Colleges and Universities
Howard W. Odum
1866-1915
Born in 1884 on a rural farm in Georgia, Howard Washington Odum became a national leader in the study of sociology, primarily through his work at the University of North Carolina (at the time, located only at Chapel Hill). Extensively educated, Odum earned a bachelor’s degree at Emory College (now University), the University of Mississippi...
The Whalers of Diamond City
Today, the Cape Lookout National Seashore includes three barrier islands along North Carolina’s southern coast. One of those is Shackleford Banks, the westernmost island, stretching nine miles eastward from the Beaufort Inlet. Known for its wild horse population and primitive landscape, it was once home to a prosperous nineteenth-century whaling community called Diamond City. Diamond...
The Episcopal Church of St. John in the Wilderness
St. John in the Wilderness is historically recognized as the first Episcopal parish established in Western North Carolina. It was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1973.
Carl Sandburg (1878 – 1967)
In the autumn of 1945, a steam engine train rolled into the Flat Rock Depot carrying more than twenty tons of books, manuscripts, furniture, awards, and personal belongings bound for 1928 Little River Road in Henderson County, North Carolina. Around the same time, Carl Sandburg and his wife Lilian made the journey from Michigan by...
North Carolina’s Role in the Creation of the U.S. Forest Service
The story is complicated. In the United States in the late 1800s, demand for wood seemed insatiable—for houses, ships, fuel, and railroad ties. Americans were logging trees all over the country.
Salem
A Moravian town formed in 1772, Salem, or Old Salem, was once the center of the Wachovia Tract. Salem's history is rooted in Moravian culture and religion.
Howard W. Odum
Born in 1884 on a rural farm in Georgia, Howard Washington Odum became a national leader in the study of sociology, primarily through his work at the University of North Carolina (at the time, located only at Chapel Hill). Extensively educated, Odum earned a bachelor’s degree at Emory College (now University), the University of Mississippi...
“Whistler’s Mother,” Anna McNeill Whistler
After the Virgin Mary herself, Anna McNeill Whistler may be one of the most recognizable mothers in all of art history. The Wilmington native is also one of the most famous moms to call North Carolina home.
Second-to-the-Last in Freedom (for Women)
In 1971 the North Carolina legislature ratified an amendment to the U.S. Constitution giving equal voting rights to women. Not the Equal Rights Amendment! The Nineteenth Amendment of 1920.
Richard Etheridge
Richard Etheridge was the first African American to command a lifesaving station in the United States. Lifesaving stations on the Atlantic Coast were responsible for rescuing people from shipwrecks in the late 1800s. Etheridge also fought for the Union in the Civil War and continued to fight for civil rights for the African American community...
James H. Harris (1832 – 1891)
Described by W.E.B. Du Bois as a politician of “great ability,” James Henry Harris was perhaps the most consequential black political leader in nineteenth-century North Carolina.[1] By the time of his death in 1891, Harris had served as chair or president of several state and national equal-rights conventions, a delegate to the 1868 North Carolina...
Rosenwald Schools
North Carolina once had about 800 Rosenwald schools. These schools, made possible by Julius Rosenwald, president of Sears & Co., taught African American children in the early 1900s, when public schools in the South were segregated and poorly funded.[1] However, today these schools are little known to the public. In 1915, North Carolina’s first Rosenwald...
Braxton Craven: Forgotten Educator (1822 – 1882)
“The history of Trinity College is the history of Braxton Craven.” So said Thomas N. Ivey, an early biographer of the Methodist minister and educator. Ivey, a graduate of Trinity College, astutely described the inseparable connection between the man and the institution. Craven (1822–1882) devoted his life and career to building a humble school into...