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Chapel Hill’s sewers and the Bolin Creek plant, 1923–1944

How Chapel Hill extended its sewers in the 1920s: the small bond issues, engineer W. C. Olsen’s plan for a Bolin Creek interceptor and disposal plant, the plant site, a downstream owner’s suit, the Church Street lines, and the 1926 contest with Carrboro for ditch diggers.

In briefIn 1923 about four homes in ten in Chapel Hill lacked water and sewer connections, and from then to 1944 the town and the University built and kept enlarging a sewer system and a disposal plant in the Bolin Creek valley. In 1925 the town contracted for a plant in Strowd's Lowgrounds, with the University agreeing to pay half the cost. Neighbors downstream sued or claimed damages over sewage, odors and flies. A Church Street main in 1926 gave the Black neighborhood there complete service. A new plant went into operation in 1931, a 1937 pumping station let every home within the town limits connect, and in 1944 the aldermen moved to enlarge the long-inadequate plant again.

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In E. M. Knox's first year as Chapel Hill's business manager, 1922 to 1923, the town added about 2,000 feet of sewer line. In April 1923 it was digging a sewer line on Rosemary Street, and on April 10 the aldermen authorized up to $750 in sewer bonds. Knox's 1923 report found about four homes in ten without water and sewer connections. By July 1924 the board had hired W. C. Olsen to plan an interceptor (a large sewer that collects the flow of smaller lines) down the Bolin Creek valley and a disposal plant in Strowd's Lowgrounds. On June 1, 1925 the aldermen called for bids; the University had agreed to pay half the cost.

On July 8 Mayor W. S. Roberson announced the plant site, 1,700 feet below Strowd's bridge, and a contract for a plant put at about $35,000. That fall the town sold $116,000 in bonds, including $27,500 for sewers. By March 1926 G. H. King, who owned land downstream, had sued over sewage in Bolin Creek. That year the University laid a new water line and the town a sewer main under Church Street, giving the Black neighborhood there complete service. By November about fifty Black laborers on Chapel Hill's crews began leaving for Carrboro's new sewer job at $3 a day, and Chapel Hill raised its pay from $2.50 to $3.25.

In July 1928, under an agreement among the University, the town and the Gimghouls, a pipe line to the municipal plant in Strowd's lowgrounds was finished and the Battle Park disposal plant was abandoned so the woods could be restored. In August 1930 the aldermen authorized enlarging the plant at up to $35,000, shared equally by the town and the University, on H. G. Baity's recommendation of a digester (a tank in which sewage sludge is broken down), a larger sludge bed, a sedimentation plant and chlorination, and on August 13 they rejected damage claims of $12,500 and $5,000 from two neighbors on the Durham road who complained of odors and flies.

By September 1931 the McClelland Company of Charlotte had finished its part of the new plant about 300 yards below the Durham road bridge, with a primary clarifier, a control house and a digester, using gas from the sewage for heating and paid for by bonds carried by sewer rentals. That November the plant went into operation at a cost to the town of about $26,000, and the aldermen invited citizens to inspect it.

On June 4, 1934 the aldermen passed an ordinance for up to $32,000 in bonds to extend and enlarge the town's sanitary sewer system, and the Local Government Commission advertised the town's $42,000 of street and sewer bonds for sale on July 31. With a $21,000 PWA (Public Works Administration) grant from October 1936 for the west-end sewer, street surfacing and an incinerator, the aldermen on February 2, 1937 gave the Nye Odorless Incinerator Company of Macon, Georgia, a $17,700 contract for a garbage and trash incinerator beside the sewage disposal plant in Strowd's Lowgrounds. By early April the Gilbert Engineering Company of Statesville had finished, for $11,620 with PWA aid, a pumping station in the woods behind the Isaac W. Pritchard place for the 24 to 26 low-lying houses in the southwest of town that gravity sewers could not reach, making it possible for every home within the corporate limits, and several outside, to connect to the municipal sewer system.

By March 1941 forty to fifty men were extending the town sewage disposal plant in the Bolin Creek valley east of town, a project of about $45,000 paid partly by a W.P.A. (Works Progress Administration) grant and partly by the town and the University; its main new structure, a trickling filter 125 feet across, was to treat the outflow with a secondary clarifier before it reached the creek, and completion was expected in the fall. On November 8, 1944 the aldermen decided to go ahead with enlarging the long-inadequate plant and asked Gilbert, White and Company of Durham for a survey and cost estimates.

In the chronology

Events in this storyline, in date order. See these 27 dated events in the chronology →

  1. Chapel Hill aldermen authorize bonds for a town building, sewer extension and fire apparatus The Chapel Hill Board of Aldermen passed three ordinances under the Municipal Finance Act authorizing $5,000 in bonds for a municipal building, $8,000 to extend the sewer system and $6,000 for fire engines or other fire-fighting vehicles, each with a tax to pay them off. The statements filed with the ordinances put the town's average assessed valuation at $1,629,025 and its net debt at $31,600. People: C. B. GriffinSearch the index · The News (Chapel Hill), December 1, 1921, p. 8
  2. Chapel Hill builds sidewalks, extends its sewers and plants street trees In E. M. Knox's first year as town business manager the town laid about 1,500 feet of sidewalk, extended its sewer lines by about 2,000 feet and planted more than a hundred trees along its streets. People: Edward M. KnoxSearch the index · E. M. Knox, Report of the Town Business Manager to the Board of Aldermen, Chapel Hill, for the Fiscal Year 1922-1923 (1923), scan p. 11
  3. Chapel Hill aldermen authorize $750 in bonds to extend the sewer system On April 10, 1923, the Chapel Hill board of aldermen passed an ordinance under the Municipal Finance Act to issue up to $750 in bonds to extend the town's sewer system, with a yearly tax to pay them. The town's statement put its average assessed valuation at $1,913,729 and its net debt at $37,409.75. People: Edward M. KnoxSearch the index · The News (Chapel Hill), April 19, 1923, p. 8
  4. Chapel Hill lays a sewer line on Rosemary Street Chapel Hill was digging a new sewer line along Rosemary Street in April 1923, in a ditch 10 to 12 feet deep in places. That month the aldermen passed an ordinance to issue sewer bonds to extend the town's existing sewer system.Search the index · The News (Chapel Hill), April 26, 1923, p. 5
  5. About 40 percent of Chapel Hill's homes lack water and sewer connections The business manager's 1923 report found about four homes in ten still without water and sewer connections and said the town was working to let every householder connect.Search the index · E. M. Knox, Report of the Town Business Manager to the Board of Aldermen, Chapel Hill, for the Fiscal Year 1922-1923 (1923), scan p. 19
  6. Chapel Hill aldermen pass bond ordinances for sewers and town equipment The board of aldermen adopted ordinances under the Municipal Finance Act for up to $1,600 in bonds to extend the town sewer system and up to $3,050 in bonds to buy town equipment, with a tax to be levied each year to repay them, as published in the Weekly.Search the index · The Chapel Hill Weekly, June 13, 1924, p. 3
  7. Chapel Hill aldermen hire engineer W. C. Olsen to plan the sewer extension The board of aldermen engaged W. C. Olsen of Raleigh, a municipal engineer, to design and supervise an extension of Chapel Hill's sewers, an interceptor line down the Bolin Creek valley and a disposal plant in Strowd's Lowgrounds, and to draw a general layout for future sewers. His plans were to go to contractors for bids.Search the index · The Chapel Hill Weekly, July 17, 1924, p. 1
  8. Aldermen move the planned sewage plant farther down Bolin Creek and call for bids Because the Strowd farm was being opened for houses, the Chapel Hill aldermen in May 1925 gave up engineer W. C. Olsen's site for the sewage disposal plant 800 feet south of the Durham road and looked farther down Bolin Creek in what was known as Strowd's lowgrounds. On June 1 they voted to ask for bids on the sewer line and plant, with alternatives at 1,450 and 2,200 feet from the one-mile bridge estimated at $43,750 and $47,000; the University had agreed to pay half the cost.Search the index · The Chapel Hill Weekly, June 4, 1925, p. 1
  9. Chapel Hill aldermen fix the site of the new sewage disposal plant below Strowd's bridge Mayor W. S. Roberson announced that the Chapel Hill Insurance and Realty Company had given the school board a 12-acre tract 1,700 feet below Strowd's bridge, and the school board sold it to the town for $4,000 as the site of the new sewage disposal plant. The Elliott Building Company of Hickory had the construction contract, and the plant was put at about $35,000. People: W. S. Roberson, Edward M. KnoxSearch the index · The Chapel Hill Weekly, July 10, 1925, p. 1
  10. Chapel Hill aldermen set a $1.35 tax rate and pass $80,000 in street improvement bonds With the town's assessed valuation up $253,555 to $2,955,555, the aldermen fixed the 1925 tax rate at $1.35, two and a half cents above the year before, and passed ordinances for $80,000 of street improvement bonds, $27,500 of sewer bonds and smaller issues for street equipment and old debts. The bonds were sold November 2 at 5 1/4 percent, below the 6 percent the town had been paying. People: John Lindsay Morehead, Edward M. KnoxSearch the index · The Chapel Hill Weekly, September 11, 1925, p. 1
  11. Chapel Hill sells $116,000 of bonds at 5 1/4 percent The town of Chapel Hill sold $116,000 of bonds for street, sewer and equipment work and old debts to Braun, Bosworth and Co. of Toledo, best of 19 bidders, for $116,670, borrowing at a little under 5 1/4 percent where it had been paying 6. People: Edward M. KnoxSearch the index · The Chapel Hill Weekly, November 6, 1925, p. 1
  12. Downstream landowners sue Chapel Hill over sewage in Bolin Creek G. H. King filed suit against the town of Chapel Hill for damages, saying its sewage had polluted Bolin Creek where it ran through his land several miles below town, and five more suits were threatened. King said his cattle would not drink the creek water during the 1925 drought; Town Manager E. M. Knox said the town could show no nuisance had been created and that its new disposal plant now cleaned the water. People: Edward M. KnoxSearch the index · The Chapel Hill Weekly, March 26, 1926, p. 1
Show all 27 dated events
  1. Chapel Hill and the University arrange a sewer for the Black neighborhood on Church Street By joint action the University agreed to put in a new water line and the town to build a sewer for the Black section along Church Street. Town Manager E. M. Knox said that with this job done Chapel Hill would be 'ninety-five per cent sewered.' People: Edward M. KnoxThe Chapel Hill Weekly, April 16, 1926, p. 1
  2. Carrboro lets the contract for a new water and sewer system Carrboro let the contract for a new water and sewer system to the Burlington Construction Company, which went to work at once, after its aldermen authorized $80,000 in bonds for pipes, a standpipe and a sewage disposal plant in the Morgan Creek valley. Water was to be bought from the University's plant and piped out to Carrboro. Chapel Hill's aldermen turned down a Carrboro proposal to join the two towns' sewers.Search the index · The Chapel Hill Weekly, October 22, 1926, p. 1
  3. Chapel Hill extends sewers to Pritchard field and the Church Street neighborhood In what the Weekly called Chapel Hill's most active year of sewer building, the town laid about a mile of new lines in the Pritchard field section and gave the Black neighborhood around Church Street complete service, with a main under Church Street from Rosemary Lane north to the town limits. Other new lines served western Cameron Avenue and the east end of town.The Chapel Hill Weekly, October 15, 1926, p. 2
  4. Black ditch diggers win higher wages as Carrboro and Chapel Hill compete for labor Chapel Hill's sewer and paving crews, about fifty Black laborers paid $2.50 a day, began leaving for Carrboro's new sewer job when its contractor offered $3 a day, and Chapel Hill's force fell from 49 to 6. Chapel Hill answered with $3.25 a day, and the Weekly reported more Black men at work in the two towns than in many a day.Search the index · The Chapel Hill Weekly, November 12, 1926, p. 1
  5. A new pipe line to the town plant ends the Battle Park sewage plant Under an agreement among the university, the town and the Gimghouls, a pipe line to the municipal plant in Strowd's lowgrounds was finished, and the park's disposal plant was abandoned so the woods could be restored.Search the index · Valiunas, An Archaeological and Historical Investigation of the Battle Park Pavilion Site (31OR639), UNC Research Laboratories of Archaeology, Research Report 35 (2012) · Also: Chapel Hill Weekly, July 13, 1928, p. 1
  6. Chapel Hill votes $35,000 in bonds to enlarge its sewage disposal plant In August 1930 the aldermen authorized enlarging the sewage disposal plant in Strowd's low grounds, at up to $35,000 shared equally by the town and the University, on H. G. Baity's recommendation of a digester, a larger sludge bed, a sedimentation plant and chlorination. On August 13 they unanimously rejected damage claims of $12,500 and $5,000 from two neighbors on the Durham road who complained of odors and flies; Jack Sparrow later dropped his claim. People: Herman G. BaityThe Chapel Hill Weekly, August 15, 1930, p. 1
  7. Chapel Hill calls for bids to rebuild its Bolin Creek sewage plant The town of Chapel Hill advertised for bids, to be opened June 25, to improve and reconstruct its sewage treatment plant on Bolin Creek east of the town limits. The specifications by H. G. Baity, consulting sanitary engineer, called for a sludge collector and pump, a gas holder, a chlorinator, sludge heating and a fence around the works. People: Herman G. Baity, Zeb P. Council, John M. FousheeThe Chapel Hill Weekly, June 5, 1931, p. 5
  8. The McClelland Company finishes building Chapel Hill's new sewage disposal plant in Strowd's lowgrounds The McClelland Company of Charlotte, general contractor, finished its part of the town's new sewage disposal plant about 300 yards below the Durham road bridge, and installation of the equipment was set to begin. The plant, costing about $25,000 and paid for by bonds carried by sewer rentals, had a primary clarifier, a control house and a digester, used the gas from the sewage for heating, and was expected in use by October 1. People: Herman G. Baity, Arthur R. HollettSearch the index · The Chapel Hill Weekly, September 11, 1931, p. 1
  9. Chapel Hill's new sewage disposal plant goes into operation The town finished its new sewage disposal plant on the slope down to Strowd's Lowgrounds, reached from the Durham road, and put it in operation; the aldermen invited citizens to inspect it. The plant cost the town about $26,000.The Chapel Hill Weekly, November 20, 1931, p. 4
  10. Chapel Hill aldermen pass ordinances for $10,000 in street bonds and $32,000 in sewer bonds The aldermen adopted two bond ordinances in place of earlier ones: up to $10,000 for street surfacing, curbs and gutters at least a quarter of whose cost was assessed on property, and up to $32,000 to extend and enlarge the town's sanitary sewer system. The Local Government Commission advertised the $42,000 of street and sewer bonds for sale on July 31.Search the index · The Chapel Hill Weekly, June 8, 1934, p. 4
  11. Chapel Hill aldermen accept a PWA grant for sewers, an incinerator and street paving A week after Senator Bailey and Representative Umstead wired that Washington had approved a $21,000 Public Works Administration grant, 45 per cent of a $47,000 project, the aldermen accepted it and agreed to raise the town's $26,000 share by bonds. The project called for sewer lines and a pumping station serving 21 homes in the southwest of the village, a 30-ton incinerator near the sewage plant east of town, and hard surfacing of most remaining dirt streets. People: John M. Foushee, Arthur R. HollettSearch the index · The Chapel Hill Weekly, October 16, 1936, p. 1
  12. Chapel Hill lets the contract for a town incinerator At a special meeting the aldermen gave the Nye Odorless Incinerator Company of Macon, Georgia, a $17,700 contract for a garbage and trash incinerator beside the sewage disposal plant in Strowd's Lowgrounds, about a mile east of the village. It was one part of a public works project for which the town had a $21,000 PWA grant from October 1936, with the west-end sewer and street surfacing; laborers began digging its foundations in late March. People: Arthur R. HollettThe Chapel Hill Weekly, February 5, 1937, p. 1
  13. Chapel Hill completes the west-end sewage pumping plant The town finished a pumping station in the woods behind the Isaac W. Pritchard place, making it possible for every home within the corporate limits, and several outside, to connect to the municipal sewer system. Built by the Gilbert Engineering Company of Statesville for $11,620 with PWA aid, it served the 24 to 26 low-lying houses in the southwest of town that gravity sewers could not reach and that had used septic tanks, with two pumps so that one could stand by. People: Arthur R. HollettThe Chapel Hill Weekly, April 2, 1937, p. 1
  14. Chapel Hill begins enlarging its sewage disposal plant on Bolin Creek Forty to fifty men were at work extending the town sewage disposal plant in the Bolin Creek valley east of town, a project of about $45,000 paid partly by a W.P.A. grant and partly by the town and the University. The main new structure was a trickling filter 125 feet across which, with a secondary clarifier, was to treat the outflow before it reached the creek; completion was expected in the fall.The Chapel Hill Weekly, March 21, 1941, p. 1
  15. Chapel Hill's aldermen decide to enlarge the town sewage plant At their November 8 meeting the Chapel Hill aldermen decided to go ahead with enlarging the long-inadequate sewage disposal plant and asked Gilbert, White and Company of Durham for a survey and cost estimates. A committee under R. J. M. Hobbs was also studying a plan to extend the town limits to Morgan Creek on the south and Bolin Creek on the north. People: Richard Junius Mendenhall Hobbs, Robert H. Wettach, Peter L. BurchSearch the index · The News of Orange County (Hillsborough), November 16, 1944, p. 1

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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.

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Background on Black Life & Civil Rights

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Widely held

Cross & Sampson

Patterson, James · 2026 · Little, Brown and Company / Hachette Book Group

An Alex Cross thriller by James Patterson with Chapel Hill among its settings alongside Washington, D.C. Bombings, a kidnapping, a missing-persons investigation, terrorism and fathers and sons are its subjects; the Sampson of the title is Cross's longtime partner John Sampson. Published by Little, Brown in 2026.

✓ Held at OCPL · F PATTERSO NC Cardinal Durham Chapel Hill PL Library of Congress

Brazen: Race, Gentrification, and the Path of My Own Life

Parrish, Theodore · 2025 · Chapel Hill Historical Society

Theodore Parrish's memoir of a Black life in Chapel Hill and of gentrification in the town, subtitled race, gentrification, and the path of my own life. Published by the Chapel Hill Historical Society in August 2025, 243 pages with illustrations. Subjects include African Americans in Chapel Hill, race relations and gentrification in North Carolina.

UNC

Wagging tongues and tittle tattle : gossip, rumor, and reputation in a small Southern town

Hoffert, Sylvia D. · 2025 · University of Georgia Press

Sylvia D. Hoffert's study of gossip, rumor and reputation in nineteenth-century Hillsborough, using the town as a case study of how talk shaped social standing and race relations in a small Southern place. Chapters take up the workings of idle chatter, people living on the edge of freedom under slavery, schooling, daily labor, and a period of fear over madness in the community. Published 2025 by the University of Georgia Press.

UNC NC State Library of Congress Wake Forest

Sheer Resilience : An Untold Story of A Free Community of Color in Orange County, N.C

Scarlett, Beverly A. · 2024

Beverly A. Scarlett's 2024 study of a free community of color in nineteenth-century Orange County, drawing on apprenticeship and freedmen's records among other county sources.

✓ Held at OCPL · NC 306.363 SCARLETT

Hidden History of Chapel Hill

Burns, Brian · 2023 · The History Press

Brian Burns's collection of lesser-known episodes from Chapel Hill's past, published by The History Press of Charleston, South Carolina, in 2023. Topics include the town's history, its buildings and structures, and the history of civil rights in Chapel Hill. 158 pages with illustrations and portraits.

UNC NC Cardinal Library of Congress CH Historical Society

Bloodmarked

Deonn, Tracy · 2022 · Simon & Schuster BFYR

Tracy Deonn's young adult fantasy novel set around the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Bree, an African American teenager with newly awakened powers she cannot yet control, learns that the leaders of the secret Order mean to hide the coming demon war, and she and her friends flee so that she can find her own training. Subjects include magic, secret societies, imaginary wars and psychic trauma. Published by Simon & Schuster in 2022, 561 pages.

Reviewed in Bulletin of the Center for Children's Books./Bulletin of the Center for Children's Books (2022).

UNC NC State Wake Forest Davidson
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Minnie finds a home

Smith, Courtney Soling · 2022 · Orange County Historical Museum

Picture book by Courtney Soling Smith, published by the Orange County Historical Museum in Hillsborough in 2022, about a collie named Minnie and an African American family in Cedar Grove Township. Twenty-nine unnumbered pages, chiefly color illustrations, with portraits that point to a real family behind the story.

UNC CH Historical Society

Minnie tries to be useful

Smith, Courtney Soling · 2022 · Orange County Historical Museum

Companion picture book about Minnie the collie by Courtney Soling Smith, again from the Orange County Historical Museum in 2022, following an African American farm family in Cedar Grove Township. Thirty-seven unnumbered pages, chiefly color illustrations, with a facsimile. Written for children, with the museum's local history interest behind it.

UNC CH Historical Society

Together: The Amazing Story of Carolina Basketball's 2021-2022 Season

Lucas, Adam · 2022 · University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill Department of Athletics

Adam Lucas's account of the 2021-2022 Carolina men's basketball season, Hubert Davis's first as head coach. Davis, appointed in April 2021, was the first Black head coach in the program's history, and the season ended at the NCAA tournament in New Orleans. Published 2022 by the UNC Department of Athletics, 155 pages with color illustrations. Topics include the Tar Heels, Davis, and college basketball in Chapel Hill in the twenty-first century.

NC Cardinal UNC Library of Congress

Histories of home : a walk with Northside neighbors

Jackson Center for Saving & Making History · 2021 · Marian Cheek Jackson Center

A folded walking tour map of Northside, the historically African American neighborhood near downtown Chapel Hill, produced by Alexander Stephens for the Marian Cheek Jackson Center for Saving and Making History in 2021. One illustrated sheet, 43 by 28 centimeters, folded to pocket size. The walk introduces the neighborhood through its residents' own histories of home.

UNC

Ribbons of Color Along the Eno River

2021

Collected first-hand and second-hand stories from the Eno River valley as told from the standpoint of African Americans and Native people who have lived along the river in Orange and Durham counties, from prehistory to the present day. Issued by the Eno River Association in Durham as volume 10, number 2 of the Eno Journal, 2021, 106 pages with illustrations.

✓ Held at OCPL · NC 975.656 RIBBONS NC Cardinal UNC Duke Durham Chapel Hill PL CH Historical Society

To Drink from the Well: The Struggle for Racial Equality at the Nation’s Oldest University

Kapur, Geeta · 2021

Geeta Kapur's history of race at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, from the enslaved labor that built the campus through desegregation and the Black student protests that followed. Twelve chapters, with a foreword by William Barber II, move from the founding era and the Great Depression controversies to the state's response to integration and the turmoil of later decades; North Carolina Central University also figures. Published 2021 by Blair in Durham.

NC Cardinal UNC NC State NCCU Durham Chapel Hill PL Library of Congress UNCSA

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