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The Graham Plan dispute, 1936

The 1936 dispute over President Frank P. Graham’s Southern Conference eligibility rules: the trustees’ referral to the faculties, the Chapel Hill faculty’s 80 to 40 vote to approve them, and Carl Snavely’s departure for Cornell that spring.

President Frank P. Graham proposed new eligibility rules for the Southern Conference, signed by six conference presidents, that barred aid to athletes as athletes and required every candidate to disclose his sources of support. On January 31, 1936 the University trustees, meeting in Raleigh, referred the rules to the faculties of the University and State College with power to act. On February 4 the Chapel Hill faculty met for four hours and voted 80 to 40, by secret ballot, to approve them. Carl Snavely did not see eye to eye with Graham, whose Graham Plan would have reduced the place of big-time football at the University and across the Southern Conference. Snavely resigned in March 1936. Early on the morning of April 3 he left Chapel Hill to become head coach at Cornell University.

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  1. University faculty endorses the Graham Plan athletic rules, 80 to 40 After the trustees, meeting in Raleigh on January 31, referred President Frank P. Graham's proposed Southern Conference eligibility rules to the faculties of the University and State College with power to act, the Chapel Hill faculty met for four hours and voted 80 to 40, by secret ballot, to approve them. The rules, signed by six conference presidents, barred aid to athletes as athletes and required every candidate to disclose his sources of support. People: Frank Porter GrahamSearch the index · The Chapel Hill Weekly, February 7, 1936, p. 1
  2. Carl Snavely leaves UNC for Cornell after the Graham Plan dispute Snavely did not see eye to eye with university president Frank Porter Graham, whose Graham Plan would have reduced the place of big-time football at UNC and across the Southern Conference. He resigned in March 1936 and left Chapel Hill early on April 3, 1936 to become head coach at Cornell University. People: Frank Porter GrahamSearch the index · NCpedia: Snavely, Carl Gray (Dictionary of North Carolina Biography) · Also: Chapel Hill Weekly, March 20, 1936, p. 1; Chapel Hill Weekly, April 3, 1936, p. 2

Background on UNC & Campus Life

Background reading on UNC & Campus Life. These works cover the broader subject and may not discuss this storyline. Follow a link to find a copy or view the material.

Widely held

Carolina Nursing through the decades: a historic timeline

2025 · The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill School of Nursing

An illustrated online timeline of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill School of Nursing, issued by the school in 2025. One page with portraits.

North Carolina baseball: the blue thread and the rise of an ACC power

Johns, Bill · 2025

A 2025 history of University of North Carolina baseball from its nineteenth-century beginnings to the program's rise as an ACC power. Chapters cover the early years on campus, the building of Boshamer Stadium, and the Mike Fox era. Self-published by the author, 288 pages.

Tar Heel Bred

Whisnant, Scott · 2025 · Bearface Publishing

Scott Whisnant's memoir of a life measured out in North Carolina basketball seasons. A former sportswriter, Whisnant writes for readers raised in ACC country who learned the fight song early and treated the conference tournament in Greensboro as the high point of the year, recalling family, friends and the personal milestones that fell alongside Tar Heel games. Subjects include humor and anecdotes as well as the team's history. Published by Bearface Publishing in 2025, 318 pages with photographs.

Bright and tender dark: a novel

Pearson, Joanna · 2024 · Bloomsbury Publishing

Joanna Pearson's novel of a cold case at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Karlie Richards was a nineteen-year-old student when she was murdered; decades later her onetime roommate, divorced and in middle age, finds herself drawn back to the crime as online conspiracy theories about it multiply. A psychological thriller with a Chapel Hill setting, published by Bloomsbury in 2024, 275 pages.

Lessons afield : adventures in nature with students and other living things

Wiley, R. Haven · 2023 · Hickory Woods Press

R. Haven Wiley's anecdotes of field work with students at Mason Farm, the university's biological reserve on the edge of Chapel Hill, and at other natural settings in North Carolina. It is natural history and nature anecdotes, personal pieces from a working naturalist. Published in Carrboro by Hickory Woods Press in 2023, 109 pages with illustrations.

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Putting Down Roots

Burk, William R. · 2023

William R. Burk's history of botany at the University of North Carolina, from its early natural scientists such as Denison Olmsted and Elisha Mitchell through later figures including George Francis Atkinson, Joseph Austin Holmes and Henry Van Peters Wilson, closing with a chapter on the Department of Botany itself. Published in Fort Worth in 2023.

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).

A Consequential Life: David Lowry Swain, Nineteenth-Century North Carolina, and Their University

Whichard, Willis P. · 2022

Willis P. Whichard's biography of David Lowry Swain, governor of North Carolina from 1832 to 1835 and president of the University of North Carolina from 1835 until his death in 1868. The subtitle ties Swain, nineteenth-century North Carolina and the university together, and the book belongs with the lives of college presidents and governors. Published in 2022.

The dove in the belly

Grimsley, Jim · 2022 · Levine Querido

Jim Grimsley's coming-of-age novel about Ronny, who grew up in a trailer alongside his mother and a string of stepfathers, kept his head down, earned good grades and won a scholarship to UNC in Chapel Hill. On campus he finds his first love and begins to sort out who he is. Subjects include gay college students, first loves and mothers and sons. Published by Levine Querido in 2022, 322 pages.

Hooper finds the pitch

Smith, Courtney Soling · 2022 · Orange County Historical Museum

A picture book by Courtney Soling Smith about a Boston terrier named Hooper and a glee club at the University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill. Published in 2022 by the Orange County Historical Museum in Hillsborough, 35 unnumbered pages with illustrations, facsimiles and portraits.

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.

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