Storyline
The recreation park a Hillsborough service club built south of town: the land it leased and bought, the minstrel shows and notes its members signed to pay for it, and the miniature golf course that opened it in 1956.
In briefHillsboro's Exchange Club built a community park and paid for it partly with yearly minstrel shows, blackface stage comedy built on demeaning caricatures of Black people. In 1954 the town leased the club twelve acres north of the town cemetery, and in 1955 the club approved buying about seven acres a mile south of town on the Chapel Hill road, a site recommended by design students from State College. The 1955 minstrel show raised about $600 for the park, and the 1958 show drew 900 to 1,000 people. Work on a $5,000 miniature golf course began in April 1956, and on May 15 the club dedicated the park to the youth and recreation of the town and county.
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In September 1954 Hillsboro's town board gave the Hillsboro Exchange Club a fifteen-year lease at $1 a year on twelve acres north of the town cemetery for a community park, and in April 1955 the club approved buying about seven acres a mile south of town on the Chapel Hill road, a site that design students from State College had recommended. It paid for the park partly with its yearly minstrel shows, blackface stage comedy built on demeaning caricatures of Black people: the 1955 show raised about $600 for it, and the 1958 'Ole Time Minstrels' drew 900 to 1,000 people. Work on a $5,000 miniature golf course, financed by notes the members endorsed, began in April 1956; it opened for play on May 3, and on May 15 the club formally dedicated the park to the youth and recreation of the town and county, with plans that included a swimming pool.
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Background reading on Community & Civic Organizations. These works cover the broader subject and may not discuss this storyline. Follow a link to find a copy or view the material.
Jean Bolduc's 2016 collection of interviews with African American residents of Durham and Orange counties, presented as short biographies. The subjects are Floyd McKissick (1922-1991), the first African American admitted to UNC's law school, Walter Jackson, Brenda Stephens, Nate Davis, poet Jaki Shelton Green, Jackie Wagstaff, Diane Wright and Michelle Johnson, with a closing chapter on the Ku Klux Klan. 125 pages with illustrations.
A longer Southern Oral History Program interview with Presbyterian minister Charles M. Jones (1906-1993), recorded November 8, 1976, by Joseph A. Herzenberg. Jones traces his civil rights work in Chapel Hill from the 1930s into the 1960s. He characterizes town and university leaders, Frank Porter Graham among them, as cautiously liberal on race, willing to allow a little integration at performances and student activities, and describes the church's place in the town's social conflicts. Published online in 2008 in Documenting the American South.
Raised in Orange County's Cane Creek community, Nancy Holt became one of its organizers when the Orange Water and Sewer Authority planned a reservoir there. Interviewed alongside Brian Holt by Frances E. Webb in October 1985, she describes farm life, the school and church that held the community together, how scattered neighbors cooperated, and the environmental and social costs residents expected from the reservoir. Runs about two and a half hours; electronic edition from the UNC library, 2007, through Documenting the American South.
Sam Crawford (born 1949) helped found Cane Creek Conservation Authority, the residents' group formed in 1975 to fight plans by OWASA, the Chapel Hill area's water utility, for a reservoir on Cane Creek in rural Orange County. In this October 1985 interview with Judith Wheeler, joined by Patty Crawford, he recounts how residents learned of the plan and organized, and the environmental and water-supply arguments on each side. A little over two hours; electronic edition from the UNC library, 2007, through Documenting the American South.
The Rev. Charles M. Jones (1906-1993), minister of Chapel Hill's Presbyterian church in the late 1940s, and his wife Dorcas talk with John Egerton in a Southern Oral History Program interview recorded July 21, 1990. Jones spends most of the hour on the disputes his stand on race provoked, when the regional presbytery objected to his conduct of the church, and his dealings with university president Frank Porter Graham. Published online in 2006 by the UNC-Chapel Hill Library in Documenting the American South.
Guion Griffis Johnson (1900-1989), a historian of the antebellum South, talked with Jacquelyn Hall and Mary Frederickson in August 1974 for the Southern Oral History Program. She recalls her training, her years at the Institute for Research in Social Science at the University of North Carolina, the standing of women historians in higher education, and the research behind her study of antebellum North Carolina society. Running about an hour; electronic edition issued by the UNC library in 2006 through Documenting the American South.
Miriam Slifkin started the Rape Crisis Center in Orange County and was active in feminist organizing there. Interviewed by Lynne Degitz in March 1995, she describes the center's work on violence against women and her role in NOW (National Organization for Women), and she is frank about friction between NOW and other parts of the local movement. About an hour and fifty minutes, part of the Southern Oral History Program; electronic edition from the UNC library, 2006, through Documenting the American South.
Dairy farmer Bobby Kirk, who led the conservation authority formed at Cane Creek, describes the fight against the Cane Creek Reservoir, proposed for southwestern Orange County. In this Southern Oral History Program interview, recorded October 28, 1985, by K. Campbell, Kirk explains why he and neighboring farmers opposed the project, how residents first organized against it, and his view that the reservoir was badly planned. Just over an hour long. Published online in 2005 by the UNC-Chapel Hill Library in Documenting the American South.
Edward S. Johnson (1933-2022) recounts the organized effort to stop OWASA, the Orange County water utility, from damming Cane Creek for a reservoir, in a 40-minute Southern Oral History Program interview recorded October 28, 1985, by Patricia E. Sloan. Johnson describes how neighbors came together into a coherent opposition, the questions of eminent domain raised by the taking of farmland, and the environmental review of the project. Published online in 2004 by the UNC-Chapel Hill Library in Documenting the American South.
Mark Pryor's biography of the Rev. Charles M. Jones (1906-1993), minister of the Presbyterian church in Chapel Hill. It explores his life in relation to civil rights work, race relations and the religious response to racism in the town. Published by Writer's Showcase, San Jose, in 2002, xii and 398 pages with illustrations.
Dorothy J. Kiester's account of the Inter-Faith Council for Social Service, the Chapel Hill and Carrboro charity through which local congregations pooled volunteer and professional effort, subtitled 'a volunteer/professional partnership'. Published by the council in 1984, 68 pages with illustrations. It relates to charities, churches and social service in Chapel Hill and Carrboro.
A program from a community salute to the Inter-Faith Council for Social Service, an evening event at the Carolina Inn in Chapel Hill on Tuesday, September 14, 1982. A note says it describes the council's past and present activities, which fall under social service in Chapel Hill.
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