Emily Jack – Page 3 – NC Miscellany

Wikipedia edit-a-thon: American Indians in North Carolina

In 1929, Henry Owl, a member of the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians, became the first American Indian to graduate from the University of North Carolina.

Owl received a master’s degree in history with a thesis called “The Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians Before and After the Removal.” A year later, officials in Western North Carolina denied voting rights to Cherokees on the supposed basis of illiteracy. Owl pointed to his thesis as evidence to the contrary.

When officials pivoted and barred Cherokees from voting because they were not U.S. citizens, Owl testified before Congress. The federal government passed a law guaranteeing Cherokee suffrage — although Cherokees didn’t vote in North Carolina until after World War II.

Because of his achievements, Henry Owl’s name has been immortalized in the Virtual Museum of UNC History, the Sports Hall of Fame at Lenoir-Rhyne University (his undergraduate institution), and an endowed scholarship for UNC students.

It has not been immortalized in Wikipedia… at least, not yet.

On April 1, we hope to change that.

Wikipedia edit-a-thon

Next week, the North Carolina Collection will host its third Wikipedia edit-a-thon, with the theme American Indians in North Carolina. At the event, participants will create, update, and improve articles about people, places, events, and organizations associated with American Indian history in North Carolina.

Everyone is welcome, even if you’ve never edited Wikipedia before. Staff will be on hand to help with Wikipedia edits and find books and articles on topics that interest you. A list of suggested topics, and additional details, can be found on the event meet-up page.

Please bring a laptop if possible.

April 1, 5:00 to 8:45 p.m.
Wilson Library, UNC-Chapel Hill

Artifact of the month: Millard Fillmore tobacco pipe fragment

Even relative newcomers to UNC remark about the seemingly endless construction on campus. The orientation of the University seems forever attuned to building and changing, moving toward the future.

Fortunately, there are people on campus paying careful attention to UNC’s past — foremost among them the Research Laboratories of Archaeology. The RLA is responsible for our March artifact of the month, a fragment of a red clay tobacco pipe associated with the presidential campaign of Millard Fillmore.

millard fillmore pipe

The pipe was excavated in the 1990s at the site of the Eagle Hotel, where Graham Memorial Hall now stands. The Eagle Hotel, built about 1796, was first a tavern house and later a hotel and boarding house. It was also one of the first commercial structures in Chapel Hill.

In the decades leading up to the Civil War, the Eagle Hotel served as a center of social life at the university. The University reacquired the property in 1907 and turned it into a dormitory, which was used until its destruction in a 1921 fire.

Glimpses of the 19th-century campus on display

The Millard Fillmore pipe, along with many other fascinating artifacts on loan from the Research Laboratories of Archaeology, can be seen in the North Carolina Collection Gallery’s exhibition The Hidden Campus: Archaeological Glimpses of UNC in the Nineteenth Century.

Steve Davis, Associate Director of the Research Laboratories of Archaeology, will deliver a lecture associated with the exhibition on April 14. More details about the exhibition and the lecture can be seen on the Gallery’s current exhibition page.

Artifact of the Month: 19th-century pressed flower picture

An informal poll of North Carolina Collection employees suggests that some of us are true hearts-and-flowers romantics on Valentine’s Day, and some of us approach the day like scrooges.

Regardless of how you plan to spend Valentine’s Day, we hope you’ll enjoy this pressed flower picture from 1882 — our February Artifact of the Month.

Pressing flowers was a popular pastime for women in the 19th century, particularly as a way of marking sentimental occasions.

This picture was made by Ella Williams Graves Thompson of Caswell County, soon after marrying George Nicholas Thompson (whose papers are in the Southern Historical Collection) in January 1882. A note accompanying the picture, written by Thompson’s daughter, reads:

Mama gathered and pressed these flowers the first year of her married life, and made the picture the last few months before Graves [Thompson’s son Azariah Graves Thompson] was born. The picture belongs to Graves. In it are woven all her hopes and prayers for her firstborn son. She meant it always to represent that to him.

So, all you Valentine’s scrooges: If that didn’t warm your heart just a little, what will?

Artifacts of the Month: Saxophone and clarinet of Hal Kemp

UNC can count many popular musicians on its list of notable alumni. Among the very earliest is Hal Kemp, the big band leader of the 1920s and 30s who started his musical career at UNC and went on to achieve national fame. Kemp’s saxophone and clarinet are our December Artifacts of the Month.

Kemp organized his first dance band, the five-piece Merrymakers, when he was still in high school at Charlotte Central High. After entering UNC in 1922 he started the Carolina Club Orchestra, which recorded for Okeh records and performed in Europe during summer breaks. Before graduating, Kemp invited Kay Kyser to take over as bandleader for the Carolina Club Orchestra.

The seven-piece combo Kemp formed during his senior year became the foundation for the professional band he established in the spring of 1926, the year he graduated. While it was active, Kemp’s band recorded some of the era’s major hits and consistently appeared in the top ten of the Billboard’s College Poll. It was the first band featured in a motion picture — 1938’s Radio City Revels.

Kemp’s instruments were generously donated by his nephew, Howard Yates Dunaway, Jr.

Dunaway traveled with the band as a teenager in the 1930s, helping to set up the band members’ instruments. When he brought the saxophone and clarinet, Dunaway, now in his 90s, shared his memories of life on the road with his uncle’s band.

scrapbook page — Scrapbook in the Hal Kemp Papers in the Southern Historical Collection.

kemp saxophone — Kemp’s saxophone is a Buescher Aristocrat.

Howard Dunaway and his brother Kemp Dunaway inherited the family’s musical talent: Howard played violin in the Charlotte Symphony at age 16. And his brother Kemp played these very instruments, which he had inherited from his uncle.

Howard Dunaway, from the 1947 UNC yearbook the Yackety Yack.

Kemp Dunaway, from the 1947 Yackety Yack.

Hal Kemp wasn’t with us long enough. He died following an auto accident in 1940 at just 35. But his recordings will be with us forever — and so will his instruments. The North Carolina Collection Gallery is proud to care for these artifacts, which tell an important story of a time when UNC made significant contributions to the world of popular music.

Artifact of the Month: Littleton College commemorative plate

In 1882, Littleton Female College opened in Littleton, North Carolina. Originally chartered as the Central Institute for Young Ladies, the school grew from an inaugural class of eleven students to 274 students in 1907.

Our November Artifact of the Month is a commemorative plate that recalls Littleton College (which eventually dropped the word “female” from its name).

commemorative plate

Littleton College offered courses in chemistry, physics, and mathematics in addition to the domestic courses of study that were common in contemporary women’s schools. Littleton was a private Methodist school, owned by Rev. James Manly Rhodes.

In 1919 a fire destroyed the school’s buildings and Mr. Rhodes didn’t rebuild. But despite Littleton College’s relatively short lifespan, we’re left with some great documentation of the institution and its students.

The North Carolina Digital Heritage Center has digitized three editions of the Littleton College yearbook, the Pansy.

littleton basketball team — Yearbook photo of the Littleton College “A.B.C. Basket ball Team,” 1905

littleton orchestra — Yearbook photo of the Littleton College Orchestra, 1905

The North Carolina Collection Photograph Archives holds several photographs of Littleton buildings and students in its North Carolina County Photograph Collection. And the North Carolina Postcard Collection holds a Littleton College postcard:

The commemorative plate, a recent donation from a descendant of several Littleton students, is the Library’s first non-paper artifact from Littleton College. It’s a great addition to the North Carolina Collection Gallery.

Artifact of the month: 1878 state fair pass

Fans of the North Carolina State Fair (and those who are emphatically not fans) may associate the fair with bright lights, outrageous fried foods, and giant plush bananas inexplicably dressed like Rastafarians.

It can be difficult to imagine the state fair as an elegant event, but just take a look at this 1878 fair pass, our October Artifact of the Month:

Just for fun, here are two other passes, from regional fairs: one from the 1881 Sampson County State Fair, and one from the Great Albemarle District Fair in 1923.

If you’re going to the state fair this year, we trust you’ll keep it classy.

Artifact of the Month: Counterfeit bank note, 1856

What’s the downside to having beautiful money? Not knowing whether it’s real.

Our September Artifact of the Month is a counterfeit bank note, supposedly from the Commercial Bank of Wilmington. The bank was real, but it had nothing to do with this note.

Before the Civil War, coins were scarce and the federal government printed very little paper money. Paper money printed by banks, merchants, and local governments served as common currency. These private and local issues were typically embellished with artwork in the form of vignettes, or pictorial elements. The variety and beauty of these vignettes is the subject of the NCC Gallery’s current exhibition.

While mid-nineteenth-century printing technology did assist in deterring some counterfeiters, the wide variety of available notes presented opportunities for fraudsters.

Our featured note, with its dramatic whaling vignette, was a genuine note from a New Jersey bank. When the bank folded, its paper money became worthless. As was typical in that era, some enterprising criminal altered the note so it bore the name of the Commercial Bank of Wilmington.

Because banks issued so many different designs, this fraudulent note could be passed off easily, with its recipient none the wiser.

Gallery event

If you’d like to know more about the art that appeared on North Carolina money, join us in the North Carolina Collection Gallery for an open meeting of the Raleigh Coin Club on Tuesday, September 16, 2014. The meeting will include a guided tour of the exhibition hosted by its curators Bob Schreiner and Linda Jacobson.

7:00 pm: Exhibit viewing and gallery tour
7:30 pm: Meeting

Artifact of the Month: Laundry bag used at UNC

This week the North Carolina Collection welcomes new and returning UNC students to the 2014-15 academic year. Campus has been buzzing with students unpacking cars, buying books, and reuniting with friends. At the moment, everyone looks pretty clean… but it won’t be long before they all have dirty laundry.

Our August Artifact of the Month is a canvas laundry bag that was used by UNC students of two generations: First, Charles Edward Hight, Class of 1926, and later his daughter, Elna Hight, Class of 1964. Both Charles and Elna used this bag when attending UNC.

We love that this humble laundry bag survived two tours of duty at UNC, decades apart. And we’re grateful to the Hight family for trusting us to be the caretakers of this timeless slice of student life.

Best wishes to all the students starting the academic year. Don’t forget to wash your sheets!

Carolina Playmakers exhibit yields lucky find

Was it serendipity? Or the hand of providence?

As the staff of the North Carolina Collection Gallery prepared for our exhibit on the Carolina Playmakers, we contended with a number of difficult decisions about what to include. With dozens and dozens of playbills from which to select, sometimes the choice came down to factors as arbitrary as color.

Whatever the reason for it, we’re glad we selected this 1942 playbill — and we’re not the only ones.

The playwright of the second play on the bill, A Man’s Game, was Robert Schenkkan, a UNC student from Brooklyn, New York. The role of Countess Stephanie in A Man’s Game was played by the lovely young co-ed Jean McKenzie.

After graduating from UNC, Schenkkan and McKenzie were married and had a son named after Robert. Robert Jr. would go on to become a professional, Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright.

Through a lucky twist of fate, a friend of the younger Schenkkan visited the exhibit and saw the older Schenkkan’s name on the playbill. Mr. Schenkkan contacted us and we were pleased to offer him a copy of his father’s play.

Is it any surprise that the third play on the bill is called The Hand of Providence?

Exhibit extended

The exhibit “Making a People’s Theatre: Proff Koch and the Carolina Playmakers” has been extended through June 15, 2014. Who knows — there may be a serendipitous surprise in store for you, too!

Artifacts of the Month: Costume pieces from Thomas Wolfe play

When the Thomas Wolfe Society meets later this month, they’ll honor Thomas Wolfe the writer. We’d like to take a moment to salute Thomas Wolfe the actor.

In 1919, Wolfe was an eighteen-year-old college student in a playwriting class at UNC, which was taught by Carolina Playmakers founder Frederick “Proff” Koch. The student playwrights’ first plays produced on stage included Wolfe’s The Return of Buck Gavin. In the absence of a willing volunteer to play the title character, Koch convinced a reluctant Wolfe to take on the role.

When Thomas Wolfe made his stage debut as the mountain outlaw Buck Gavin, he wore a button-down shirt, pants tucked into tall boots, and this belt, which is one of our May Artifacts of the Month.

Wolfe appeared alongside Leila Nance Moffatt, who played Mary Gavin. Mary wore a dress, apron, and a pair of brown shoes.

All of these items can be seen through June 10 in the North Carolina Collection Gallery’s exhibit Making a People’s Theater: Proff Koch and the Carolina Playmakers.