Carson Fish, Research Assistant – History on the Hill

A New Addition of Athletics Photographs from the 1960s and 1970s

We are excited to announce that a new accession of photographs to the Department of Athletics Collection is available for research. This accession is particularly special since it contains images of less-documented sports — including women’s sports and intramural sports — … Continue reading →

Included in this addition are images of the Titleholder’s Championship (also called the Women’s Pro Tournament), held at Southern Pines and sponsored by UNC in 1972. The Titleholder’s Championship was only a handful of championship-level events for professional women’s golf in the 1970s, and the winner of the event — Sandra Palmer — was one of the most accomplished female golfers of the time. The addition also includes photographs of the 1963 renovations to Kenan Stadium.

The selection of photos below include images of men’s intramural handball; women’s intramural basketball, volleyball, tennis, and bowling.

Carolina Firsts: Vermont C. Royster

At the University Day celebration on October 11, 2016, Chancellor Carol Folt announced a new program to name scholarships after notable “firsts” in UNC history. In recognition of the individuals recognized as pioneers at UNC, the University Archives is publishing blog … Continue reading →

When Vermont C. Royster began his studies at UNC in 1931, he was no stranger to the campus. He was born in Raleigh, and his father, Wilbur Royster, was a professor of Greek and Latin at the university. Although Royster did receive his degree in Classics, his mark on UNC as a student, alumnus, and professor was made through his journalism — writing for the Wall Street Journal and later teaching at the School of Journalism. Royster was one of the first UNC alumni to receive a Pulitzer prize in 1953 (the same year as W. Horace Carter), and he later received a second Pulitzer in 1984.

Royster’s profile in the 1935 Yackety Yack.

Royster began his journalism career at UNC, where he worked for several campus publications, including The Daily Tar Heel and The Student Journal. During his senior year, he revived and wrote a column in the Daily Tar Heel titled “Around the Well,” which highlighted and described various campus happenings and gossip.

In addition to being drawn to journalism at UNC, he was also an active writer and participant in the Department of Dramatic Arts. As part of a play-writing course, he wrote and staged two plays — Shadows of Industry and Prelude — both of which can be found in the archives.

After graduating, Royster went on to begin the journalism career for which he is well known. He moved to New York and began working for the Wall Street Journal in 1936. He retired from the Wall Street Journal in 1971 and joined UNC’s School of Journalism as a faculty member later that year. Over the course of his career — both as a professional journalist and university professor — he won two Pulitzer Prizes: the first in 1953 for Editorial Writing and the second in 1984 for Commentary.

Royster died in 1996, and his personal papers are housed in the Southern Historical Collection at Wilson Library. In addition, Royster published several books over the course of his life — including My Own, My Country’s Time, A Pride of Prejudices, and Journey Through the Soviet Union — all of which can be found in UNC Libraries.

Sources & Additional Readings:

Collection of “Around the Well” columns

“Vermont C. Royster (1914-1996),” written by Will Schultz. North Carolina History Project. http://northcarolinahistory.org/encyclopedia/vermont-c-royster-1914-1996/.

Vermont Royster papers #4432, Southern Historical Collection, The Wilson Library, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

The Essential Royster: a Vermont Royster reader. edited by Edmund Fuller. Chapel Hill, N.C. : Algonquin Books, 1985.

My Own, My Country’s Time: a journalist’s journey. Vermont Royster. Chapel Hill, N.C. : Algonquin Books, 1983.

A Pride of Prejudices. Vermont Royster. Chapel Hill, N.C. : Algonquin Books, 1984.

Journey through the Soviet Union. Vermont Royster. New York, D. Jones [1962].

Now Available: Edie Parker Papers

We are pleased to announce a new addition to University Archives, the Edie Parker Papers. Edie Parker (then Edie Knight) attended UNC from 1947 to 1949. As a student, she was active in student government, Greek life, and the Model … Continue reading →

We are pleased to announce a new addition to University Archives, the Edie Parker Papers.

Edie Parker (then Edie Knight) attended UNC from 1947 to 1949. As a student, she was active in student government, Greek life, and the Model United Nations. The collection — mostly in the form of a scrapbook — includes materials from the Women’s Intercollegiate Government Forum that Parker planned, orientation booklets, rush invitations, clippings about the Model UN from the Daily Tar Heel, and letters from male suitors. While at UNC, Parker also participated in a conference about the U.S. role in European recovery from World War II that Mademoiselle magazine hosted in 1948. Her notes from the conference are included in the collection. Parker’s scrapbook and accompanying papers provide insight into the life of a woman student at UNC during the late 1940s.

Below, we’ve highlighted just a few items from the Edie Parker scrapbook, including photographs of UNC students and the 1949 UNC Commencement program.

Now Available: Edie Parker Papers

We are pleased to announce a new addition to University Archives, the Edie Parker Papers.

Below, we’ve highlighted just a few items from the Edie Parker scrapbook, including photographs of UNC students and the 1949 UNC Commencement program.

Carolina Firsts: Patricia Horoho

Patricia Horoho was born in Fort Bragg, North Carolina. She went to school in Fayetteville and then enrolled at UNC, graduating in 1982 with a Bachelor of Science in Nursing.

After leaving UNC, Horoho began a successful career as a nurse and later as an administrator in the U.S. Army. She was serving in the Pentagon on September 11, 2001, and provided first aid to many of the victims of the attack. The American Red Cross and Nursing Spectrum honored her service on September 11 by recognizing her as a “Nurse Hero.” In 2009, Horoho received the USO Woman of the Year award.

In 2011, Horoho was nominated by President Barack Obama to be the Surgeon General of the U.S. Army. She was the first nurse and the first woman to serve in that role. She completed a four-year term as Surgeon General in December 2015 and retired from the Army in 2016.

Sources & Further Reading

“SON Alumna Becomes Army Surgeon General.” December 6, 2011. UNC School of Nursing news release.

“First Rank: Nurse Nominated to be Army Surgeon General.” Carolina Alumni Review, September/October 2011, p. 57.

Campus Events 2011: School of Nursing and the Kenan Flagler Business School: General Patricia Horoho (Presentation), in the News Services of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill Records #40139, University Archives, Wilson Library, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

Carolina Firsts: Patricia Horoho

Patricia Horoho was born in Fort Bragg, North Carolina. She went to school in Fayetteville and then enrolled at UNC, graduating in 1982 with a Bachelor of Science in Nursing.

Sources & Further Reading

“SON Alumna Becomes Army Surgeon General.” December 6, 2011. UNC School of Nursing news release.

“First Rank: Nurse Nominated to be Army Surgeon General.” Carolina Alumni Review, September/October 2011, p. 57.

Carolina Firsts: Karen L. Parker

Karen L. Parker Diary, Letter, and Clippings #5275, Southern Historical Collection, The Wilson Library, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

Karen L. Parker made history at UNC in 1965, when she became the first African American woman to receive an undergraduate degree from the University.

Parker began her studies at UNC in 1963 following two years of study at the North Carolina Women’s College in Greensboro (now UNC-Greensboro). During her time at UNC, she took an active role in the local and national civil rights movements, participating in sit-ins and marches. The diary she kept as a student — which documents her experience on campus and in the community, her hopes and goals for the future, and the trials she encountered along the way — has been digitized and can be found in the Southern Historical Collection.

At UNC, Parker majored in Journalism. For her senior year, she was named the editor of The Journalist, a news publication put out by the School of Journalism and Mass Communications. Parker was also chosen to participate in UNC’s exchange program with the University of Toronto.

After graduating, Parker went on to have a successful career in journalism, working at Grand Rapids Press in Grand Rapids, Michigan; the Los Angeles Times; and other publications before returning to North Carolina to work at the Winston-Salem Journal. She retired in 2010, and was inducted into the North Carolina Journalism Hall of Fame in 2012.

Parker has been active with UNC, serving on the Friends of the Library Board and the Board of the General Alumni Association. In 2015, during the campaign to rename the former Saunders Hall (now Carolina Hall), a UNC student wrote to the Daily Tar Heel published a letter to the editor, suggesting that the building be renamed in honor of Karen Parker.

Sources and Further Reading:

“A Role Model for Change.” UNC News Services, February 19, 2015.

“Karen Parker.” I Raised My Hand to Volunteer, UNC Library Exhibit, 2007.

Morgan Jones, “Karen Parker: A Woman to Remember.” For the Record, UNC University Archives blog, March 18, 2013.

Karen L. Parker Diary, Letter, and Clippings #5275, Southern Historical Collection, The Wilson Library, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

Oral Histories:

February 2007 interview with the Southern Oral History Program
April 2007 interview with the Southern Oral History Program
December 2012 interview with UNC-Greensboro
March 2016 interview with the Southern Oral History Program

1982 — UNC’s First Annual Martin Luther King Jr. Celebration

In 1982, UNC held its first annual Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial Day Celebration. The multi-day celebration included a variety of events honoring Dr. King and his legacy. The featured speaker at the University-wide celebration was Dr. Prezell R. Robinson, president of St. Augustine’s College in Raleigh and of the United Negro College Fund. Originally scheduled for January 15, the celebration was postponed due to snow and ice in Chapel Hill. The event featuring Dr. Robinson was held on January 28, 1982.

Program from the Records of the Office of Chancellor of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill: Christopher C. Fordham, 1980-1988 (40024).

North Carolina Governors Who Went to UNC

When Roy Cooper was sworn in as Governor of North Carolina on January 1st, he became the 32nd North Carolina Governor to have attended the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Here’s the full list. William Miller Attended 1802 … Continue reading →

William Miller	Attended 1802	In office 1814- 1817
John Branch	Class of 1801	In office 1817-1820
John Owen	Attended 1804	In office 1828-1830
David Lowry Swain	Attended 1821-1822	In office 1832-1835
Richard Dobbs Spaight	Class of 1815	In office 1835-1836
John Motley Morehead	Class of 1817	In office 1841-1845
William Alexander Graham	Attended 1882-1884	In office 1845-1849
Charles Manly	Class of 1814	In office 1849-1851
Warren Winslow	Class of 1827	In office 1854-1855
John Willis Ellis	Class of 1841	In office 1859-1861
Henry Toole Clark	Class of 1826	In office 1861-1862
Zebulon Vance	Attended 1851-1852	In office 1862-1865; 1877-1879
Tod Robinson Caldwell	Class of 1840	In office 1871-1874
Alfred Moore Scales	Attended 1888-1890	In office 1885-1889
Thomas Michael Holt	Attended 1849-1850	In office 1891-1893
Elias Carr	Attended 1855-1857	In office 1893-1897
Daniel Lindsay Russell	Attended 1860-1862 (honorary degree given 1911)	In office 1897-1901
Charles Brantley Aycock	Class of 1880	In office 1901-1905
William Walton Kitchin	School of Law, Class of 1910	In office 1909-1913
Locke Craig	Class of 1880	In office 1913-1917
Angus Wilton McLean	Attended the School of Law 1890-1892	In office 1925-1929
O. Max Gardner	Attended 1905-1906	In office 1929-1933
John C.B. Ehringhaus	Class of 1901	In office 1933-1937
Clyde R. Hoey	Attended the School of Law 1899	In office 1937-1941
William B. Umstead	Class of 1916	In office 1953-1954
Luther H. Hodges	Class of 1919	In office 1954-1961
Terry Sanford	Class of 1941	In office 1961-1965
Dan K. Moore	Class of 1927	In office 1965-1969
James Holshouser	School of Law, Class of 1960	In office 1973-1977
James B. Hunt, Jr.	School of Law, Class of 1964	In office 1977-1985; 1993-2001
Mike Easley	Class of 1972	In office 2001-2009
Roy Cooper	Class of 1979	Currently in office

Carolina Firsts: Henry Owl

From the 1927 “Hacawa,” student yearbook at Lenoir Rhyne College.

Henry Owl, a member of the Eastern band of Cherokee Indians, was the first Native American student to attend UNC. Owl came to Carolina in the fall of 1928 and graduated the following year with a Master of Arts in History.

Owl was born in 1896 near Rattlesnake Mountain in western North Carolina. He attended the school at the Cherokee reservation, which at the time went only through eighth grade. Owl began his college education at the Hampton Institute, a primarily African American school in Hampton, Virginia. After leaving Hampton, Owl joined the U.S. Army and then taught briefly in Oklahoma. He returned to North Carolina in 1925 to enroll in Lenoir College (now Lenoir-Rhyne University) in Hickory.

At Lenoir, Owl was a member of multiple college clubs and was elected “Most Popular Boy.” He was also a star athlete, playing football and baseball. He was inducted into the Lenoir-Rhyne Sports Hall of Fame in 2012. According to Lenoir-Rhyne, Owl was the first Cherokee to graduate from a North Carolina college.

from the Daily Tar Heel, 6 October 1928

Not long after coming to Chapel Hill, Owl was mentioned in a Daily Tar Heel article about UNC’s “most cosmopolitan student body,” which discusses the growing number of international and out-of-state students at the university, despite the fact that Owl was neither an international nor an out-of-state student.

Owl wrote his master’s thesis on the history of the Cherokee Indians in North Carolina. The thesis, The Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians Before and After Renewal, is available in Wilson Library.

In 1930, just a year after graduating from UNC, Owl was prohibited from voting in Swain County. A profile in a the Lenoir-Rhyne alumni magazine described what happened:

[Owl’s daughter, Gladys Cardiff] said her father often discussed this incident. “North Carolina had some issue that they knew the tribe would be voting against,” she said. In those days the state had a literacy test for voters. When Owl tried to register, he was turned away on the grounds that he was illiterate. Owl left the courthouse and returned with a copy of his master’s thesis.

The story of Owl’s struggle to vote eventually reached the U.S. Congress, which passed a law affirming that Cherokees in North Carolina were citizens and had the right to vote.

Owl worked for the Bureau of Indian Affairs as a teacher and principal on reservations in North Carolina, Montana, and South Dakota. He moved with his family to Seattle where he worked as a counselor at the Veteran’s Administration and later as an inspector at Boeing. Wary of the racism that he knew he and his family would encounter on leaving the reservation, Owl began using his wife’s last name, Harris. He died in Seattle in 1980.

In addition to the new Carolina Firsts scholarship named in Owl’s honor, in 2011, the Department of American studies announced an endowed scholarship named The Henry Owl Scholarship Fund for Undergraduate Students. The scholarship provides need-based assistance to undergraduate majors in the American Studies department, with preference given to those studying American Indian and Indigenous Studies.

Sources and Further Reading:

“Living in Two Worlds,” Profile: The Magazine of Lenior-Rhyne College, Winter 2007. https://archive.org/stream/profilemagazineo2007wunse#page/10/mode/2up

“The Henry Owl Scholarship and a Class in ‘Gumption,’ UNC Arts & Sciences Magazine, 2014. http://college.unc.edu/2014/11/10/the-henry-owl-scholarship-and-a-class-in-gumption/

“Cherokee Indian Leaders Eloquently Describe to Senators Needs of Tribe.” Asheville-Citizen Times, 27 March 1930.

“Members of Indian Family Win Honors in Scholastic Work.” Asheville-Citizen Times, 27 November 1932

“Owl Family Holds Reunion.” Asheville-Citizen Times, 26 August 1962

“North Carolina Deaths, Funerals: Henry Harris” Asheville-Citizen Times, 11 March 1980

“Lenoir-Rhyne Announces Sports Hall Of Fame Class Of 2012” L-R Athletics, 26 September 2012. http://lrbears.com/article.asp?articleID=1814

Lenoir-Rhyne University. Hacawa. 1927. http://library.digitalnc.org/cdm/singleitem/collection/yearbooks/id/6760/rec/17

“University Presents Most Cosmopolitan Student Body.” Daily Tar Heel. 6 October 1928. https://www.newspapers.com/image/76356709

“First Indian Student at UNC, Henry Owl.” The Carolina Story: A Virtual Museum of University History. https://museum.unc.edu/exhibits/show/american-indians-and-chapel-hi/henry-owl

“Henry Owl Fellowship honors American Indian pioneer.” Cherokee One Feather. 31 October 2012. https://theonefeather.com/2011/10/henry-owl-fellowship-honors-american-indian-pioneer/