Businesses, mills and venues
The Colonial Inn is the two-story inn on West King Street in Hillsborough that Isaiah Spencer built in 1838, known for fifty years as the Orange Hotel and later as the Occoneechee Hotel and the Corbinton Inn. Richison Nichols added its two-story piazza over the sidewalk about 1888, and it took the name Colonial Inn in 1946.
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 Colonial Inn. Each has been reviewed for relevance; materials held at OCPL appear first.
Amanda Boyd's stories of the Colonial Inn in Hillsborough, gathered as anecdotes of the inn and of the town's social life. The inn on West King Street is one of Hillsborough's landmarks. Published in Durham in 2021, 120 pages with illustrations, facsimiles, maps and portraits, many in color.
Included because: The site is named in the title, catalog subjects, or description.
A cookbook from the Colonial Inn in Hillsborough, published by the inn in 1972. Beyond its Southern recipes, the full title promises notes on historic Hillsborough and photographs of the town's landmarks. 96 pages with illustrations.
Included because: Published by or for this business.
A cookbook put out in 1972 by the Colonial Inn of Hillsborough, ninety six pages with illustrations and a portrait. The recipes feature Southern dishes served at the inn, alongside material on its history. The title page verso records a fourth printing in 1979.
Included because: The site is named in the title, catalog subjects, or description.
A folded promotional sheet for the Colonial Inn in Hillsborough, issued by the inn in 1959 under the tagline in the center of an historic village. Illustrated, with a color map.
Included because: The site is named in the title, catalog subjects, or description.
Table runner made between about 1850 and 1870 by Octavia Stroud Jordan or her mother, Sarah Holeman Stroud, and once in use at the Colonial Inn in Hillsborough.
Included because: The site is named in the title, catalog subjects, or description.
The Colonial Inn at Hillsborough, captioned with the building date of 1759, on a card credited to C. H. Ruth and printed by Aerial Photography Services of Charlotte. The 1759 date belongs to the inn; the card is undated.
Included because: The site is named in the title, catalog subjects, or description.
Undated photograph of the Colonial Inn in Hillsborough, the county seat, grouped with the Chapel Hill Historical Society's pictures of Chapel Hill businesses.
Included because: The site is named in the title, catalog subjects, or description.
Menu from the Colonial Inn in Hillsborough dated 5 May 1949. A color drawing of a horse-drawn carriage decorates the front, a map to the restaurant fills the back, and inside are the day's luncheon specials.
Included because: Published by or for this business.
The guest register of the Occoneechee Hotel in Hillsborough, covering 1888 to 1890 and 1896 to 1898, a single volume in the Southern Historical Collection at UNC, collection 4092-z. A register of this kind lists arrivals by name and date, so the volume records who stopped in the town.
Included because: Published by or for this business.
Not about Colonial Inn 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.
Survey of Hillsborough's historic buildings by Heather Wagner Slane of hmwPreservation, completed in September 2017. The 40-page report covers the town's architecture and history with color illustrations and maps.
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.
Cheryl Davis Warren's 2005 study of history and sense of place in Hillsborough, 216 leaves with illustrations, maps and a bibliography. Written as human geography, it treats the town's past alongside its social conditions and the ways residents understand where they live.
Included because: A survey or map of the town or county where the site stands.
Plan of Hillsborough drawn in October 1863, showing the downtown blocks around the crossing of Tryon and Churton Streets, with the Eno River, spelled Enoe on the sheet.
Included because: A survey or map of the town or county where the site stands.
Fire insurance map of Hillsborough, spelled Hillsboro, drawn by the Sanborn Map Company in January 1905 on two sheets, from the Sanborn Maps collection.
Included because: A survey or map of the town or county where the site stands.
Bird's-eye view of Hillsborough looking east, with houses and industrial buildings, on a postcard published by A. C. Bosselman & Co. of New York about 1905 to 1915. Card number 11116.
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.
Books in OCPL’s Rebecca B. Wall Local History Collection at the Main Library in Hillsborough whose titles, catalog subjects or descriptions are about this site. The Friends’ recommended starting points are labelled.
Amanda Boyd's stories of the Colonial Inn in Hillsborough, gathered as anecdotes of the inn and of the town's social life. The inn on West King Street is one of Hillsborough's landmarks. Published in Durham in 2021, 120 pages with illustrations, facsimiles, maps and portraits, many in color.
A cookbook from the Colonial Inn in Hillsborough, published by the inn in 1972. Beyond its Southern recipes, the full title promises notes on historic Hillsborough and photographs of the town's landmarks. 96 pages with illustrations.
These books don’t necessarily mention Colonial Inn, 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.
A 1982 revision of Allen Alexander Lloyd's history of Hillsborough, now written with Pauline O. Lloyd and carried forward from the town's founding in 1754 to 1982. Published in Hillsborough by A. A. Lloyd, 310 pages with illustrations and a bibliography.
J. Chris Holaday's Images of America volume on Hillsborough (Arcadia, 2002), built mostly from photographs and postcards. Chapters cover homes, churches and schools, business and industry, local people, scenes around town, and sports, entertainment and events.
Elizabeth Shreve Ryan's combined histories and tour guides for Hillsborough, Chapel Hill and Carrboro, the three towns of Orange County, with the University of North Carolina treated alongside Chapel Hill. Each town gets a narrative history and a tour of its streets and buildings. Published by Chapel Hill Press in 2004, 369 pages with illustrations and maps.
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.
An inventory of the buildings in the Hillsborough Historic District, dated 2006. It concerns historic buildings and the buildings and structures of Hillsborough. Useful for anyone checking a particular property in the town's historic district.
Susan McArtor Bellinger's photographic survey of the buildings in the Hillsborough Historic District put up before 1950, self-published in Hillsborough in 1991. Arranged as a guidebook, it records houses and other structures in photographs. 142 pages with illustrations.
Lucile Noell Dula's guidebook to Hillsborough and its historic buildings, published by Pelican in 1989. It pairs a tour of the town with notes on its history, in 128 illustrated pages with a bibliography. Part of the Wall Local History Collection.
Stewart E. Dunaway worked through Hillsborough, N.C., lot by lot, giving each town lot a synopsis of its history, a plat showing where it sits and transcripts of the deeds he could locate for it. The second issue runs to 720 pages with illustrations, maps and facsimiles.
Stewart E. Dunaway's 2015 addendum to his history of Hillsborough's town lots, adding deed records arranged by lot number and further town history, with the expansion of the 1890s covered for the first time. Self-published in North Carolina as version 1.0, 446 pages with illustrations, facsimiles and maps. Topics include deeds, court records, land titles and real property in Hillsborough.
An index to the town lots of Hillsborough, Orange County, compiled in 1982 as a guide to the deeds and court records that trace each lot's ownership.
Storyline about this site, with a page of its own:
Sources cited in this site’s history, National Register documents, and places to get research help. Research guide: Research a business or a changing street.
Something wrong or missing on this page, a location, a date or a name? Suggest a correction or a source →
