University buildings and grounds
The Forest Theatre is the university's open-air amphitheatre at the western edge of Battle Park in Chapel Hill, built in 1919 and rebuilt in local stone by the WPA in 1940, with a screen wall along Country Club Road, curved hillside seating and a rough stone stage. In 1953 the university dedicated it to drama professor Frederick Koch.
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 Forest Theatre. Each has been reviewed for relevance; materials held at OCPL appear first.
Sonya Dowhaluk's 2003 case study of the Forest Theatre in Chapel Hill, looking at what open air staging asks of a production in technical terms. Topics include open air theater and drama at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and a bibliography follows on leaves 39 to 42.
Included because: The site is named in the title, catalog subjects, or description.
A program for the dedication of the Forest Theatre in Chapel Hill, issued by the University of North Carolina in 1943 and marking the twenty-fifth anniversary of the Carolina Playmakers, 1918 to 1943. Frederick H. Koch, who founded the Playmakers, and university president Frank Porter Graham are both also named for the open-air theater.
Included because: The site is named in the title, catalog subjects, or description.
Maud Macdonald Hutcheson's article on the natural features of the university at Chapel Hill, taking up three in particular: the Arboretum, the Herbarium and the Forest Theatre. Detached from Nature magazine, volume 35, number 4, April 1942, and issued by the American Nature Association in Baltimore.
Included because: The site is named in the title, catalog subjects, or description.
Shirley Brimberg of New York, costumed as a mountain sprite for a production of Peer Gynt, stands with another cast member at the Forest Theatre in Chapel Hill. Hugh Morton negative, probably May 1942.
Included because: The site is named in the title, catalog subjects, or description.
Shirley Brimberg as the mountain sprite lures Peer Gynt, played by Douglass Watson of Barnesville, Georgia, in a Carolina Playmakers production at the Forest Theatre. Hugh Morton's photograph ran in the Daily Tar Heel on 17 May 1942.
Included because: The site is named in the title, catalog subjects, or description.
Forest Theatre of the Carolina Playmakers at the University of North Carolina, on a postcard sold by the Student Supply Store and printed by the Albertype Company of Brooklyn. A visitor mailed it from Chapel Hill on 12 April 1937 to a friend named Edythe, praising the campus. The view shows an audience at an open-air production.
Included because: The site is named in the title, catalog subjects, or description.
Spectators watch an outdoor play at the Forest Theatre of the Carolina Playmakers in Chapel Hill, on a postcard sold by the Student Supply Store at the University of North Carolina. Undated.
Included because: The site is named in the title, catalog subjects, or description.
Forest Theatre, the open-air stage in Battle Park at UNC, in two undated photographs: an audience gathered for a performance, and three people at the theater. From the UNC Campus binder, Prints and Photographs Collection (CHHS.002).
Included because: The site is named in the title, catalog subjects, or description.
Not about Forest Theatre 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.
Margaret Ruth Little-Stokes's survey of Chapel Hill's town and campus buildings from 1795 to 1975, published by the Preservation Society of Chapel Hill in 2006. Chapters run from the first campus buildings through David Swain's romantic campus to midcentury modernism, followed by area surveys of the campus, east and west Chapel Hill, downtown, Northside and the suburbs.
Included because: A survey or map of the town or county where the site stands.
M. Ruth Little's 2004 architectural history of Chapel Hill and the university campus from 1795 to 1975, written for the Preservation Society of Chapel Hill. A 99-page survey 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.
M. B. Gatza's final report of the 1992 Chapel Hill historic sites survey for the town Planning Department, with contributions by Beverly C. Kawalec and Catherine Bishir. It covers historic buildings and districts in Chapel Hill in 80 pages.
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.
Cornelia Spencer Love's recollections of Chapel Hill as a village, published by the Chapel Hill Historical Society in 1976 with drawings by John V. Allcott. Love lived from 1892 to 1981, and the book covers Chapel Hill biography, the town's social life and customs, and the faculty of the university before 1962. viii and 87 pages with illustrations.
Included because: A survey or map of the town or county where the site stands.
Pen-and-ink manuscript map of Chapel Hill dated 1852, with a table of measurements, showing the University campus, the village around it, street widths and layout, and the town limits. Later notes attributed to Kemp P. Battle give the longitude and latitude of landmarks as measured from atop New East Hall in 1880.
Included because: A survey or map of the town or county where the site stands.
Sanborn Map Company fire insurance map of Chapel Hill, June 1925, on eleven sheets, with Carrboro also drawn. Sanborn maps recorded the outline, construction and use of each building for fire insurers, so the set shows both towns block by block in the mid 1920s.
Included because: A survey or map of the town or county where the site stands.
Street and property map of Chapel Hill and the surrounding country, revised to 1 January 1933 and printed in the town. Topics include streets, real property and the historical geography of Chapel Hill along with maps of the University of North Carolina in its 1793 to 1962 period. A useful sheet for tracing lot lines and street names as they stood at the start of the 1930s.
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 Forest Theatre, 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.
Steven Stolpen's pictorial history of Chapel Hill, one of the Donning Company's photographic town histories, published in Norfolk, Virginia in 1978. Photographs and portraits carry the story of the town and the university, including references to Thomas Wolfe's years as a student at Carolina. 156 pages with illustrations.
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.
A pocket-sized guide to the historic buildings and landmarks of Chapel Hill, prepared by the Chapel Hill Historical Society and printed by Creative Printers in 1973. Forty pages with illustrations and maps, 14 by 22 cm. Topics include architecture, historic buildings and historic districts in Chapel Hill, and the guide is useful for a walking tour of the older parts of town.
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: Investigate a school or community institution.
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