.
Included because: Published by or for this institution.
Printed form letter from the Bingham School in Orange County, with blanks for a statement of account. It cites articles 28 and 29 of the school catalogue on payment of expenses and is signed by Robert Bingham from the Bingham School post office. Tentatively dated 1849. A single sheet, 40 by 21 centimeters.
Included because: Published by or for this institution.
A collection of loose announcements, bulletins and programs from the Bingham School in Orange County. Listed with a date of 1793.
Included because: Published by or for this institution.
Bingham School yearbook for 1908 to 1909, from the school at Mebane, with a register of students, maps and a handful of photographs. Part of the North Carolina Yearbooks collection.
Included because: Published by or for this institution.
Bingham School issued this catalogue for the 1905 to 1906 year. It describes the university curriculum. From DigitalNC's North Carolina Yearbooks collection.
Included because: Published by or for this institution.
Two volumes from the Bingham Military School at Asheville, covering 1872 to 1876 and 1890 to 1919, part of the Southern Historical Collection at UNC. The volumes concern the earlier Bingham School in Orange County, Robert Bingham, 1838 to 1927, debating societies and the history of schools in North Carolina.
Included because: Published by or for this institution.
Not about Bingham School alone: the architectural surveys that cover its town or the county, and maps drawn while it stood. Several of the surveys can be read free online at NC Digital Collections.
Richard L. Mattson's manuscript survey of the history and architecture of Orange County, completed in September 1996. Its 78 pages cover the county's historic buildings and structures and end with a bibliography.
Included because: A survey or map of the town or county where the site stands.
NC Digital Collections record courtesy of the North Carolina Department of Natural and Cultural Resources.
National Register multiple property documentation form on the historic resources of Orange County, completed in 1993. Kelly Lally and M. Ruth Little led the first phase of the survey, and Jody Carter and Todd Peck the second. It runs 123 pages with a bibliography.
Included because: A survey or map of the town or county where the site stands.
NC Digital Collections record courtesy of the North Carolina Department of Natural and Cultural Resources.
Historic building survey forms for Orange County gathered in 1974 by the state's Historic Preservation Section for a report on the Tar-Neuse River basin. About 400 pages of forms covering buildings in Chapel Hill, Hillsborough and the countryside; a form can carry a description, historical notes, location, a photograph and a floor plan.
Included because: A survey or map of the town or county where the site stands.
Large manuscript map of Orange County on linen, tracing ownership and chains of title for notable tracts with the dates each passed to new owners. Hachures show relief, and it marks principal towns, roads, railroads, mines, creeks, rivers and lakes. The date is uncertain; both 1849 and 1913 have been given for it.
Included because: A survey or map of the town or county where the site stands.
Facsimile, dated 1940, of George W. Tate's 1891 map of Orange County. It shows towns, roads, railroads such as the North Carolina Rail Road and the Chapel Hill line, residences, schools, churches, mills and mines, with portraits and pictures of buildings in the margins.
Included because: A survey or map of the town or county where the site stands.
Marcus Cicero Stephens Noble drew this 1915 map to show how Orange County's original territory was divided, tracing the formation of Caswell, Person, Alamance, Durham, Chatham, Randolph, Guilford and Rockingham counties out of it. Topics include county boundaries and the history of political divisions in the Piedmont. Surviving as a photocopy on a sheet 31 by 23 centimeters.
Included because: A survey or map of the town or county where the site stands.
Color soil map of Orange County issued in 1918 by the U.S. Government Printing Office at one inch to the mile, 68 by 46 cm. Besides soil types it marks roads and railroads, the Southern Railway among them, churches, schools, mills, stores, cotton gins, iron mines, cemeteries and the county home, and it names the townships of Bingham, Cedar Grove, Chapel Hill, Cheeks, Eno, Hillsborough and Little River.
Included because: A survey or map of the town or county where the site stands.
Hand colored map of Orange County drawn by E. A. Stanaland and published at Parrott, Georgia, in 1939. It shows towns and townships, roads and railroads, and marks the schools and churches standing in the county. One sheet, 58 by 36 centimeters.
Included because: A survey or map of the town or county where the site stands.
School map of Orange County from about 1922, a blue line print marking townships, towns, churches and the separate schools for white and Black children under segregation. Communities shown include Hillsborough, Chapel Hill, Carrboro, Efland and Mebane.
Included because: A survey or map of the town or county where the site stands.
Found a book OCPL doesn’t own? You can often borrow it through interlibrary loan at OCPL.
These books don’t necessarily mention Bingham School, but they cover where it stands, its kind of building and the land, family and burial records behind it, and they are where a search for a place like this usually goes next. All are at OCPL, most in the Wall Collection.
J. Ronald Oakley's pictorial history of Mebane, the railroad town on the Orange and Alamance county line, from Arcadia Publishing in 2012, 127 pages of photographs. Chapters cover the railroad, industries, businesses, the Depression and war years, profiles past and present, churches and civic clubs, recreation and sports, school days, and preserving the past. Topics include Mebane's history, economy, buildings and railroads.
Hugh Talmage Lefler and Paul W. Wager's history of Orange County across its first two centuries, 1752 to 1952, prepared for the county's bicentennial. It covers government and politics, biography and the county's families, and doubles as a genealogical reference. Published in Chapel Hill by the Orange Printshop in 1953, 389 pages with illustrations and an index; this copy is a later reprint.
Irene Oliver Pender's history of the public schools of Orange County from 1752 to 1983, covering more than two centuries of schooling in Hillsborough, Efland, Cedar Grove and the rural districts of the county. Published in 1983, 186 pages with illustrations.
Catherine W. Bishir and Michael T. Southern's field guide to the historic buildings of the North Carolina Piedmont, arranged county by county from Wake and Franklin in the east to Mecklenburg and Gaston in the west. The Orange County section takes in Hillsborough, Chapel Hill and Carrboro along with the rural county, with entries on individual buildings and maps for finding them. Published 2003, 596 pages with illustrations and maps.
County planning department survey of significant sites in the unincorporated parts of Orange County, published in 1988, 95 pages with maps. The survey covers cemeteries, church buildings and archaeological sites on the cultural side, and plants, animals, endangered species, wildlife refuges, geology and recreation areas on the natural side. Useful for local historians, genealogists tracing burial grounds and land planners alike.
The historic preservation element of Orange County's comprehensive plan, prepared for the county Historic Preservation Commission and Planning Department by the Jaeger Company of Gainesville, Georgia, and adopted on 1 April 1996. Partly financed by National Park Service funds through the state Division of Archives and History, it sets county policy on historic buildings and sites and their conservation. 59 pages plus 50 unnumbered, with illustrations and maps, some folded and in color.
Mark Chilton's oversized atlas plotting eighteenth-century land grants across the original Orange County, which stretched well beyond today's boundaries into what became Alamance and Durham counties. Published in Carrboro by Hand Made Books beginning in 2012, the set was planned in four volumes: Henry McCulloh's great tract number 11 and the land north of it; the Saxapahaw old fields (volume 2); Chapel Hill, Hillsborough and the Johnston Tract; and Durham, Rougemont and McCulloh's tract number 12. Maps and color illustrations, 41 cm.
Storyline about this site, with a page of its own:
A deed from the county’s deed books that bear on this site, from Mark Chilton’s published abstracts. The note under each says why: the site’s survey file or National Register nomination cites it, it names the site, or it passes the site’s land along the chain of title the survey traces. Each deed’s page links to its deed-book page at the Register of Deeds.
Sources cited in this site’s history, National Register documents, and places to get research help. Research guide: Investigate a school or community institution.
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