University buildings and grounds
McCorkle Place is the university's north quad in Chapel Hill, the core from which the campus grew, and home to the Davie Poplar and the 1858 monument to Joseph Caldwell. Across its low stone wall on Franklin Street, Frank Wilkinson and Herbert Aptheker spoke to students in 1966 in defiance of the Speaker Ban.
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 McCorkle Place. Each has been reviewed for relevance; materials held at OCPL appear first.
A talk given on October 12, 1993 by P. S. White to one hundred four sixth graders, one from each North Carolina county, at the Davie Poplar III ceremony during the University of North Carolina bicentennial. The North Carolina Botanical Garden printed it as six unnumbered illustrated pages. The subject is the Davie Poplar, the landmark tree on the Chapel Hill campus.
Included because: The site is named in the title, catalog subjects, or description.
Kemp P. Battle's 1902 account of the two monuments to Joseph Caldwell, the university's first president, on the Chapel Hill campus. Battle lived from 1831 to 1919. Detached from the December 1902 University of North Carolina Magazine and signed by Battle, it was published by the Dialectic and Philanthropic Literary Societies.
Included because: The site is named in the title, catalog subjects, or description.
A set of 77,570 tweet identifiers, about one gigabyte, gathered by the University Archives at Chapel Hill to document protests over the Confederate monument on campus between 2017 and 2019, University Archives 40486. Topics include soldiers' monuments and war memorials in North Carolina, Civil War monuments, protest movements in the state, and the statue by John A. Wilson (1878-1954) known as Silent Sam.
Included because: The site is named in the title, catalog subjects, or description.
Renée Ater writes on two efforts to memorialize slavery in North Carolina: the Unsung Founders Memorial on the campus at Chapel Hill, made by the artist Do-Ho Suh, and the North Carolina Freedom Monument Project. Dated 2012, concerning monuments to enslaved people in Chapel Hill and on monuments to African Americans across the state.
Included because: The site is named in the title, catalog subjects, or description.
Articles, correspondence and images gathered on the Davie Poplar, the historic tree on the campus of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. The file was donated by Mr. Burk and organized by Lucy Hart Peaden in December 2010, and it fills one volume with various foliations, illustrations in part in color, facsimiles and portraits. Part of UNC's North Carolina Collection.
Included because: The site is named in the title, catalog subjects, or description.
Hugh Morton photographed the Davie Poplar and the campus sidewalks around it in January 1992. Color mounted slide, 35 mm.
Included because: The site is named in the title, catalog subjects, or description.
The Bicentennial Observance Office at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill produced this color wall map in 1989, showing the county representatives connected with the Davie Poplar, the historic tree on the Chapel Hill campus. Mounted on board and measuring 36 by 94 cm, it belongs with the material prepared for the university's bicentennial.
Included because: The site is named in the title, catalog subjects, or description.
McCorkle Place, the older quad at UNC, in two photographs from 1976: a bicentennial pageant staged on the grounds and a view across the quad to the Silent Sam statue. From the Chapel Hill Historical Society's Prints and Photographs Collection (CHHS.002).
Included because: The site is named in the title, catalog subjects, or description.
Twenty two leaves arguing the case for McCorkle Place on the Chapel Hill campus as a national landmark, dated 1972 and ascribed to Louis Round Wilson, 1876 to 1979. The text survives as a photoreproduced typescript. Topics include historic sites and plazas in Chapel Hill and the history of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Part of UNC's North Carolina Collection.
Included because: The site is named in the title, catalog subjects, or description.
Two 1970 photographs of the monument to Joseph Caldwell, first president of the University of North Carolina, one with the Old Well behind it. From the UNC Campus binder, Prints and Photographs Collection (CHHS.002).
Included because: The site is named in the title, catalog subjects, or description.
Hugh Morton's black-and-white negative of the Davie Poplar on the UNC campus in Chapel Hill, the old tree named for university founder William R. Davie, made sometime between the 1970s and the early 1980s.
Included because: The site is named in the title, catalog subjects, or description.
The Davie Poplar on the UNC campus in autumn color, about the 1970s. The tree is named for William R. Davie, a founder of the university. Hugh Morton color transparency on sheet film, 4 by 5 1/4 inches.
Included because: The site is named in the title, catalog subjects, or description.
Graffiti on Silent Sam, the Confederate monument on the UNC campus, in April 1968, with Franklin Street visible behind the statue. Hugh Morton color slide, 35 mm.
Included because: The site is named in the title, catalog subjects, or description.
Hugh Morton photographed graffiti painted on Silent Sam, the Confederate soldier monument on the UNC campus in Chapel Hill, in April 1968. Color mounted slide, 35 mm.
Included because: The site is named in the title, catalog subjects, or description.
Graffiti marks the Silent Sam Confederate monument on the UNC campus in April 1968, with Franklin Street visible behind it. Color 35 mm slide by Hugh Morton.
Included because: The site is named in the title, catalog subjects, or description.
Silent Sam, the Confederate monument, stands before Graham Memorial on the UNC-Chapel Hill campus in this Hugh Morton negative from about 1942, probably made on infrared film. A cropped print appeared in the 1942 and 1943 Yackety Yack yearbooks.
Included because: The site is named in the title, catalog subjects, or description.
Looking up at Silent Sam, the Confederate soldiers' monument on the UNC-Chapel Hill campus. Hugh Morton took the black-and-white negative sometime between the 1940s and the early 1950s.
Included because: The site is named in the title, catalog subjects, or description.
Hugh Morton photograph from 1939 to 1942 of a young man perched on the Confederate monument known as Silent Sam on the UNC campus while a young woman reaches up for his foot. Black-and-white sheet film negative.
Included because: The site is named in the title, catalog subjects, or description.
UNC students talk in a group beneath the Silent Sam monument on campus in a Hugh Morton photograph from 1939 to 1942. The Confederate statue stood on the university's campus until 2018.
Included because: The site is named in the title, catalog subjects, or description.
Five photographs of the Silent Sam Confederate monument at UNC, from 1917 on. Two World War I student soldiers, Graham D. and Clem B. Holding, pose with the statue; other views show it in fog, being returned to its pedestal and McCorkle Place under snow. Part of the Chapel Hill Historical Society's Prints and Photographs Collection, CHHS.002.
Included because: The site is named in the title, catalog subjects, or description.
Crowds gather in Chapel Hill on 2 June 1913 for the unveiling of the university's Confederate monument, later known as Silent Sam, in this real photo postcard. Writing to his mother, the sender explains that it honors students who left the university to enlist in 1861 and describes the parade of the day before.
Included because: The site is named in the title, catalog subjects, or description.
Holliday Studio postcard of the Davie Poplar on the University of North Carolina campus, postmarked 7 June 1910 and addressed to Henry B. Marrow of Henderson. The writer thanks him for his cards and says he is leaving the Hill for home in Burlington.
Included because: The site is named in the title, catalog subjects, or description.
The Davie Poplar, the campus tree linked to the founding of the University of North Carolina, in five pictures dated 1873: views with surrounding trees, a negative of an illustration and the tree in summer. From the UNC Campus binder, Prints and Photographs Collection (CHHS.002).
Included because: The site is named in the title, catalog subjects, or description.
Alumni Hall and the Caldwell Monument at the University of North Carolina appear together on this undated card. Joseph Caldwell was the university's first president.
Included because: The site is named in the title, catalog subjects, or description.
Undated postcard of the Confederate Monument on the University of North Carolina campus in Chapel Hill, the statue known as Silent Sam. Though labeled Durham, the monument stood in Chapel Hill.
Included because: The site is named in the title, catalog subjects, or description.
The Davie Poplar, the campus tree linked by tradition to William R. Davie and the university's founding, in newspaper clippings and promotional materials. Undated folder from box 34 of the UNC series, Chapel Hill Historical Society Vertical File Collection.
Included because: The site is named in the title, catalog subjects, or description.
The Davie Poplar on the University of North Carolina campus at Chapel Hill, issued as a postcard by R. W. Foister of Chapel Hill. Part of UNC's North Carolina postcard series.
Included because: The site is named in the title, catalog subjects, or description.
Statue of William R. Davie among the trees of McCorkle Place on the UNC campus, in an undated photograph from the UNC Campus binder of the Chapel Hill Historical Society's Prints and Photographs Collection (CHHS.002).
Included because: The site is named in the title, catalog subjects, or description.
Ng Chiang Hoe, a UNC student, sketches the Davie Poplar on the old campus at Chapel Hill. Undated photograph from the student life pictures in the Chapel Hill Historical Society's Prints and Photographs Collection.
Included because: The site is named in the title, catalog subjects, or description.
A periodical on the Confederate monument known as Silent Sam and on what followed its fall at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. The cover phrasing speaks of making history visible in absence and of reckoning with myth and reality. Topics include protest movements and white supremacy movements in Chapel Hill and registers of students and alumni who were slaveholders.
Included because: The site is named in the title, catalog subjects, or description.
Not about McCorkle Place 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.
Bernard Lee Bryant's compilation of who occupied each structure on Franklin Street in Chapel Hill at five-year intervals from 1793 to 1998, issued by the Chapel Hill Historical Society in 1999 as a photocopy of his original computer printout on cotton paper. 191 leaves.
Included because: A survey or map of the town or county where the site stands.
John Daniel, a surveyor employed by the university trustees, made this pen and ink map of the future university site in 1792. It shows the tracts of land, the springs and creeks, nearby mills and the roads running from Fayetteville to Hillsborough, Pittsborough to Petersburg, Hillsborough to Newberne, and on to Raleigh. William S. Powell describes the map in First state university.
Included because: A survey or map of the town or county where the site stands.
Dated June 1, 1795, this pen and ink plan lays out the University of North Carolina site in its earliest years: the village, the cleared ground, the avenue, the ornamental ground, the lands belonging to the trustees and the springs. Archibald Henderson reproduced it in The campus of the first state university and identified it as the lost 1795 map by Charles W. Harris. Manuscript map, 30 x 36 cm.
Included because: A survey or map of the town or county where the site stands.
Early hand-drawn plan of the University village at Chapel Hill and the lands around it, which Archibald Henderson dated to between 1797 and 1812. It shows town lots with owners' names, Main Building (South Building), the steward's and president's houses, the chapel, Franklin Street and a Grand Avenue, plus a partial list of buyers at the 1793 lot sale.
Included because: A survey or map of the town or county where the site stands.
An early manuscript plan of Chapel Hill drawn at 200 yards to the inch, dated 1812, with a note on the verso reading September 4, 1817. It copies an earlier pen and ink plot in the possession of William Pannill, taken in turn from one by John Craig, and it marks boundary lines, town lots with some owners named, the University buildings, the president's lot, the chapel and the preparatory school.
Included because: A survey or map of the town or county where the site stands.
Henry Dennis Carter's reconstruction, drawn as a blueprint in 1934, of Chapel Hill as it stood between 1875 and 1885, showing the buildings of the village. A note on the map says the information came from old residents who gave it to Mary L. Thornton.
Included because: A survey or map of the town or county where the site stands.
Dating from 1888 and attributed to Hunter Lee Harris, a map of Chapel Hill and its vicinity, reproduced as a photocopy measuring 22 by 37 centimeters. Harris died in 1893, which brackets the drawing to the late nineteenth century. An early depiction of the streets of the village and the land around it.
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 McCorkle Place, 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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