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New Partner Wake Forest Historical Museum and DuBois School Materials Now Available on DigitalNC

Thanks to our newest partner, Wake Forest Historical Museum, an array of materials related to the DuBois School including yearbooks, student newspaper issues, posters, and a binder of DuBois School memories compiled by Myrlin Skinner are now available here and here.

The DuBois School was one of several African American schools in built in North Carolina that was funded by Julius Rosenwald. The school, which was later renamed to Wake Forest-Rolesville Middle School in the 1960s, is one of only five Rosenwald schools that are still visible today. The binder of materials compiled by Skinner is a wonderful resource for researching the DuBois school. It provides an in-depth look at the history of the school from materials such as letters from alumni, faculty names, photographs, yearbook scans, and newspaper clippings.

We are pleased to introduce our newest partner the Wake Forest Historical Museum. The museum is located in the Calvin Jones House in Wake Forest, North Carolina. They feature variety of exhibits on life in the Town of Wake Forest and surrounding areas as well as the history of Wake Forest College. The museum’s collections and exhibits are continuously expanding and changing with the donation of artifacts from community members and organizations.

To learn more about the Wake Forest Historical Museum, please visit their website.

To view more materials from North Carolina’s African American high schools, please view our North Carolina African American High Schools Collection.


100 Years of Wake Forest History Now Available for Viewing!

Thanks to our generous community partner, Olivia Rainey Local History Library, and at the request of our partner Wake Forest Historical Museum, the book Connections: 100 Years of Wake Forest History by Carol W. Pelosi is now available to read for free on DigitalNC. You can flip through the pages of Connections and find local history of Wake Forest, NC ranging from 1910-2008. Information covers topics like farms and crops, the railroad, local businesses, holiday celebrations, festivals, and local government leaders.

To learn more about what our community partners, Olivia Rainey Local History Library are up to please visit their website.

To view other materials made available by the Olivia Rainey Local History Library visit their contributors page.

To view more North Carolina historical items visit the North Carolina Digital Heritage Centers website DigitalNC.


Small Town Rock With “The Wake Weekly”

Headmast for August 31, 1967 issue of The Wake Weekly

In this batch we have hundreds of issues of The Wake Weekly and Youngsville-Rolesville Record spanning from 1963 to 1967, a period of time when pop culture was rapidly changing throughout the world.

When The Beatles made their first American television appearance in February of 1964, it seemed like millions of teens immediately ran out and bought their first guitars. Despite only having a population of around 3,000 at the time, it would appear Wake Forest was no different in that regard.

Four local men posing in suits, wigs, and sunglasses pretending to be the Beatles.
Youngsville “Beatles”
May 29, 1964

As rock ‘n roll sank its teeth into American teen culture, new groups began to pop up left and right like local crowd pleasers The Vandals, the young and talented Stephens Brothers (and Little Sister), and even Fuquay-Varina’s very own Contortions came to visit. There doesn’t seem to be any evidence of these musicians making recordings during this time period, but another Wake Forest teen did wind up making it to tape.

Four boys with musical instruments and their younger sister standing in front with a microphone.
The Stephens Brothers and Little Sister
September 22, 1966
Photo of rock band The Vandals playing live in front of a crowd at a teen club.
The Vandals
August 17, 1967
Posed photo of teenage rock band The Contortions with their instruments.
The Contortions
May 19, 1966

Hjordis Christoph was attending St. Mary’s Junior College in the mid-60s and joined “…One of St. Mary’s Leading Symphonic Washtub Bands” The Cold Cuts. She is credited as playing “Hot Dog” on their 1966 LP released by the beloved JCP record label out of Raleigh. Other instruments listed on this record include sticks, crazy stick, bird cage, sponges, and rulers.

Newspaper clipping describing that Hjordis Christoph is visiting Chicago and has joined The Cold Cuts.
June 9, 1966
Front and back of The Cold Cuts 1966 LP. Front has members posing around a statue, back has what each member played on the record.
Cold Cuts LP via Popsike

These papers were provided to us by our partners at the Wake Forest Historical Museum. For information about events and planning a visit you can visit their site here.


A Glimpse Into Small Town Life With “The Wake Weekly”

Header for Wake Forest, N.C. newspaper "The Wake Weekly"

We now have issues of The Wake Weekly and Youngsville-Rolesville Record from 1952 and 1960 through 1962 up on DigitalNC! The scope of the paper rarely ventures outside its tri-town borders, but offers a unique look into the lives of Raleigh’s northern neighbors in the 1950s and 60s.

Newspaper clipping announcing that Karen Pearce has won the Wake Dairy Princess Pageant. She is pictured wearing a dress, sash, and crown.
June 10, 1960

In this batch we have illegal gambling parties complete with confiscated moonshine, the much-anticipated results of the Dairy Princess Pageant, writers expressing their feelings about this wild new thing called “rock ‘n roll,” and a teenage gossip column where you can learn whether Jerry Beddingfield and Nancy Pettigrew like Twist and Shout by the Isley Brothers or not. Every accomplishment was celebrated and every traffic citation documented. With a paper this intimate it’s easy to see how tight knit this community really was.

Newspaper clipping that says "One thing that really ought to come with no strings attached is a rock and roll singer's guitar."
September 21, 1962
Clipping from gossip column called "This and That" listing what teens have been up to.
June 15, 1962

These papers were provided to us by our partners at the Wake Forest Historical Museum. For information about events and planning a visit you can visit their site here.


North Carolina Newspaper Digitization Part 2: The State of the State

Sign pointing microfilm users to different online resources. Taken in Wilson Library's North Carolina Collection Reading Room, UNC-Chapel Hill.

Sign pointing microfilm users to different online resources. Taken in Wilson Library’s North Carolina Collection Reading Room, UNC-Chapel Hill.

[This post updated July 2017.]

Newspaper digitization is challenging for a number of reasons (refer to our previous post). Although we’re biased, if you’re interested in accessing North Carolina newspapers online you’re actually pretty lucky; North Carolina is positioned well ahead of many other states. Below we’ve listed, in descending order of size, all of the major historic online newspaper databases sponsored by North Carolina institutions that are on our radar.

Name: Newspapers.com
Dates: 1751-2000
Coverage: Statewide
Amount Online: 3,500,000+ pages
Details: The North Carolina Collection at UNC-Chapel Hill Library recently partnered with Newspapers.com to digitize millions of pages of North Carolina newspapers. These are accessible for free at the State Archives of North Carolina or UNC-Chapel Hill’s Library, or you can view them anywhere at newspapers.com for a monthly fee. As of July 2017, NC LIVE also makes these papers available to member libraries and their card holders. While there are other vendors out there with historic North Carolina newspapers, this is the most comprehensive to date.

Name: The North Carolina Digital Heritage Center
Coverage: Statewide
Dates: 1824-2013
Amount Online: 640,000+ pages
Details: Each year we receive LSTA funding from the State Library of North Carolina to digitize newspapers. Part of that funding goes toward papers on microfilm, for which we ask for title nominations from libraries and archives. We also digitize some newspapers from print (mostly college and university student newspapers) as well as small runs of community papers that have not been microfilmed.

Name: The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, National Digital Newspaper Program Grant Award
Coverage: Statewide
Dates: 1836-1922
Amount Online: 100,000+ pages
Details: UNC-Chapel Hill is currently in its second round of providing selected historic newspapers for digitization and sharing through the Library of Congress’ Chronicling America website. These issues are searchable along with a selection of titles from other states.

Name: University of North Carolina at Greensboro Library / Greensboro Museum
Dates: 1826-1946
Coverage: Town of Greensboro and surrounding area
Amount Online: 5,000+ issues
Details: The Greensboro Historical Newspapers collection includes a variety of papers from that area, including World War II military base papers.

Name: The State Archives of North Carolina
Dates: 1752-1890s
Coverage: Statewide
Amount Online: 4,000+ issues
Details: The State Archives of North Carolina actively preserves, microfilms, and digitizes newspapers. While most of these are not currently available online, they have shared some of the earliest on their website.

Name: East Carolina University Library
Dates: 1887-1915
Coverage: Town of Greenville and surrounding area
Amount Online: 1,800+ issues
Details: ECU’s Digital Collections include The Eastern Reflector, a community paper published in Greenville.

While more focused, college and university papers (especially earlier issues) often included local community news. In addition to those featured on DigitalNC, here’s a list of other school papers online:

This isn’t to say others aren’t scanning their local newspapers – we know some heard of local entities (businesses and libraries) working toward that goal. But this post was intended to list the largest, statewide, and (mostly) freely searchable endeavors. Know of others? Tell us.

In Part 3 of this Newspaper Digitization series, we’ll get technical and describe how we digitize newspapers here at the Digital Heritage Center.


Two related notes:

  1. Looking for a newspaper that isn’t online (yet)? Through your local public library, you can most likely loan and view newspaper microfilm from the State Library of North Carolina. This Newspaper Locator may be helpful if you want to determine some of the titles published in a specific area.
  1. North Carolinians are heavily involved in efforts to preserve born-digital news. The Educopia Institute, located in Greensboro, is spearheading a conversation that brings in news producers and cultural heritage professionals to talk about our disappearing journalistic heritage.  At their website you can learn more about the Memory Hole events and read a white paper on Newspaper Preservation.

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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.

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