Though this batch of yearbooks covers so many different eras of high school throughout the 20th century, one consistent element among several editions is a focus on uniforms. The 1970 edition of The Falcon, for example, shows a representative from the school’s various teams showing off their athletic uniforms. This 1970 cheerleading uniform is a bit of a departure from the cheerleading uniforms of the 1950s, as evidenced by this squad from Mills River High (though the dance teams’ preference for shiny uniforms seems to be evergreen).
Front cover of the 1957 edition of The Tiger, the yearbook of Ninth Avenue School in Hendersonville, North Carolina.
You can see other yearbooks we’ve scanned for Henderson County Public Library on their contributor page. For more information about this partner, visit their website.
A new batch of yearbooks are now available and online at DigitalNC, courtesy of our partners, the Henderson County Public Library, and the Henderson County Genealogical and Historical Society. The first batch, from HCPL, includes issues of Hendersonville High School’s yearbook, the Laureate, from 1948 to 1961. The second, from the HCGHS, includes more issues of the Laureate, from 1962 to 1963, as well as a 1916 yearbook from Hendersonville High School, which was entitled The Mountaineer. These batches represent the first digitized items from both partners, and we are privileged to have them on our website.
The 1916 Mountaineer has a class poem, class prophecy, valedictorian address, “The A.B.C. of the H.H.S.”. Most others have class portraits, individual portraits, photos of faculty, class photos, sports teams, student clubs and activities, national honor society honorifics. 1956 Laureate also has a dedication for the students themselves at the very end.
These yearbooks are the first items from the Henderson County Public Library and the Henderson County Genealogical and Historical Society, and we are privileged to have them as contributing partners. Having their materials improves our knowledge of what Henderson County life was like for high schoolers in the 20th century.
To learn more from the Henderson County Public Library, please visit their partner page or check out their website. To see more from the Henderson County Genealogical and Historical Society, please take a look at their partner page or visit their website.
Collage of the covers of the recently digitized Henderson Junior Woman’s Club scrapbooks (not to scale). Clockwise from upper left: JWC (Junior Woman’s Club) 1989, JWC 1978, JWC 1991, JWC 1974, Week of the Young Child (1979-1986), JWC 1993, JWC 1952, JWC 1975, Bicentennial Trees (1977).
The recently digitized scrapbooks from Perry Memorial Library capture both the activities of the Henderson Junior Woman’s Club and the distinct personalities of the women who created them. Each of the nine scrapbooks has its own quirks, whether it’s the Vance County Bookmobile carved into the wooden cover of the 1952 volume, the delightful illustrations in volumes 1974 and 1975, the entirely Charlie Brown-themed 1978 volume, or the lovely needlepoint scene adorning the cover of the 1989 volume. It is clear that many painstaking hours went into crafting these informative and artistic records of club activities and achievements.
Page from Vance County Week of the Young Child Scrapbook.
Most of the scrapbooks document the community service work and fundraising the club did over the previous year; they also contain information on clubwomen. There are two scrapbooks devoted to special topics, however: the Vance County Bicentennial Trees Book and the Vance County Week of the Young Child Scrapbook. The Bicentennial Trees Book was made by the Vance County Bicentennial Commission, whose goal was to plant 1776 trees in Vance County to celebrate the 200th anniversary of the founding of the United States. It documents the trees that were planted as part of this project. The second specialized volume, the Vance County Week of the Young Child scrapbook, chronicles the eponymous annual event during 1979-1986. Sponsored by the National Association for the Education of Young Children, the celebration was first established in 1971 and continues annually in April. Its purpose is to celebrate young children and teachers, families, and programs while affirming the importance of early childhood (defined as birth through age 8). The scrapbook contains photographs, newspaper clippings, and other memorabilia from the celebrations in Vance County.
To view all of the scrapbooks from Perry Memorial Library, click here.
Here we have materials spanning three decades from our partners over at the Granville County Public Library! These additions include issues of the Oxford Public Ledger, a student paper from Henderson High School, and yearbooks from Henderson and Dabney, N.C.!
More materials from the Transylvania County Library have recently been added to our site, including several issues of Brevard-area newspapers from the early 20th century, a set of telephone directories, and a couple of yearbooks. It is thanks to this batch of newspapers that the life of one of Brevard’s beloved community members was brought to light.
Fritz was “the famous Nobby Shoppe cat,” “well known among the business houses of Brevard” and “petted by everyone.” He was, according to his obituary, “the object of much admiration on account of his enormous size and his beauty.” Sadly, Fritz succumbed to illness, but his obituary shares front page real estate of The Transylvania Times with a feature on the Lindbergh baby and updates on the county tax penalty—in other words, he was a big deal. (Then again, this front page also features a story about Ralph Woodfin, a farmer who found two “freak eggs,” or an egg within an egg—known today to happen because of a counter-peristalsis contraction).
Fritz’s home, the Nobby Shoppe, was a popular women’s store on West Main Street and a frequent advertiser in The Transylvania Times. In the 1930s, the shop seemed to specialize in ladies’ hats, which sold for $1-$2.95. They also sold “frocks” and “triple crepe dresses” in an expansive selection of sizes.
You can read more about the noteworthy community members of Transylvania County in the three newspapers just added to our site: The Transylvania Times(issues from 1887, 1932, 1953, and 1967), the French Broad Hustler (issues from 1893, 1894, and 1896), and the Brevard News (issues from 1905 and 1923).
The full list of telephone directories included in this batch can be found here. These include the names and numbers of local businesses and individuals across the county from 1952-1984.
More Henderson county high school yearbooks are now available on our site thanks to one of our newest partners, the Hendersonville High School Alumni Association. Included in this batch are 12 yearbooks from the Bearcats spanning from 1954-1972.
One of the main characters of this stretch of yearbooks is longtime teacher and alumnus Tom Orr, who graduated in 1957 and came back to teach at his alma mater after attending UNC Chapel Hill and Western Carolina. The HHSAA recently posted a scholarship announcement honoring his contributions to the school as well.
Since these yearbooks span a few decades, you can see Mr. Orr back when he was still a student in 1955. Back then, he was on the business staff of The Red and White as one of the ad men. Perhaps this is what later inspired him to pursue teaching English as a career.
His obituary notes that he taught at the school for 32 years, and in that time, he received several teaching awards, both for English and Drama.
Sometimes, it’s easy to feel like the problems of today are unique to our time and place, but this latest batch of the Carteret County News-Times (1960-1963) demonstrates that people have been working through similar problems for at least 50 years. One issue, from March 16, 1962, somehow touches on big storms flooding the area (and the difficulty of insuring coastal property), U.S. House elections, and redistricting—almost as if it were printed in 2022.
Luckily, no one died in the nor’easter that hit Morehead City and the rest of the coast in March 1962, but the storm did cause quite a bit of damage. A paper from the preceding week (March 2, 1962) pictures flooding along some of the commercial streets and describes buildings that were not up to code to withstand the storm. One commissioner reported that an insurance firm in New York abstained from insuring the area because of the building code problems. A week later, a headline reads (perhaps unsurprisingly): “Red Cross Says Best Way to Help Dare Is Give to Local Red Cross.”
Another front page story describes a bid for the 3rd Congressional District by Morehead City resident S.A. Chalk Jr. Chalk Jr. ran against incumbent David Henderson in the Democratic primary (though in a much different Democratic party than we think of today). He accused Henderson of voting for “policies that are bound to cause even further trouble,” saying, “He claims he’s conservative, but his voting records do not bear this out.” Chalk Jr. still lost the primary, apparently, as Henderson went on to represent the district until 1977.
Aside from the familiar arguments of House elections, the article also mentions that Harnett County was added to the district in 1960. And while the headlines haven’t changed much over the last 50 years, the list of counties included in the 3rd District certainly has. In 1962, the district included 10 counties: Carteret, Craven, Duplin, Harnett, Jones, Onslow, Pamlico, Pender, Sampson, and Wayne. In 2023, the district will expand and morph to contain parts of 15 counties: Beaufort, Camden, Carteret, Craven, Currituck, Dare, Duplin, Hyde, Jones, Lenoir, Onslow, Pamlico, Pitt (partly), Sampson, and Wayne (partly). For visual thinkers, an interactive map of NC’s congressional districts can be found here.
With the start of the fall semester and football season here in North Carolina, marching bands are officially back on the field and in the stands supporting their teams and entertaining audiences with favorites such as Fight Song, Hey Baby, and You Can Call Me Al. While we all appreciate what marching bands adds to these sporting events, no school has shown as much appreciation for their marching band than Henderson High School.
In the school’s 1964 yearbook, an overwhelming amount of page space is given to the school’s band. Some of these photographs show the students rehearsing in the band room with band director W. T. Hearne, but a majority of them show the students in their full marching band and majorette uniforms. The photographs included in this post from the 1964 Pep Pac showcase the amazing size of their band as well as their snazzy uniforms.
To learn more about the Granville County Public Library, visit their website here.
These envelopes, filled with a multitude of information, are a great resource for researchers and individuals looking to learn more about Vance County residents, students, and schools. The front of the envelopes include a students’ name, address, date of birth, years they attended school, which Vance County school they went to, how many days they attended, if they were promoted, and noted if they moved out of the county.
Due to the inclusion of medical records and other sensitive personal information, the content within the envelopes were not digitized. If you are interested in learning more about the documents inside of the envelopes, please reach out to the Henderson Institute Historical Museum for more information.
To learn more about the Henderson Institute Historical Museum, please visit their website.
This blog is maintained by the staff of the North Carolina Digital Heritage Center and features the latest news and highlights from the collections at DigitalNC, an online library of primary sources from organizations across North Carolina.