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A new batch of student newspapers from the University of North Carolina at Charlotte is now available on DigitalNC, thanks to our partners at UNC Charlotte! This recent addition includes 44 issues from August 1978 through April 1979, a testament to the paper’s prolific output. Readers can peruse the volumes to gain insight into the issues with which students were most concerned. While many of the stories featured in the paper are local to campus and the surrounding Charlotte area, articles also cover state-wide and national news.
Jerry Winston from the Nov 28, 1978 issue of The Carolina Journal
Visitors to the site can view all of our newspaper issues from UNC Charlotte here. To view other student newspapers, navigate to “Browse Newspaper Titles” and select the “Student Papers” filter. See all of our materials from UNC Charlotte, including yearbooks, catalogs, photographs, and more newspaper titles at their contributor page here.
North Carolina’s thespians will be pleased to know that, thanks to our new partner Temple Theater, DigitalNC is now hosting four massive theater scrapbooks online! These scrapbooks cover the rich history of Sanford’s Temple Theater, a historic venue that was founded in 1925 as a vaudeville theater and soon became a center for all arts and culture in Lee County. The scale of these scrapbooks are monumental, and they hold every possible detail a dramaturge could hope for: from play programs to color photographs of productions, from newspaper clippings to blueprints.
One scrapbook contains original records from the theater’s early days in the 1930s, and includes original video rental invoices from studios such as Metro-Goldwyn-Meyer, Universal, and Fox. The rest of the scrapbooks cover the theater’s revitalization efforts, which began in 1981, as well as the early days of the theater’s status as a National Historic Site. Interested readers can see the variety of acts and events that took place during this period: including street carnivals and Dungeons & Dragons tournaments to raise money for theater. Almost every page is suffused with color and includes color photographs of the stage, complete play programs, or even posters advertising the theater’s productions. You’d be hard pressed to find a more comprehensive record of a historic theater’s operation, or more convincing evidence of the love and effort that goes into play production.
You can find these four new scrapbooks online at DigitalNC here. Interested in learning more about Temple Theater? Visit their partner page online at DigitalNC here, or find them online at their website here.
2024 marks 10 years of fruitful partnership between Central Piedmont Community College (CPCC) and the North Carolina Digital Heritage Center (NCDHC)! With over 40,000 students enrolled annually, 6 campuses, and nearly 300 programs offered, CPCC is a significant educational institution in North Carolina with a long history and extensive archives. We’re pleased to continue our collaboration with this latest addition from CPCC, a large batch of student literary magazines spanning 46 years. The CPCC literary magazine has been known as The Paul Atwell Memorial Literary Magazine, Keystone, and in its most recent iteration, The Hammer. These magazines showcase the talents of decades of students, and gives researchers insight into the literary and artistic subjects that most preoccupied them.
See over 500 digitized records from Central Piedmont Community College at their contributor page here. Check out our North Carolina Community College Collections exhibit here.
Thanks to our partner at the Shepard-Pruden Memorial Library, DigitalNC is proud to announce that over a hundred brand new issues of The Chowan Herald have been digitized by our team in Elizabeth City. Many of these issues are from recent history, spanning from 2017 to 2019, with one special issue coming from 2003. They will join over four thousand issues of The Chowan Herald already online at DigitalNC, reaching back to the paper’s very first issue in 1934.
Front page of the Chowan Herald after Isabel hit the town September 24, 2003
The Chowan Herald serves the city of Edenton and Chowan County in eastern North Carolina, on the banks of the Albemarle Sound. The paper serves a vital role in the function of Chowan County life; recording local events, letters from community members, and changes in county infrastructure and business. Highlights from this batch include the “Pets of the Week” section (included in each issue), the weathering of Hurricane Isabel in 2003, and the celebration of “Ye Olde Halloween on the Green” in 2019.
In addition to these physical papers scanned in house by the DigitalNC satellite staff, we also added issues of the Chowan Herald from microfilm covering 2015 to 2017, thanks to funding by the folks at Shepard-Pruden.
You can find every issue of The Chowan Herald online at DigitalNC here. Interested in learning more about Chowan County History? Look at “Chowan County” online at DigitalNC here, or find the Shephard-Prudent Memorial Library partner page online at DigitalNC here.
In honor of our 14th birthday this week (May 12th is officially when digitalnc.org went live!) we thought we’d do a fun post to explore one of the real quirks of working with materials from so many different places around North Carolina – the phenomenon of towns and counties with the same name being separated by miles and miles geographically. We tried to brainstorm as many as we could but we welcome any additional suggestions!
A map of cessions from Orange County over time – all the counties pictured broke off from Orange to form their own government over a hundred year period.Chapel Hill Historical Society
Towns at One end, Counties at the Other
Albemarle, NC is in Stanly County, not Albemarle County (which used to exist but no longer does!)
Beaufort, NC is in Carteret County, not Beaufort County
Cherokee, NC is in Swain and Jackson Counties, not Cherokee County
Cherokee, NC spanning the Swain County and Jackson County lines. Map is of the Cherokee Reservation and is from 1962.Western Carolina University
Columbus is in Polk County, not Columbus County
Davidson, NC is in Mecklenburg County, not Davidson County
Hendersonville is in Henderson County, but Henderson, NC is in Vance County
And a fun bonus one – not a county or town – but! Wake Forest University is of course in Winston-Salem, NC not Wake Forest, after moving there in the 1960s.
We’d also like to thank the following town/county pairs that are conveniently in the same place:
Camden, NC is in Camden County
Currituck, NC is in Currituck County
Durham, NC is in Durham County
Map of Durham County, NC that includes the city of Durham, from 1910 Durham County Library
Gastonia, NC is in Gaston County
Gatesville, NC is in Gates County
Halifax, NC is in Halifax County
Lincolnton, NC is in Lincoln County
Nashville, NC is in Nash County
Rutherfordton, NC is in Rutherford County
Warrenton, NC is in Warren County
Wilkesboro, NC is in Wilkes County
Wilson, NC is in Wilson County
Can you name any others? If you want to check out all 100 counties of content on our site, visit our county browse page on DigitalNC!
Thanks to our partners at the Henderson County Education History Initiative, decades of mid-century yearbooks are now available at DigitalNC! This batch contains almost fifteen issues of The Chief, the historic yearbook of Etowah High School in Henderson County. The yearbooks span from 1938 to 1960, recording student life as America prepared for, entered, and emerged from the second World War. They join thirty yearbooks already digitized in collaboration with Henderson County Education History Initiative, further expanding the area’s archival presence online.
Cover of the 1956 Etowah High School Yearbook
One of the most interesting recurring features within the new yearbooks is the annual feature on the North Carolina Apple King and Queen, the winners of a pageant celebrating North Carolina’s apple orchards. The pageant is split into several age divisions, with a junior, elementary, and senior king and queen announced each year and meticulously recorded within The Chief’s pages. The pageant would culminate in a King Apple Parade, which drew great crowds of spectators.
Interested in Henderson County history? You can find our entire Henderson County collection online at DigitalNC here, or visit our partners at the Henderson County Education History Initiative here.
Thanks to our partners at the Burwell School Historic Site and the Historic Hillsborough Commission, DigitalNC is proud to announce that two new scrapbooks are now available online! These scrapbooks cover a pivotal period in the preservation of Hillsborough’s history, chronicling the formation and initial efforts of the Historic Hillsborough Commission during the town’s bicentennial celebrations.
One of the main missions of the commission’s early years was the renaming of then “Hillsboro” to a more accurate “Hillsborough.” The scrapbooks chronicle the efforts of the commission as they lobbied local politicians, raised awareness of the town’s history, and celebrated their eventual victory in time for the town’s two-hundredth birthday. Later clippings in the scrapbook record the organization and commencement of a “colonial pageant” on the bicentennial, wherein Hillsborough residents dressed in period garb and celebrated the town’s history.
You can find the new scrapbooks online here. Interested in learning more about Hillsborough’s history? Find the Historic Hillsborough Commission’s partner page online at DigitalNC here, or visit the Burwell School Historic Site’s website online here.
Thanks to our partners at the Person County Museum of History, DigitalNC is pleased to announce that decades of local papers are now available online! Many of the new issues are from the Roxboro Courier, a locally owned and operated publication based out of Roxboro, as well as several issues of the Roxboro High School Student Newspaper. The student newspaper went by many names at different points during its publication, with the issues in this collection including “The Rocketeer,” or “The Roxboro Rambler.” Together, these publications reflect life in Person County through both an adult and adolescent perspective, providing two different lens to view history through.
The Roxboro Courier issues span as far back as 1942, and as recent as 1982. Included in this collection are two notable issues: the centennial and the sesquicentennial, Both of these issues are massive, with the centennial edition containing over a hundred pages of Roxboro history! Each issue recounts Person County’s past with articles on the county’s founding, interviews with longtime locals, and advertisements from local businesses celebrating the county’s history. While the sesquicentennial edition is somewhat shorter than the centennial edition, both are valuable insights into how past publications memorialized history. These issues will join a collection of almost three thousand issues of the Roxboro Courier already hosted on DigitalNC’s site.
Also included in this batch are a series of photographs from Person County’s past. The photographs display the workers at many of the mills and tobacco warehouses located in Person County, which bolstered the area’s economy for decades. There are even a few class photographs from Person County’s schools! Could any of the students pictured be featured in the new student papers? If you discover any connections, we’d love to know in the comments down below.
The Roxboro High School Student Newspaper’s new issues reach as far back as 1938, and as recent as 1969. The pages of this publication are only somewhat less regal than the Roxboro Courier’s anniversary editions, and are written with a humorous, satirical voice. Collections of jokes, gossip columns, and comedic superlatives can be found in each issue, as well as heartfelt goodbyes to graduating seniors or longtime teachers. While contemporary events are recorded in these issues, they’re oftentimes placed next to articles recording rumors overheard in the hallway. You can find the brand new batch online here, or our entire collection of Roxboro High School’s student newspaper online here.
Together with our partners at the Museum of Haywood County History, DigitalNC is proud to announce the addition of six new scrapbooks! This collection exemplifies the grand variety of content that can be found within scrapbooks, covering American news during the second world war, postcards and souvenirs from across the world, and the operation of home demonstration clubs. This astonishing array of subject matter and material from across the world exemplifies the increasing global awareness of North Carolinians throughout the mid-twentieth century, reflecting the growing perception of Americans as global citizens. And, as is typical for many of Haywood County’s scrapbooks, some are beautifully bound in engraved local leather.
Cover of the Morning Star Club scrapbook from 1976, a beautiful example of the leather engraved covers found on many scrapbooks from Haywood County
Perhaps the most colorful example of global citizenship within this batch is the scrapbook of Mrs. Maggie Ellen Morgan, a world traveler that collected a vast array of postcards during her travels across Europe, America, and Africa. Each postcard has a beautiful illustration or photograph of the sights seen by Mrs. Morgan, along with occasional notes on her travels. These postcards not only reflect post-war tourism, but are in many cases historical artifacts that portray important cultural and historical sites during a time of reconstruction and reinterpretation.
You can discover these colorful (and oftentimes whimsical) postcards, along with the other new scrapbooks, online at DigitalNC’s website here. Interested in learning more about Haywood County history? Find our collection online here, or visit our partners at the Museum of Haywood County History at their website here.
Thanks to our partners at the Raleigh Fire Museum, DigitalNC is pleased to announced that even more records from the Raleigh Fire Department are now available online! These records cover an amazing variety of aspects to the daily life and operation of Raleigh’s firefighters, including financial and municipal reports, fire academy graduation programs, and certificates of award. They will almost double our coverage of the Raleigh Fire Department, which ranges from as far as 1947 to as recent as 2002.
Without a doubt, the highlight of this batch is an issue of The N.C. Fire Service News, a state-wide publication created by and for North Carolina’s firefighters. The pages of this magazine are absolutely full of articles covering fire news, including stories on an antique model T fire engine, the annual fire conference in Asheville, and a story on firefighters in Durham “only” working 56 hours a week! Reading N.C. Fire Service News is a fascinating glimpse into a community of dedicated and passionate professionals supporting each other with advice on how best to protect the public. And, perhaps more superficially, the aesthetics of the 70’s make the pages of the magazine even more engaging.
You can read N.C. Fire Service News, along with the rest of the new records from the Raleigh Fire Museum, online at DigitalNC here. Interested in learning more about the history of fire safety? Take a look at our partner pages for Raleigh Fire Museum and the Greensboro Firefighters History Book Committee online at NC Digital!
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.
