Category: University Archives

In the summer of 1877, the University of North Carolina offered classes in the summer for the first time. It wasn’t just a continuation of the regular course offerings: UNC was host to a statewide “Summer Normal School,” providing teacher education to primary school teachers (and aspiring teachers) from around the state.

The Normal School was established by the North Carolina General Assembly in March 1877, allocating $2,000 for the program, which was to be jointly administered by the University and by the North Carolina Board of Education.

The act creating the school specified that it was “for the purpose of teaching and training young men of the white race for teachers of the common schools of the state.” The act also mentioned the possibility of creating a separate school to train African American teachers.

While the UNC administrators did not appear to object to the limitation of the program to white teachers,* they did argue that the school should open its doors to women. In his early history of UNC, Kemp Battle, who was President of the University in 1877, wrote:

 An important question came up at the outset. The Act authorizing the school confined its benefits to male teachers and those desiring to be teachers. It was exceedingly important that females should be included. The Board of Education took the ground and the University concurred, that while the public money could not be paid to females, there could be no objection to their attending the sessions, and they were accordingly invited to take advantage of all the exercises. Their presence contributed much to the success of the school. (Kemp Plummer Battle, History of the University of North Carolina, vol. 2.)

The Hillsborough Recorder reported on the new program on May 30, 1877. The paper called attention to the fact that women would be allowed to attend, writing: “Although the law requires that the moneys paid by the State shall be devoted to the use of males, yet females are cordially invited to attend all the exercises of the school free of charge.”

Of the 235 students enrolled in the six-week program, 107 were women. The presence of women on campus as students was especially significant as it would be another 20 years before UNC admitted its first women students. The inclusion of women was hailed by Cornelia Phillips Spencer, who wrote that she hoped the state would “do as much for her daughters as she has done for her sons.”

The following summer, Emily Coe, a teacher from New York, joined the Normal School faculty, making her the first woman to teach on the University campus. Coe specialized in training kindergarten teachers at a time when formal preschool education was still fairly rare in the United States. Battle thought that Coe’s course in the 1878 Summer Normal School was the first Normal kindergarten class in North Carolina.

Women continued to make up a substantial number of the Summer Normal School attendees each year, and the number of women on the faculty slowly increased.

Education remained a focus of the summer school for decades, but the University gradually began offering courses in other areas. In 1914, summer school classes were able to be counted for credit toward a degree, which led to even more integration with the regular UNC curriculum.

* The Summer School, like the rest of the University, would not be integrated until 1951, when four African American law students enrolled.

UNC’s Confederate history is very well documented: in the Confederate monument on campus, in the “Roll of Confederate Dead” in Memorial Hall, and in the names of several buildings. While the heavy focus on Confederate veterans is not surprising for a state university in the South, we often get asked about a largely unexplored aspect of Carolina history: alums who served in the Union army.

Were there any Union veterans from UNC? We’ve heard the question a lot, and never had a great answer. We do now: Yes, but not many.

After some research and consultation with colleagues around campus, we’ve identified a handful of UNC students who went on to serve in the Union army or in the federal government during the Civil War.

Francis Preston Blair, a native of Kentucky, attended UNC for the 1839-1840 school year.  According to available student records, he was expelled from UNC. Blair also attended Yale before finally earning his degree from Princeton. He was living in Missouri when he joined the army, eventually rising to the rank of Major General. 

Junius B. Wheeler was a native of Murfreesboro and a veteran of the war with Mexico. He was student from at UNC from 1849-1851, then transferred to the U.S. Military Academy in West Point, N.Y., where he earned a degree in 1855. When the war began, there were split loyalties in his family: one of his half brothers was an officer in the Confederate Army. Wheeler served in the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers throughout the war.

Edward Mallet, UNC class of 1818, was Paymaster General for the United States from 1862 to 1865.

Edward Stanly attended UNC during the 1829-1830 school year. He was elected to the North Carolina state legislature and represented the state in Congress before moving to California. He was appointed by President Lincoln as military governor of Eastern North Carolina in 1862, but resigned the following year.

We think there are almost certainly more Union veterans who attended UNC, but these are the only ones we know about right now. If you know of any, or have suggestions, let us know. If we confirm any others, we will add them to this list.

In the mid 1980s, UNC students actively campaigned to convince the University to divest from investment in South Africa in protest of the legalized segregation in place under that country’s apartheid system.

This timeline presents an overview of major dates and activities on campus.

1978-1979: Students at Harvard and several other American universities begin advocating for university endowments to stop investing in South African companies. The students argue that providing financial support for South African business provides indirect support to the government and its formal policy of racial discrimination (apartheid). UNC administrators discuss the issues but decide not to make any changes to the university’s investment policy at the time. Source: Office of the Chancellor, Nelson Ferebee Taylor Records #40023, box 11, “Sullivan Principles 1978-1979.” 

October 21, 1982: UNC students hold a rally calling for UNC to end its business relations with IBM due to IBM’s business presence in South Africa. Sources: Anti-Apartheid Support Group Records #40143, folder “UNC Related Materials: Collateral, 1981-1981”; Daily Tar Heel, 22 October 1982.

November 19, 1982: UNC Public Interest Research Group lobbies the Board of Trustees to divest from South Africa. Source: Anti-Apartheid Support Group Records #40143, folder “UNC Related Materials: Collateral, 1981-1981.”

February 8, 1983: UNC students vote 3,313 to 1,891 in support of a resolution urging the Board of Trustees to divest from South Africa Source: Anti-Apartheid Support Group Records #40143, folder “UNC Related Materials: Collateral, 1981-1981.”

April 23, 1983: UNC Endowment Board rejects divestment but says they will not invest in South African companies unless they agree to the “Sullivan Principles,” described as a voluntary code of racial equality for companies doing business in South Africa. Source: Daily Tar Heel, April 7, 1986.

October 1985: UNC Anti-Apartheid Support Group formed. Source: Anti-Apartheid Support Group Records #40143,

October 11, 1985. Students hold an anti-apartheid rally in the Pit. Source: Daily Tar Heel, October 14, 1985.

February 4, 1986. Students vote 2,560-1,130 in support of a referendum in favor of UNC divesting from South Africa. Source: Daily Tar Heel, February 5, 1986.

March 18, 1986. The UNC Anti-Apartheid Support Group builds several shanties in front of South Building in order to draw attention to their cause and to express sympathy for South Africans forced to live in shantytowns. Campus police dismantle the structures, which are rebuilt later in the day after the group receives permission from Chancellor Fordham. Source: Daily Tar Heel, March 19, 1986.

March 31, 1986. Two student groups, the College Republicans and Students for America, stage a counter protest in front of the shanties by construction a mock “Berlin-type wall.” The counter-protesters spoke out against oppressive governments in South Africa and the Soviet Union. The Daily Tar Heel quoted the College Republicans Chairman: “(The wall) is to show that there are other atrocities around the world that are even far greater than those in South Africa. It is hypocritical to just call for divestment (in South Africa). If you say you’re against ‘immoral governments’ then you should do it across the board.” The counter-protesters also objected to the extended presence of the shanties. Source: Daily Tar Heel, 1 April 1986.

April 24, 1986. University Endowment Board meets in a “very argumentative” secession and votes against total divestment, electing partial measures and agreeing to place pressure on South African companies to encourage them to abandon Apartheid. Chancellor Fordham supports divestment and says “we did not get the vote I wanted.” Student protesters hold a sit-in followed by a march down Franklin Street to protest the decision. Source: Daily Tar Heel, April 4, 1986.

11 February 1987: A new student group, Action Against Apartheid, is formed. Source: Daily Tar Heel, February 11, 1987.

May 1987: A group of students from Action Against Apartheid hold an eight-day hunger strike to protest UNC investment in South Africa. Source: Daily Tar Heel, 21 May 1987.

October 1, 1987: UNC Endowment Board agrees to divest all funds from South African companies. The change of mind is due partly to the ongoing protests, but also due to diminishing returns in those funds. Source: Daily Tar Heel, 2 October 1987.

October 12, 1987. Student protesters interrupt University Day celebrations in Memorial Hall, marching down the aisle carrying signs and banners opposing apartheid in South Africa. Source: Daily Tar Heel, October 13, 1987.

 

 

 

When Gwendolyn Harrison decided to come to UNC to pursue a Ph.D. in Spanish, she went through the usual process: she applied and was accepted, and she was assigned a room in one of the women’s dormitories. She arrived on campus in June 1951, checked into her dorm, and went to begin the registration process. When she returned to her dorm, a university employee told her that there had been a mistake: Harrison’s registration was cancelled and should would not be allowed to attend UNC that term. The reason? They had not realized that Harrison was an African American.

UNC denied entry to African American students until forced by a federal court to admit African American graduate students in 1951. The lawsuit was initiated by four African American law students, who would enroll in the first summer session of 1951.

Believing that the ruling applied to all of the graduate programs at UNC, Harrison, who was from Kinston, assumed that she would finally be able to attend her home state university. In a letter to a local newspaper, Harrison wrote, “I was proud because I thought that North Carolina at least was about to live up to the democratic ideals which are a part of the heritage of our great land.”

Harrison’s story encapsulates the upheaval on campus as administrators and trustees struggled to accept that the University’s practice of excluding African American students — which had been in place for more than 150 years — was coming to an end. Their responses wavered between confusion, caution, and resistance.

While campus administrators were anticipating the first African American law students in 1951, Harrison’s arrival was a surprise. Her application did not ask for her race, but her dormitory reservation card did.

After Harrison’s enrollment was cancelled, she immediately appealed to University administrators. Both W.W. Pierson, Dean of the College of the Graduate School, and Chancellor Robert House told Harrison that the question of her enrollment was out of their hands and that it had to be resolved by the Board of Trustees at their June meeting. Harrison wrote the next day to Governor Bob Scott, who was the chairman of the UNC Board of Trustees.

Harrison was not going to wait. Working with attorney C.O. Pearson of the North Carolina NAACP, she announced her intent to sue the University. The suit was filed in early July and Chancellor Robert House received a subpoena ordering him to appear in the United States District Court in Greensboro on July 12, 1951. Likely wary of getting involved in more legal struggles and probably aware of the University’s weak position in denying Harrison when other African American students were already enrolled in graduate programs, the University agreed to settle. On July 16, 1951, a few days after negotiating a delay in the trial, House wrote to Dean Pierson of the graduate school, telling him to inform Gwendolyn Harrison that she was admitted to UNC.

Harrison was able to enroll in the second summer session of 1951. In doing so, she became the first African American woman to attend UNC. She returned to Chapel Hill for summer school in 1952, but did not pursue any further education at Carolina. She returned briefly to teaching at Johnson C. Smith and then spent most of her adult life in Bessemer City, N.C.

Gwendolyn Harrison Smith passed away last month. In an obituary in the Gaston Gazette, family members noted that she rarely talked about her role in the long struggle to integrate UNC. Perhaps due to her brief time at Carolina, as well as the fact that she followed so closely behind the first African American students, who received a great deal of media attention, her story has been rarely told in accounts of UNC history. Neal Cheek, in his 1973 dissertation about the integration of UNC, includes a thorough account of Harrison’s efforts to attend UNC, and she has been occasionally noted as a trailblazer, though not nearly as often as other Carolina “firsts.”

 

 

 

It’s one of the most enduring legends of UNC history: a lone student, Hinton James, walking all the way from his home in Wilmington and arriving in Chapel Hill on February 12, 1795, where he reported to the one-building campus and enrolled, becoming the first student at the University of North Carolina. But did he really walk all the way here?

We’re not sure. We checked all of the records and reports that we could find and, while there are no contemporary reports confirming James’s long walk to Chapel Hill, there’s nothing to refute the story, either.

We know for certain that UNC officially opened on January 15, 1795. It was reported to be a blustery day and must have been an odd ceremony because there were no students present. The campus remained empty of students for four weeks before James arrived. For the two weeks after that, he was the only student at the school. Others trickled in after that and by 1798 James was part of the first graduating class at UNC, when a grand total of seven students received their diplomas.

Hinton James did not have a lot of options for getting from Wilmington to Chapel Hill in 1795. We know he didn’t take I-40, and the arrival of railroads in North Carolina was still a few decades away. He probably traveled along recently established post roads to Raleigh and then found his way to Chapel Hill. For the long trip inland he could have taken a horse-drawn carriage, ridden on horseback, or, of course, walked. Given reports about the state of the roads during that cold, wet winter, a carriage was probably out of the question.

In the University Archives, there is a short account of the early days of the University written by Hinton James himself in 1838. He mentions the names of early professors and students and describes early exams, but does not talk about how he got to campus.

The earliest account that we’ve been able find, which mentions James’s mode of travel, was a speech by UNC history professor (and later President) Kemp Plummer Battle at University Day in 1880 (later reprinted in the 1886-1887 North Carolina University Magazine). Battle wrote, “Soon the first student came in — journeying all the way, hundreds of miles, from the Lower Cape Fear, on horseback doubtless, saddle-bags between his legs.”

Battle wrote about James in both volumes of his history of the University, though he told the story slightly differently in each. In the first volume, published in 1907, he wrote, “It was not until the 12th of February that the first student arrived, with no companion, all the way from the banks of the lower Cape Fear, the precursor of a long line of seekers after knowledge. His residence was Wilmington, his name Hinton James.” By saying that James arrived with “no companion,” Battle likely meant that he was the only student at the time. But this phrase may have been interpreted to mean that James made the entire trip by himself, a common detail in the story we often hear today.

After Battle’s history was published, the story began to take on the form we know today. Early 20th century issues of the Tar Heel mention James as the first student, but the first suggestion we could find of his having walked was in a 1908 article about the Dialectic and Philanthropic Societies, which referred to “the time when Hinton James first tramped from Wilmington to Chapel Hill and found himself the only student on the campus.” (Tar Heel, 17 September 1908).

When Kemp Battle published the second volume of his history of UNC, in 1912, the story changed a little: “Thus it happens that Hinton James has gained immortal fame by being the first to trudge through the muddy roads of the winter of 1795, and presenting himself to the delighted gaze of the first presiding Professor, Dr. David Ker, exactly four weeks after the session began.”

Note that these don’t specifically say that he walked. Can one tramp or trudge on horseback? We’re not sure.

It didn’t take much longer for the myth to begin to take shape. A 1920 Tar Heel article  said that “Hinton James established the Carolina long-distance walking record by tramping all the way from Wilmington so that he could be the first student to enter the University when it opened in 1795.” (Tar Heel, 20 June 1920).

While the story took hold, some still expressed doubt. At the University’s Sesquicentennial Convocation in April 1946, Victor Bryant, the chairman of the Legislative Committee on the Sesquicentennial, delivered the opening remarks. Bryant said, “We are told [Hinton James] had walked to Chapel Hill from his home in Wilmington, though I believe it possible that he did some hitch-hiking.”

In Archibald Henderson’s 1949 book, The Campus of the First State University, James’s trek had the sound of a mythical journey: “The ambitious freshman of eighteen years, historic in primacy, trudged manfully more than 150 miles to reach the beckoning bourne of the State University on February 12, 1795.”

By the time William Snider published Light on the Hill, in 1992, there seemed to be no doubt about James’s long journey. Referring to the first student, Snider writes, “His name was Hinton James and he walked the entire distance from his native Wilmington to Chapel Hill to enroll.”

So, returning to our original question: did Hinton James really walk the whole way from Wilmington to Chapel Hill? We don’t know. There’s nothing in the University Archives that says he did, but there’s also nothing to prove otherwise. As we’ve seen, the earliest account says James “probably” came on horseback, and it took a while for the full walking story to emerge. However, it’s certainly possible that this is a true story that was simply carried orally through the generations. No matter how Hinton James got here, it had to have been a difficult trip and serves as an enduring inspiration to the the generations of students who have continued to follow him in their own journeys to Chapel Hill.