Hugh Morton’s 103rd

1950s portrait of photographer Hugh Morton with Graflex camera.
1950s portrait of photographer Hugh Morton with Graflex camera.

Today marks the 103rd anniversary of Hugh Morton’s birth. It also serves as a herald for the next three years of A View to Hugh.

It’s safe to say this blog is a COVID-19 victim. Closure of the UNC campus meant no access to the Morton collection and the library resources that Jack Hilliard and I use to build the stories around Morton’s photographs. The reopening of campus and Wilson Library, however, did not lead to the revitalization of A View to Hugh. A shift in my priorities after reopening, most notably the curation of an exhibition commemorating the 40th anniversary of the Warren County PCB Landfill protests that opened in August 2022, left insufficient time for me to ramp up the regular creation of new stories for the blog.

Now, a new closure awaits us: Wilson Library Special Collections will close this August for improvement projects, with reopening expected during 2027. Just like during the pandemic, there will be no access to collection materials. Library staff is currently working to determine the projects on which we will work during closure. It is possible that digitization and metadata projects related to the Morton collection could occur. Between now and then, staff have much planning and preparation work to accomplish. There just isn’t the time available to rekindle A View to Hugh back to the way it used to be. It’s quite possible we could engage this blog’s followers and future newcomers through digital projects, but it is too soon to say.

For now, blog post comments will remain open and monitored, but with less frequency. Most importantly, if you have research you need to conduct on any topic using any collection in Wilson Library, you will to need complete that work by August—which means you have about five months. Since reopening after the pandemic, Wilson Library now requires reservations for research appointments. Don’t delay . . . make yours today.

Saving Hatteras Light

. . . Mr. Byram and his handful of youths went along this ridge and when they came to a dead bush they cut it. Lacking a vehicle that would negotiate the sand, they dragged it to the Lighthouse and before nightfall they had built a hedgerow thirty inches high for a distance of sixty feet, set well back out of reach of the tide. . . Daylight next morning found Mr. Byram and his boys out to see what had happened in the night. Nothing except the tops of their hedgerow of dead brush was visible.—from Ben Dixon MacNeill’s The Hatterasman.

Edward Jefferson Byram was the leader of the advanced detachment of the Civilian Conservation Corps contingent assigned to the land and lighthouse on Cape Hatteras in August 1935. Deeded to the state of North Carolina for a state park, the state transferred the land to the National Park Service in December 1936.

Governor Hunt holding aerial photograph of Cape Hatteras Lighthouse
Governor Jim Hunt holding an aerial photograph made by Hugh Morton of the Cape Hatteras Lighthouse. Morton made the photograph on August 6, 1981—one month prior to the kickoff of the Save the Cape Hatteras Lighthouse fundraising campaign. Morton made this portrait after Hunt spoke at an unidentified meeting of the Travel Council of North Carolina.

Today, September 8, 2021 marks the fortieth anniversary of another attempt to thwart the ravages of wind and sea against the lighthouse: the Save the Cape Hatteras Lighthouse fundraising campaign kickoff at the Mission Valley Inn at Raleigh. In 2009, Jack Hilliard wrote an extensive blog post about Hugh Morton’s role in saving the lighthouse. Jack’s story includes that event, but what happened the prior year that led to Morton’s involvement?

From time-to-time, Morton’s executive planners provide answers or clues. There are only a few entries on the topic in his 1981 planner:

  • April 30—“TV 7-8AM WCTI-TV New Bern at Mission Valley re Lighthouse Jerry Dean”
  • August 6—“Fly Hatteras Robert Baker”
  • September 8—“noon—Gov. Hunt—Sen Helms Raleigh”
  • October 8— 8:00 a.m. “Lighthouse meeting” with an additional entry: “Gov. Hunt – Nags Head – Hatteras”

Morton’s photograph held by Governor Hunt is from a 120 format negative (roll 1-101-3-3, frame 5). Several prints from that roll of film are in the Morton collection with a typed caption:

Cape Hatteras Lighthouse in August 1981, with ocean shown less than 100 feet from its base. These photographs are a featured part of information being provided to the 100 County Chairmen in the lighthouse drive for funds in regional meetings in Asheville, Salisbury, Clinton and Rocky Mount Wednesday and Thursday April 7 and 8.

Hugh Morton’s name first appears in the press in association with saving the lighthouse on 26 July 1981. The previous day, during a news conference in Wilmington Secretary of the Interior Department James Watt and United States Senator Jesse Helms announced that Morton would head a general subscription to raise funds, harkening Morton’s campaign to bring the U.S.S. North Carolina to Wilmington in the early 1960s. Morton’s planner, however, has him in Linville and Grandfather Mountain.  As listed above, his planner does suggest earlier involvement in April. (There is no planner extant for 1980.)

As for the lighthouse itself, public awareness of the lighthouse’s imminent danger surfaced in an Associated Press Reports article published by The Charlotte Observer on October 14, 1980. The report noted that local residents feared the lighthouse “might not make it through the winter” because tides were “gnawing away at its foundation” and its steward, the National Park Service, did not have a plan to save it. Ray Couch, president of the Outer Banks Preservation Society, said that its members were writing letters to their congressional representatives to draw their attention to “the seriousness of the situation.” William Harris, superintendent of Hatteras National Seashore, stated that only sixty to ninety feet of sand remained between the ocean and the lighthouse and acknowledged that the beach erosion at the site was “very acute.” He also stated that an architect and engineering firm was assessing the situation.  He closed by saying, “The cheapest option is to move the lighthouse,” but “we have no money.”

Ten days later, a fierce storm struck the North Carolina coast and work crews “began a desperate battle against the sea,” wrote Charlotte Observer writer and photographer Jim Dumbell. Workers continued their prevention effort into Saturday as the storm produced twelve-foot waves that pounded the shore. The Associated Press picked up the story on October 27, which reads like a shorter version of Dumbell’s feature. The following day, news reports announced that the National Park Service agreed to construct a jetty as a $60,000 stopgap measure. An Associated Press article described the jetty as an “underground metal wall.”

An article the following year by National Geographic writer John L. Eliot revealed that the then recent round of erosion actually arose in early March 1980 after a strong nor’easter socked the eastern United States as far south as Florida, where the temperature plummeted to thirty degrees Fahrenheit in West Palm Beach. The North Carolina coast was hit with thirty inches of snow and sixty mile-per-hour winds. More importantly at the lighthouse, ten-foot waves battered the shore when high tides were the highest since the Ash Wednesday storm of 1962. After the October storm described above, another struck in December requiring more emergency buttressing along the shore near the foundation.

Addenda (September 9, 2021): Governor Hunt gave a prepared speech on 10 November 1981 during the three-day meeting of the travel council, making that date a candidate for the date Morton made the above portrait. The meeting took place at the Holiday Inn–Woodlawn in Charlotte. Also, The State published one of Morton’s color transparencies made during the same flight on the cover of its January 1982 issue.

World Photography Day, 2021

Hugh Morton showing his camera to a child
Hugh Morton showing his camera to a child. An unknown photographer made this photograph during Morton’s World War II service with the 161st Signal Photographic Company in the Pacific Islands.

Today is World Photography Day, and thus a good day to revive A View to Hugh. During the past year and a half, I needed to take a hiatus from this blog because it was close to impossible to write posts while working from home. A few days ago I returned to working inside Wilson Library (that is, not from home) where I now have regular access to the Morton collection and, in some ways even more importantly, research material to consult when writing the stories that accompany Morton’s photographs. I’m still getting settled into a new office within the building, so this will not be a long post . . . just something to say the blog is still alive.

I hope you have an opportunity to make a photograph on this annual celebration.  If you post a photograph to a social media platform, remember tag it #WorldPhotographyDay.  If you are not making a photograph, but would like to explore the world using your computer, you may browse the online collection of Morton’s photographs by location, including nearly 150 images from the South Pacific.

White House Easter Egg Roll, 1977

Grandfather Mountain Cloggers at White House
“Grandfather Mountain Cloggers at White House,” during the Easter Egg Roll April 11, 1977.

On April 21, 1876, Congress passed the Turf Protection Law . . . or more formally, “An act to protect the public property, turf and grass of the Capitol Grounds from injury.” The act stipulated that “it shall be the duty of the Capitol police hereafter to prevent any portion of the Capitol grounds and terraces from being used as play-grounds or otherwise, so far as may be necessary to protect the public property, turf and grass from destruction or injury.”

Pray tell why? Apparently Easter Monday egg rolling on the capitol grounds had grown to unsustainable numbers!

Easter Monday had become the favorite day of the year of children in the District of Columbia. On April 6 1874, the Washington, D.C. newspaper, The Daily Critic, estimated that 1,000  children were “in the Capitol and President’s Grounds, this afternoon, indulging in the amusement of egg rolling.”  Two years later, the city’s Daily National Republican estimated there were at least 5,000 “lads and lassies, aye, and many older heads congregated to witness the pranks and capers of the boys and girls in rolling the eggs from the crest of the hill to the lawn below.” They also had their fun “at the president’s grounds and other convenient places.” Perhaps it was that day that prompted the Capitol grounds ban before April drew to a close.

Easter 1877 was a rainy day In Washington and there were no egg-rolling events.  An 1878 news brief in the Washington Post a short time before Easter Monday noted that Capitol police would be enforcing the ban, but President Rutherford B. Hayes saved the day.  He approved the use of the White House lawn for egg rolling that year—and is credited with establishing the event as it has become today—only today there will be no egg rolling at the White House due to the CORVID-19 pandemic.

Fannie B. Ward described the importance of Easter Monday in Washington in an April 1879 syndicated news article, so either the Capitol loosened its restraint or Ward recalled earlier times. Her description nonetheless captures the extent of the tradition’s popularity.

Easter Monday in the District of Columbia is a grand gala day for the little folk, what Thanksgiving is in New England or the Fourth of July in the West; schools are closed upon that day, and from sunrise to sunset thousands of children throng the hill upon which the Capitol stands, and the slopes and terraces of the White-House, all intent upon egg-rolling or egg-butting. Many bring their dinners and picnic on the springing grass—with hard-boiled eggs for every course; and there is no cessation of the sport till the purple gloaming falls, and “the blankets of the dark” shuts off the scene.

Nearly one hundred years later, Hugh Morton was on the White House lawn attending the Easter Egg Roll on Monday, April 11 1977.  The Grandfather Mountain Cloggers were part of the day’s celebration, which Morton photographed.  There are six slides 35mm color slides in the collection, five of which are in the online collection.  Two are a bit unusual: they depict Lillian Gordy Carter, President Jimmy Carter’s mother, seated in a wheelchair while watching the festivities from a White House balcony.

Lillian Gordy Carter
Lillian Gordy Carter, watching the White House Easter egg Roll activities.

Hugh Morton retrospective at Blowing Rock Art & History Museum

Winter Exhibition Celebration 2019
Announcement card for the Blowing Rock Art & History Museum’s Winter Exhibition Celebration.

It’s been incredibly busy so I am a bit behind in announcing that the exhibition Photographs by Hugh Morton: An Uncommon Retrospective is now showing at the Blowing Rock Art & History Museum through February 22, 2020. The museum’s Winter Exhibition Celebration takes place on Friday, December 13 from 4:30 to 7:00 p.m. If you haven’t yet seen the exhibition, I hope you can make your way to Blowing Rock to see it.  The musuem is the ninth venue to exhibit the retrospective since its debut in Boone at Appalachian State University’s Turchin Center for the Visual Arts six years ago on August 27, 2013.

Why, you might wonder, has it been so busy here in the North Carolina Collection Photographic Archives? Well among several other things, the thousands of Morton negatives selected for the first phase of a preservation digitization project have been returned from the vendor—along with 1.7 terabytes of image files.  This topic will be a “Behind the Scenes” blog post for 2020.

Celebrating America in space 2019

This year, 2019, marks several special anniversaries for the United States space program. Today marks the fiftieth anniversary of the Apollo 11 launch that carried the first humans to the lunar surface on July 20, 1969.  Morton Collection volunteer, Jack Hilliard, takes a look at these celebrations.  Then, in an afterward, I’ll share my current thinking on Morton’s photographs made during the Apollo 11 launch.

Aerial view of launchpads at Kennedy Space Center
An aerial view of the launchpads at Kennedy Space Center, date and photographer unknown. The 35mm color slide has likely been removed from its original cardboard mount and placed into generic mount, eliminating a possible processing date stamp or any identifying information that would be evidence that Morton may have purchased the slide from somewhere such as a NASA gift shop.

Soon after NASA announced its “Mercury 7” astronauts on April 9, 1959, the agency selected Morehead Planetarium on the UNC campus as “the place” for celestial navigational training.  Between 1959 and 1975, nearly every astronaut who participated in the Mercury, Gemini, Apollo, Skylab, and Apollo-Soyuz Test Project programs trained at the planetarium. All seven of the Mercury team and eleven of the twelve astronauts who walked on the moon trained there.  Longtime planetarium director Tony Jenzano liked to claim that “Carolina is the only University in the country, in fact the world that can claim most all the astronauts as alumni.”  So, as we celebrate the fiftieth anniversary of the first moon launch and landing, we must give a tip of the hat to the folks at Morehead who played an important part in the most important peacetime undertaking of the 20th century.

Since I began working with Stephen Fletcher at Wilson Library in 2008, we have determined that Hugh Morton was a frequent visitor at the Kennedy Space Center for Apollo launches. We have determined that he was there for Apollo 9, Apollo 10, Apollo11, and Apollo 14. (He was likely at the launch of Apollo 8 and Apollo17, but we haven’t documented those images yet.)  Over the years, we have written blog-posts about three of the Apollo fights: Apollo 9, Apollo 11, and Apollo 14.

Worker at Michoud Assembly Facilty
Worker inside NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center at Michoud Assembly Facilty in New Orleans, LA.

In February of 1965, Morton visited the NASA Michoud Assembly Facility, a part of Alabama’s Marshall Space Flight Center, but located in New Orleans. There he took several pictures of the Saturn 1B under construction. The Saturn1B would be used for the launch of Apollo 7, in 1968, three Skylab manned launches in the early 1970s and the Apollo-Soyuz Test Project in 1975.

Travel Council of North Carolina touring Kennedy Space Center,
Members of the Travel Council of North Carolina touring Kennedy Space Center, January 23, 1967.

About two years after Hugh Morton photographed the Saturn 1B at Michoud Assembly Facility, he and wife Julia were part of a fifty-person tour of Florida by the Travel Council of North Carolina. Mrs. Dan K Moore, the state’s First Lady, headed the tour.  On Monday, January 23, 1967 the group visited the Kennedy Space Center—just four days before the tragic launchpad fire that killed the Apollo 1 crew.  Astronauts “Gus” Grissom, Ed White, and Roger Chaffee died while training for the first Apollo manned mission, which had been scheduled for February 21, 1967.

Mrs. Dan K. Moore at Kennedy Space Center
Mrs. Dan K. Moore at the Kennedy Space Center, posed in front of one of the enormous machines that transport rockets between locations at the center.

The Apollo program would not make a manned flight until the launch of Apollo 7 on October 11, 1968.

Apollo 11 rocket on launchpad
The Saturn V rocket awaits liftoff from its launchpad for the Apollo 11 spaceflight. This image is one of only seven 35mm Kodachrome slides extant from Hugh Morton’s photographs of humankind’s first mission to land man on the moon.

Fifty years ago today, on July 16, 1969, Hugh Morton was one of the more than 3,500 accredited news reporters and photographers representing fifty-six countries, at NASA’s press site, three and a half miles across the Banana River from the Pad A launch facility at Kennedy Space Center. There are Morton images from the press site complex as well as the VIP viewing site where Morton took a photograph of former President Lyndon Johnson.
More than one million spectators jammed the Florida beaches and highways. Among the dignitaries at the VIP viewing site were General William Westmoreland, Chief of Staff of the Army, four members of President Nixon’s cabinet, sixty ambassadors, nineteen state governors, forty mayors, and two hundred congressmen. Vice President Spiro Agnew accompanied former president Lyndon Johnson and wife Lady Bird.

Lyndon Baines Johnson
Former president Lyndon Baines Johnson was among the dignitaries to witness the launch of Apollo 11.

An estimated twenty-five million TV viewers in the United States watched the proceedings and the live coverage was available in thirty-three countries. President Richard Nixon viewed the launch from his office in Washington with NASA liaison officer, Apollo 8 astronaut Frank Borman.

As the launch time approached for Apollo 11, a few fluffy clouds could be seen, with the temperature in the high 80s and a slight breeze. NASA’s weather team at Patrick Air Force Base just south of the space center reported “flawless” launch weather.

At 9:32 am (EDT), on July 16, 1969, the mighty Saturn V (AS-506) rocket began fulfilling President Kennedy’s 1961 goal of “landing a man on the moon and returning him safely to earth,” with the historic launch of Apollo 11.

Grandstand at an observation area during the Apollo 11 launch.
Grandstand at an observation area during the Apollo 11 launch.

Afterword by Stephen
It’s struck me as odd that there are only seven 35mm slides from the Apollo 11 launch in the Morton collection, none of which depict blast off.  Thinking photographically about the moment, I’ve come to believe that there are 35mm color negatives.  Here’s why . . .

The 35mm slides that exist are from the end of a roll of film—slides 31 through 38, with slide 35 missing.  Digital scans made from four of those slides can be seen online via the link in the story above.  Sequentially:

  • frames 31 and 32 show photographers lined up at the press site next to the Vehicle Assemble Building at the Kennedy Space Center;
  • slides 33 and 34 show the Saturn V rocket on the launchpad in the distance;
  • with frame 35 missing, slides 36 and 37 depict a sparsely populated grandstand; and
  • slide 38, the final frame, is the portrait of LBJ wearing sunglasses and looking like he may have been in the sun a bit too long (see the scans above),

At this point, Morton needs to reload his camera with a fresh roll of film.  It’s either a between slides 34 or 35 and slide 36, or after frame 38 that I think misfortune struck.

I believe Morton may have had three cameras in operation—two positioned on tripods, and one carried with him. Why? There are two unidentified rolls of 35mm color negative film (i.e., not color slide film) in the collection depicting a rocket launch—one roll is oriented horizontally the other oriented vertically.  Both are severely out-of-focus.  From the street lamp positioned in the foreground, they appear to be from the same location as the slide above.

From a content perspective regarding the slides, why would LBJ be in the press section?  More likely he would have been in the dignitaries section, which if that is what the grandstands above depict, then we can see was fairly empty.  Is this because it was early before liftoff at 9:32, or after when people would have begun to leave?  I think the later because the shadows are not long.  Morton would have photographed around the press site, then switched his attention to liftoff, then wandered back to the dignitaries section.

Somehow or other, I think the cameras with telephoto lenses on tripods lost their focus.  Or maybe there is another scenario.  What do you think?

Hugh Morton retrospective exhibition heads to Mount Airy

Unto These Hills dancer
Unto These Hills dancer, one of more than eighty photographs you can experience when you see the exhibition “Photographs By Hugh Morton: An Uncommon Retrospective.”

Jump for joy!  It’s amazing—though not hard to believe given the high-quality photographs—that the exhibition Photographs by Hugh Morton: An Uncommon Retrospective, opens on July 4th at the Mount Airy Museum of Regional History.  This marks the exhibition’s ninth venue since its debut in Boone, N. C. at the Turchin Center for the Visual Arts back in 2013.  The exhibition will be on display through October 25.  And you can leap once more because I’ve just confirmed that Blowing Rock Art & History Museum will host the exhibition starting November 9 through February 22, 2020.

Flowers, parades, parties, and golf along with the Golden Voice, Known as “The Whiz”

The North Carolina Azalea Festival is in progress for the 72nd time in Wilmington.  This year’s event takes place from April 3-7, 2019.  Going back to 1948, not only is this event a celebration of flowers and golf, it brings celebrated guests from across the United States. From Hollywood movies, to TV stars, to celebrated sports heroes, the festival has seen them all.  Over the years, many of the guests have made returned visits.  This was especially true in the early years.  As we celebrate festival number 72, Morton collection volunteer Jack Hilliard looks back at one of those guests, noted broadcaster Harry Wismer, who visited often during the1950s.

UNC Head Football Coach Carl Snavely, UNC tailback Charlie Justice, and ABC Radio play-by-play announcer Harry Wismer prior to the start of the 1949 Sugar Bowl.
UNC Head Football Coach Carl Snavely, UNC tailback Charlie Justice, and ABC Radio play-by-play announcer Harry Wismer prior to the start of the 1949 Sugar Bowl.

Hugh Morton crossed paths with legendary sportscaster Harry Wismer at the Sugar Bowl on January 1, 1949 in New Orleans.  Wismer was in town to broadcast the game for ABC Radio between the UNC Tar Heels and the Oklahoma Sooners.  Of course Morton was in town to photograph the game which featured his dear friend Charlie Justice.  And as one would expect, Morton took at pre-game picture of Justice and Wismer, a picture that Hugh often included in his famous slides shows. Morton also included the image in his 1988 book Making a Difference in North Carolina on page 257.
Nearly two years later on December 10, 1950, Morton photographed the final regular season game between the Washington Redskins and the Cleveland Browns in Washington’s Griffith Stadium.  Again, he crossed paths with Harry Wismer, the Redskins’ play-by-play man.  At the time, Harry Wismer, who was known by many as “The Whiz,” was already considered the nation’s leading sportscaster, having broadcast numerous events like the National Open and PGA, the Penn Relays, and the National Football League Championship.
Wismer was also a part owner of the Detroit Lions and the Washington Redskins of the National Football League.  In addition to his co-ownership, Wismer was “The Voice of the Redskins,” having called their games on the “Amoco-Redskins Network” since 1943.  It was on those Redskins broadcasts that I first heard him.  As a little kid, I listened to the Redskin games starting in 1950.  When the game came to TV in North Carolina in 1951, Wismer was right there with the play-by-play.  I remember those early broadcasts. Wismer’s commercial tag line went like this: “All around town, for all around service, visit your Amoco man, and Lord Baltimore filling stations.”
1949 Queen of the North Carolina Azalea Festival, actress Martha Hyer, with her court.
1949 Queen of the North Carolina Azalea Festival, actress Martha Hyer, with her court.

Starting in 1949, the Azalea Open Golf Tournament became a part of the spring festivities.    Hugh Morton invited Wismer to the 1950 Azalea Festival in Wilmington, along with Southern Methodist University football hero Doak Walker and his wife Norma.  Of course, Tar Heels Charlie and Sarah Justice returned in ’50, having been there in 1949 to crown Azalea Queen II, Hollywood starlet Martha Hyer.  When Justice and Wismer returned to Wilmington for the 1951 festival, Hugh Morton had added a new event: a special golf match at the Cape Fear Country Club called “Who Crowns the Azalea Queen?”  The match pitted two ABC Radio broadcasters, Harry Wismer and Ted Malone, against two football greats, Charlie Justice and Otto Graham.
Harry Wismer and Ted Malone
ABC Radio broadcasters Harry Wismer and Ted Malone.

Margaret Sheridan, Otto Graham, Harry Wismer, Charlie Justice, and Earl Stewart
Margaret Sheridan, Otto Graham, Harry Wismer, and Charlie Justice seek magical powers by holding the putter of golfer Earl Stewart after he shot a superb round of 65 to capture the lead after the third round of the Azalea Open Golf Tournament.

The winner of the nineholeevent would have the honor of crowning Queen Azalea IV, Margaret Sheridan.  The ‘51 winner was the Justice/Graham team.
Margaret Sheridan holding flagstick
Queen Azalea IV Margaret Sheridan takes charge of the flagstick on the 18th green at the Cape Fear Country Club.

In addition to being part of the parades, flowers, and parties, Wismer broadcast the Azalea Open Golf Tournament on ABC Radio.  The 1951 Open winner was Lloyd Mangrum, and Wismer included an interview with him on his ABC Radio show which was also originated live in Wilmington.
Harry Wismer interviewing Lloyd Mangrum
ABC Radio broadcaster Harry Wismer interviewing the 1951 Azalea Open Golf Tournament winner Lloyd Mangrum.

The 1952 “Who Crowns the Azalea Queen?” event once again put Wismer’s team, which included writer Hal Boyle and band leader Tony Pastor, against a football squad of Charlie Justice, Eddie Lebaron, and Otto Graham and this time the Wismer team won.
Harry Wismer crowns Cathy Downs as Azalea Queen V.
Harry Wismer crowns Cathy Downs as Azalea Queen V during the 1952 Azalea Festival.

According to Hugh Morton, the original queen selection for 1952 was actress Janet Leigh, but her husband Tony Curtis decided to cancel their trip to Wilmington.  Morton knew that actress Cathy Downs was in town because her husband Joe Kirkwood, Jr. was playing in the Azalea Open.  When Morton invited her, she accepted and became Queen Azalea V.
Wismer continued his Azalea Festival visits during the mid-1950s. Charlotte broadcaster Grady Cole also participated in Wismer’s broadcasts. 
Wismer would later become one of the founding fathers of the American Football League, which began play in 1960; three years later, however, he gave up his football leadership.  Wismer spent the remainder of his life trying to reclaim his glory days as broadcaster and team owner, but was unsuccessful partly because of his declining health.  In 1965, Wismer wrote a book titled The Public Calls It Sports.  In it he gives a “behind the scenes” look at professional football from a broadcast and ownership point of view.
Harry Wismer passed away on December 4, 1967, the day after a tragic fall at a New York restaurant.  He was 64-years-old.

Paul Hardin: UNC’s bicentennial chancellor

Chancellor Paul Hardin was a visionary leader who is remembered in North Carolina and across our nation for his dedication to promoting the life-changing impact and benefits of higher education

— UNC Chancellor Carol L. Folt, July 2017

One year ago today, July 1, 2017, UNC lost a giant: Chancellor Emeritus Paul Hardin III.  Hardin led the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill during its bicentennial observance, died at his Chapel Hill home after a courageous battle with ALS, commonly referred to as Lou Gehrig’s disease.  He was 86 years old.  On this first anniversary of his death, Morton collection volunteer Jack Hilliard looks back at Chancellor Hardin’s time at UNC and his magnificent bicentennial leadership.

Paul Hardin and C. D. Spangler
University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill Chancellor Paul Hardin talking with UNC President C. D. Spangler, circa 1990. Hugh Morton photograph, cropped by the editor.

A Phi Beta Kappa from Duke University, Class of 1952, Paul Hardin led three schools—Wofford College, Southern Methodist University, and Drew University—before becoming UNC’s seventh chancellor on July 1, 1988.  He was officially installed on October 12 during a University Day installation ceremony, where Hardin told those gathered: “The future belongs to those institutions and persons who command it, not to those who wait passively for it to happen.”
At UNC, Hardin established the Employee Forum, which gave non-academic university employees a greater voice.  He was an advocate for UNC-Chapel Hill and campaigned successfully for greater fiscal and management flexibility for the state’s public universities. He aggressively led UNC through some of its most important events. When he stepped down in 1995, Carolina was ready for its third century.
One of those important events was Carolina’s bicentennial observance.  On October 11, 1991, he officially launched the largest fund-raising effort in University history—the Bicentennial Campaign for Carolina.
“To command the future this university must compete successfully in the complex and highly competitive world of public higher education,” said Hardin as he announced that $55 million in gifts and pledges had already been raised.  The bell in South Building rang out to mark the announcement.
It was October 12, 1793 when the University North Carolina laid the cornerstone for its first building, now named Old East.  During the next two centuries, the university went from that single building to one of the nation’s most prestigious public universities.  And on October 12, 1993 UNC celebrated that growth in a very special way under Hardin’s leadership.
Bicentennial planning had begun on August 28, 1985 when then Chancellor Chris Fordham sent Richard Cole, dean of the UNC School of Journalism and Mass Communications, a note asking him to chair an “ad hoc committee to assist in planning the forthcoming Bicentennial.”  During the next eight years, plans were carefully put into place for the observance.  Chancellor Hardin looked upon Carolina’s 200th birthday as an opportunity to “light the way” for Carolina’s future. “Dare to think big and to dream,” he told the numerous planning committees.  They did.
UNC-Chapel Hill Bicentennial University Day
UNC-Chapel Hill Bicentennial University Day ceremonies in Kenan Stadium. Former NC governor Robert W. Scott at podium; President Bill Clinton, Edward Fort, Richard Cole, Paul Hardin, Dick Richardson, Martin Lancaster also visible.

A predawn rain fell on the UNC campus on October 12, 1993, the actual 200th birthday of the university, but that didn’t deter any of the planned celebration.  As a crowd of 3,000 filed into McCorkle Place for a 10:00 a.m. rededication ceremony of Old East, the sun came out.  UNC President C.D. Spangler then stepped to podium.
“I want to thank publicly Chancellor Paul Hardin for the excellent leadership he is giving our university.  I feel quite certain that with such strong leadership now and in the future, 200 years from now in 2193 there will be an assemblage of people at this same location again celebrating this wonderful university.”
Following the Distinguished Alumni Awards presentations, President Spangler again came forward—this time to make an unexpected announcement.  Holding up a gold pocket watch that had belonged to William Richardson Davie, the university’s founding father, Spangler explained: “Emily Davie Kornfield in her will . . . bequeathed to the University of North Carolina the watch . . . having the letter ‘D’ inscribed on its back. . . Chancellor, I take great pleasure in presenting William Richardson Davie’s watch to you for perpetual care by the University of North Carolina.”  Chancellor Hardin accepted the timepiece that is now a part of the North Carolina Collection at Wilson Library.
The University Day celebration continued with the planting of Davie Popular III from a seed of the original tree.  Also, 104 two-foot saplings from the original tree were distributed to sixth-graders representing North Carolina’s 100 counties and the Cherokee Indian Reservation.  UNC Head Basketball Coach Dean Smith handed out the twigs from a flat-bed truck.  The young students took the twigs back to each county for planting.
The University Day Bicentennial Observance culminated with a celebration in Kenan Memorial Stadium, with Chancellor Hardin leading the proceedings.  And just as he was thirty-two years before when President John F. Kennedy spoke on University Day 1961, photographer Hugh Morton was there to document the proceedings.
The University Day processional led by Faculty Marshal Ron Hyatt preceded the evening’s speakers: The Honorable James B. Hunt, Jr., Governor of North Carolina; Charles Kuralt, North Carolina Hall of Fame journalist; and Dr. William C. Friday, President-Emeritus of UNC.  Then at 8:24 p.m., C.D. Spangler introduced William Jefferson Clinton, President of the United States of America.  Following Clinton’s thirty-five-minute speech, Chancellor Hardin conferred an honorary degree on the forty-second president.
Then Hardin closed the evening’s proceedings: “Tonight we have rubbed shoulders with history, and we stand with you—Mr. President—facing a future that baffles prediction but whose promise surely exceeds our wildest imaginings.  We are profoundly grateful for your message of hope and promise and humbled to share even part of your day alongside matters of vast global consequence. . . May we set as our goal that our nation’s first state university may also be its best.”
Twelve years after Hardin stepped down from his post as Chancellor, in March of 2007, he and his wife, Barbara, joined with then-Chancellor James Moeser and Chancellor Emeritus William Aycock and former Interim Chancellor Bill McCoy for the dedication on south campus of Hardin Hall, a newly built residence hall named in his honor.
Also on hand that day was Dick Richardson, a retired provost and political science professor who chaired the bicentennial observance while Hardin was chancellor.  Richardson said of his former boss, “There is no veneer to him. No pretense, no façade of personality to hide the real person. . . . If you scratch deeply beneath the surface of Paul Hardin, you will find exactly what you find on the surface, for this man is solid oak from top to bottom.”
A memorial service was held on Saturday afternoon, July 8, 2017 at University United Methodist Church in Chapel Hill; and on that day the university rang the bell in South Building seven times, to honor Paul Hardin’s role in UNC history as the seventh chancellor. The ringing of the bell is used to mark only the most significant university occasions.
Correction: 2 July 2018
Linked to the correct blog post on William Richardson Davie’s watch on North Carolina Miscellany.  The previous link led to a post on Elisha Mitchell’s watch.

Robert F. Kennedy attends Terry Sanford's gubernatorial inauguration

On June 6, 1968—fifty years ago today—Robert Francis Kennedy died nearly twenty-six hours after being fatally shot by Sirhan Sirhan in the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles, California.  Seven years earlier—on January 5, 1961—Hugh Morton photographed Kennedy during a visit to Raleigh, North Carolina.

Robert F. Kennedy and wife Ethel
Robert F. Kennedy seated with his wife Ethel during the inauguration of North Carolina Governor Terry Sanford in Raleigh’s Memorial Auditorium, 5 January 1961. (Note: this photograph links to the record for this image in the online Morton collection, where for many years it is has been incorrectly displayed, laterally reversed.)

On that day, Kennedy sat on the platform in Raleigh’s Memorial Auditorium watching the inauguration of North Carolina’s sixty-fifth governor, Terry Sanford.  Fifteen days later, Kennedy’s brother John would be sworn in as the country’s thirty-fifth president.
Hugh Morton also attended Sanford’s swearing-in ceremony.  Morton had served as Publicity Director for the election campaign of outgoing governor Luther H. Hodges in 1956.  During Hodges’ administration, Morton served as the chair of the State Advertising Committee and as a member of the State Board of Conservation and Development.  His credentials provided Morton access to a likely restricted area for the event.
During the inauguration ceremony and Sanford’s ensuing address, Morton photographed with a 120 format roll film camera.  He worked predominately from a distance, positioned high up on stage left. He mostly photographed the audience and other officials taking their oaths of office, and Sanford from behind while centered amid the crowd.  There are ten negatives extent from the event.  In Morton’s negatives, you can see another photographer on the dais in front of the podium during their oaths.  Unbeknownst to Morton, his focus for those negatives was off badly.  On the very last frame of that roll of film (frame 12), he captured the above close up of Robert F. Kennedy with his wife Ethel.  They were seated on right side of the stage, suggesting Morton made the cross-stage trip specifically to make that photograph.
Outside, Morton switched to 35mm film.  There are forty-seven surviving 35mm negatives from that day.  Two depict Robert Kennedy, likely after the swearing-in ceremony but before Hodges and Sanford made their way into an awaiting convertible.  One of the two those two negatives is shown below.  Morton also made a 120 format color negative of the two governors seated inside the convertible (not scanned, but published in the book Making A Difference in North Carolina) that is also extant.
Robert F. Kennedy with Luther Hodges and Terry Sanford
Robert F. Kennedy (center) with Luther H. Hodges on his right and Terry Sanford on his left amid a crowd during Sanford’s inauguration.

Why was Robert Kennedy attending the inauguration of a North Carolina governor?  A four-part story in A View to Hugh from 2011 titled “A Spark of Greatness” recounts John F. Kennedy’s presidential campaign in North Carolina during the 1960 election, drawn mostly from John Drescher’s book Triumph of Good Will: How Terry Sanford Beat a Champion of Segregation and Reshaped the South.  A Spark of Greatness—Part 3 sets the stage for RFK’s return to NC for Sanford’s inauguration.  That account, however, is really only part of the story.  In terms of the presidential election, Robert Kennedy stated that “North Carolina was the most pleasant state to win for me.”  But he played a minor controversial role in Sanford’s election, too.
Sanford met with Robert Kennedy during his gubernatorial primary campaign—reluctantly, but he did so as a favor to Louis Harris, his pollster and a fellow UNC alumnus. (Sanford received his Bachelor of Arts degree in 1941, Harris received his BA in 1942, and Hugh Morton was a member of the class of 1943.)  Sanford had begun building a relationship with the Kennedys during the election season, but had not yet decided if he would endorse John Kennedy or Lyndon Johnson.  Their meeting was to be private.  It took place during the first part of June in Raleigh at the College Inn.  Sanford was impressed with Robert Kennedy’s organizational skills.  Sanford left the meeting without making a commitment, but he was now convinced John Kennedy would defeat Johnson.
During a press conference on June 13, a UPI reporter asked Sanford if he had met with Kennedy.  Sanford said he had not.  Sanford thought the reporter asked about John Kennedy but realized he had meant to say Robert.  Within a week newspapers carried stories about the meeting between Sanford and Robert Kennedy.  Sanford later regretted that he did not give a more forthright answer, one that acknowledged that he had not met with JFK but had met with RFK.  The political news was soon filled with stories that questioned, among various other scenarios, if Sanford had something to hide—particularly a promise to endorse Kennedy at the Democratic National Convention.
In his book Terry Sanford: Politics, Progress, and Outrageous Ambitions, Howard Covington recounts how Sanford made his way into the White House prior to the funeral service for John F. Kennedy.  Sanford attempted to gain access to the White House, but police physically thwarted his attempt despite his being a governor.  He finally convinced the police to escort him inside as if he was under arrest.  Once inside, Sanford spoke briefly to Robert Kennedy, then left.
Three months before the JFK assassination, Robert Kennedy had written a letter to Sanford, according to Covington, “to commend him on his management of difficult times.”  Kennedy wrote, “You have always shown leadership in this effort, which could well be followed by many chief executives in the north as well as in your part of the nation.”  Kennedy had written a post script at the bottom of his letter: “I hope I am not causing you too much trouble down there.  Just deny you ever met me.  That is the only advice I can think to give you.  Bob.”  In a note back to Robert Kennedy, Terry Sanford wrote: “I haven’t denied you yet.”