Eighty-Nine Years of Championship Basketball

Posted on March 5, 2013 by Carla Davis-Castro, ESOPI Fellow
Dixie_Classic

1959 program from the Southern Conference’s Dixie Classic. (Records of the Athletic Communications Office, #40308, University Archives.)

Eighty-nine years ago this past Monday, the Tar Heels basketball team won the first championship tournament of the then newly formed Southern Conference. The men’s basketball team went on to win seven more SoCon tournaments before joining the Atlantic Coast Conference, which it helped to form, in 1953. Collegiate sports regulations have changed over the decades but the reputation of Tar Heel athletes remains stellar across myriad sports.

Statement_President_Graham-to_Faculty2

First page of President Graham’s statement to faculty. (Records of the Office of the Vice President for Finance, #40011, University Archives.)

College athletics has long played an important role in the university’s history. President Frank Porter Graham addressed faculty in 1938, extolling “the spirit of youth in the democracy of sports.” He believed that sound regulations and codes would allow a stadium to become a rallying place full of “high devotion expressed in music, songs, cheers, struggle, and drama, deep with loyalties called forth by the precious meaning of the alma mater.” Graham notes that codes of sportsmanship, like academic study, carry over into “human relations, industrial, inter-racial, and international.”

New_conference_formed_1953

A new conference is born. (Records of the Office of the Vice President for Finance, #40011, University Archives.)

In 1953, UNC–Chapel Hill founded the Atlantic Coast Conference together with six other schools. In a copy of a letter to Dr. Oliver K. Cornwell, the temporary secretary of the as-yet unnamed conference, Chancellor R.B. House confirms the university’s withdrawal from the Southern Conference. Today, N.C. State, Duke, Wake Forest, Clemson, and Maryland, along with UNC, are still members of the ACC. Thus began an illustrious history that continues to the present.

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“An Infernal Passion Undying”

Posted on February 25, 2013 by Morgan Jones, Graduate Assistant

If you read the Daily Tar Heel, you’ve likely read Ian Williams’ iconic column “Why I Hate Duke.” The Daily Tar Heel usually highlights the piece before our first basketball game of the year against Duke. The article is essentially the Carolina student’s guide to hating that dark, blue school to the North both on and off the basketball court. In his article, Williams states that he hates Duke with an “infernal passion undying.” Many of us feel that way in light of our recent loss, but just how long has the Carolina community loved to loathe our adversary?

The answer is long before that archenemy was actually named Duke University!

Written to be sung to the tune of Little Marie, this song was from William Starr Myers book that documented much of his poetry and writing from his time at UNC. From folder 15, Box 2 of the William Starr Myers Papers, collection #03260, in the Southern Historical Collection, the Wilson Library.

Written to be sung to the tune of “Sweet Marie,” this song can be found in William Starr Myers’s notebook documenting much of his writing during his time at UNC. (Folder 15, Box 2, of the William Starr Myers Papers, #03260, Southern Historical Collection.)

That’s right.  UNC has the distinction of hating Duke before they became a full-fledged university and was simply known as Trinity College.  Let that sink in for a minute.

For the football game against Trinity College on the 24th of October 1894, William Starr Myers (an editor for The Tar Heel, the forerunner of The Daily Tar Heel) wrote several poems to commemorate the day. One of his songs began:

“I’ve a secret to impart Trinity/We’re going to break your heart Trinity;/And you’ll think that Judgment Day,/Is’nt [sic] very far away, when the Referee calls ‘Play’ Trinity./You will see Trinity, Trinity how it will be/That your faces fearful sights are to see/Every star that studs the sky/Then will wink the other eye, and bid you/’Go & die,’ Trinity.”

A float from the 1951 Beat Dook parade showing a Tar Heel Ram eating a bowl of Duke cereal for breakfast. P0033/0040, the Roland Giduz Photograph Collection, the North Carolina Collection Photographic Archives, Wilson Library

A float from the 1951 Beat Dook parade showing a Tar Heel Ram eating a bowl of Duke cereal for breakfast. (P0033/0040, the Roland Giduz Photograph Collection, the North Carolina Collection Photographic Archives.)

The rivalry with Duke has  a long history, which has taken various forms over the years. For instance, between 1950 and 1965 there was an annual “Beat Dook” Parade held on Franklin Street near the end of November.

As we anxiously await the rematch on March 9, I think it’s safe to say that yes…our Carolina community truly does hate Duke with “an infernal passion undying.” And many of us wouldn’t have it any other way.

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New Finding Aids for University Archives

Posted on February 20, 2013 by Lawrence Giffin, Records Services Archivist

Below is a list of new finding aids to collections held in the University Archives. These finding aids include a brief description of the contents of the collection, historical information about the department from which the records originated, and a container listing of the collection’s contents. For questions about these collections, please contact Wilson Special Collections Library at wilsonlibrary@unc.edu.

Architectural and Engineering Services Department (#40250): http://www.lib.unc.edu/mss/uars/ead/40250.html

Design Services Department (#40324): http://www.lib.unc.edu/mss/uars/ead/40324.html

Office of the Senior Associate Athletic Director for Business and Finance (#40335): http://www.lib.unc.edu/mss/uars/ead/40335.html

Folklore Program (#40362): http://www.lib.unc.edu/mss/uars/ead/40362.html

UNITAS (#40366): http://www.lib.unc.edu/mss/uars/ead/40366.html

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New Online Exhibit on Student Organizations at UNC

Posted on February 13, 2013 by Jennifer Coggins, Graduate Assistant

When was the first student body president elected? Who’s a Di and who’s a Phi? What’s a Gimghoul?

Loreleis Concert Poster, Courtesy of Margaret Moore Jackson

Loreleis Concert Poster, Courtesy of Margaret Moore Jackson

A new exhibit has been added to The Carolina Story: A Virtual Museum of University History that should answer those questions and more. It highlights some of the hundreds of organizations that have been a part of student life throughout the university’s history, including debating societies, student government, performance groups like the Loreleis and the Playmakers, activist groups, Greek organizations,  honor societies, secret societies, and others. Check out the new exhibit here.

Chapel Hill Revolutionary Movement, 1969 (Vice Chancellor for Student Affairs Records, #40124, University Archives).

Chapel Hill Revolutionary Movement, 1969 (Vice Chancellor for Student Affairs Records, #40124, University Archives).

Alumni–were you involved in student organizations while at UNC? Do you have photos, posters, papers, recordings, or other materials related to your organizations? If you are interested in donating these materials to the University Archives to help document the history of your organizations, please contact Jay Gaidmore (gaidmore@email.unc.edu).

Posted in Fraternities and Sororities, Student Organizations, University Archives, University History | Tagged , , , | 1 Comment

The Flu Pandemic of 1918-1919 at UNC

Posted on February 6, 2013 by Jennifer Coggins, Graduate Assistant
Letter from parent J.L. Nelson

A parent asks to be notified by telegram if his son catches the flu (University of North Carolina Papers, #40005, University Archives).

In the fall of 1918, students were preparing for battle. In August, Congress had lowered the draft age from 21 to 18, and as part of the Student Army Training Corps (SATC), students  drilled daily, anticipating the day that their numbers would be called. However, before they could be sent to fight in Europe, they found themselves fighting a deadly enemy on their own campus—influenza.

The first wave of the global “Spanish Flu” pandemic began in the spring, followed by a much deadlier second wave in the early fall. By September 1918, it had spread to North Carolina. Concerned parents wrote to university president Edward Kidder Graham, fearful for their children’s health.

Graham's response to a concerned parent

Graham’s response to a concerned parent (University of North Carolina Papers, #40005, University Archives).

The campus was quarantined in October, and second-year medical students and local nurses were recruited to work in the overflowing infirmary. Three students died in a span of less than two weeks, and on University Day, 1918, no public gathering was held. After a few weeks, the situation seemed to be improving. In an October 19th letter to a parent, President Graham noted that there were 30 students in the infirmary and 20 convalescing—significantly fewer than the nearly 130 hospitalized a week before.

However, just two days later President Graham himself fell ill. Within days, he developed pneumonia as a complication of influenza. As the campus grew concerned about his condition and hoped for his recovery, the SATC commander asked that students not disturb Graham by marching or performing drills near his house. After less than a week’s illness, Graham died.

Portrait of Edward Kidder Graham

A memorial to President Graham printed as a frontispiece to the Dec. 25, 1918 High School Journal(Edward Kidder Graham Papers, #00282, Southern Historical Collection).

The next day, all classes and military drills were cancelled, and students were asked to “demean themselves in a quiet manner” in respect for the president. On October 31, Dean Marvin Stacy was appointed chairman of the faculty and assumed leadership of the university. Over the next two months, the war ended, the SATC disbanded, and the health crisis began to wane. However, influenza remained a serious threat. In January, 1919, Stacy also died of pneumonia as a complication of influenza, just less than three months after the death of his predecessor by the same illness.

By the spring, the global pandemic was ending. Over the course of the epidemic on campus, over 500 were treated for influenza in the infirmary and six died—students William Bunting, Larry Templeton, and Kenneth Scott; nurse Bessie Roper; President Graham; Mrs. W.J. Hannah, a mother who caught the disease while caring for her son; and Dean Stacy.

 

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Fire Again!

Posted on February 4, 2013 by Morgan Jones, Graduate Assistant

We hope that everyone is enjoying the new semester.  Hopefully you’re getting back into the swing of things without too much trouble.  If everything is going well, congratulations!  It turns out that you are much luckier than some of your predecessors in the winter of 1929 were.

From 14 December 1929, the Daily Tar Heel, Vol. 38, Number 71, in the North Carolina Collection.

In fact, from the very beginning of the school year, various fraternities on UNC’s campus had some pretty rotten luck.  First, there were growing financial concerns and then the great stock market crash of 1929.  Male students were in the position of not being able to afford being in a fraternity unless they took out a loan.  Despite all of this, though, fraternities accepted a healthy number of bids that fall semester, and luck seemed to be on their side.

From the 11 January 1930, the Daily Tar Heel, Vol. 38, Number 77, in the North Carolina Collection.

Their luck ran out, however, at the end of the fall semester.  On Thursday, December 12, 1937 (a day before Friday the 13th), the Delta Sigma Phi house of Old Fraternity Row was almost completely destroyed in a fire early that morning.  When the members of the house woke up and realized the house was on fire, they attempted to call the fire department but could not be connected because the fire chief was already having a conversation of his own.  Consequently, several members had to drive down to the station to alert the chief in person.  At the time, the chief said that he heard a car beeping its horn like mad and immediately thought it was a rum runner being chased by the authorities.  By the time the fire was extinguished, most clothes and furniture could be saved, and it was lucky that the nine men sleeping in the house had escaped with their lives.

From 8 January 1930, the Daily Tar Heel, Vol. 38, Number 74, in the North Carolina Collection.

Delta Sigma Phi did not hold the distinction of being the only fraternity house that burned down that year though.  The Daily Tar Heel was beginning to make daily quips about old fraternity row as the “hot section of town.”  The Chi Psi fraternity house also burned down that winter, on Christmas night.  Unfortunately for the members of Chi Psi, they were accused (rather indirectly and hastily) of setting the fire deliberately to collect the insurance money.  The controversy raged until January 8, 1930 when the students were finally freed from blame of the fire.  In fact, Dr. Coker took great umbrage at the suggestion that any student at Carolina would be so devious and squared off with the insurance commissioner until the whole matter was cleared.

So, count yourself lucky.  If you are rushing a fraternity or sorority this semester, we are certainly glad that lady luck seems to have reinstituted herself on our campus!

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The “Pilot” of Student Government: The Student Body President

Posted on January 29, 2013 by South Moore, Order of the Bell Tower student assistant

The Daily Tar Heel, May 17, 1921.

We currently find ourselves in the middle of campaign season. For the next two (or possibly three) weeks, the Pit will be abuzz with excited, albeit cold, campaign workers, the pages of the Daily Tar Heel will be filled with news of the latest endorsements, and evenings will be dominated by candidate forums. Some wonder if all the “fuss” involved in Student Body President Elections is worth it. That question is a matter of opinion. However, it is possible to objectively examine how the Office of the Student Body President became important enough to warrant the attention afforded to those who campaign for it.

Although student self-governance is a long held tradition at Carolina, the Office of the Student Body President was not created until 1921. Prior to that, the Senior Class President was head of the Student Council. The switch from Senior Class President to Student Body President was not without controversy. Early in 1921, students voted in favor of a referendum that would create the Office of Student Body President. However, when nominations for that office were due in May, those who were opposed to the switch broke up the nomination proceedings with allegations that students had been misled by the wording of the referendum. A week later the Student Council decided to again put the measure to a referendum, this time with a different wording. Once again, the referendum passed and later that month Garland Burns Porter was elected UNC’s first Student Body President.

“Student Government Records, 1919-2011″ Box 26, University Archives.

In 1946, Student Government drew up its first constitution. The constitution gave the Student Body President the power to veto bills from Student Congress, an ex-officio seat on all boards and committees, including the Board of Trustees, and the authority to issue executive orders. The 1946 constitution required that the Speaker of Student Congress also serve as Vice President and that the Secretary-Treasurer (which was later split into two roles) be elected by the Student Body. Changes to the constitution in 1971 gave the Student Body President the power to appoint his Secretary and Treasurer, pending approval of congress. In 1995, the Student Body President was allowed to do the same with his/her VicePresident.

Past Student Body Presidents also played a role in increasing the power of their office. Paul Dickson III, Student Body President from 1965-1966, expanded the role of “representing the students of the University” when he became the face of the University in the very public conflict over the Speaker Ban Law. Eve Carson’s work as Student Body President from 2007-2008 inspired students both within student government and outside of it to seek change on campus. In between, various Student Body Presidents created cabinet positions for emerging campus issues, giving the Executive Branch greater influence on campus policy.

Perhaps it is the relative stability of the Office of the Student Body President that has most enabled it to flourish. Since 1946, little has changed in the Executive Branch. Conversely, the Legislative Branch has changed names, composition, and, to a certain extent, purpose numerous times.

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Women at UNC: A Century of Growth

Posted on January 18, 2013 by Carla Davis-Castro, ESOPI Fellow

While women were permitted to attend the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill beginning in 1896, the enrollment numbers remained small until the 1920s.

UNC’s enrollment statistics for women (Robert Burton House Records, #40019, University Archives).

In 1940, Edith Harbour, woman’s editor of the local News & Observer, wrote to then–Dean of Administration Robert B. House for information about the enrollment of women at UNC. He wrote back and included these surprising enrollment statistics: Whereas in 1920, there were only 57 women enrolled at UNC, by 1939, there were 504.

As of January 12, 2013 there are a total of 16,282 women, including foreign exchange and independent studies students enrolled at the university, according to the University Registrar. Women make up 57.9% of the student body. How times have changed.

Inez Koonce Stacy, Adviser to Women, writes to Dean R.B House (Robert Burton House Records, #40019, University Archives).

 

 

One early advocate for women on campus was Inez Koonce Stacy, adviser to women from 1919-1946. When she wrote to Dean House in 1940, women could be admitted no earlier than their junior year. It was expected that the first two years of study would be done at a women’s college and then they might transfer. Whether this was fair to the women of Chapel Hill was the subject of debate on campus at the time.

Stacy writes, “I definitely approve our return to a policy of full service to those girls who live at home and are prepared for entrance to college.” Her argument rests on the public nature of the university: “Do we have a right to deprive any young woman the privilege of a college education when she lives within the sound of the bell of an institution which is, in all probability, partially supported by her parents’ taxes.

1940 memo on a vote by the Board of Trustees (Robert Burton House Records, #40019, University Archives).

The issue of Chapel Hill women attending UNC prior to their junior year came to a head in 1940 when the Board of Trustees voted on the matter. Dean House issued a brief memo to report that the vote had gone in favor of admitting local women as underclass students. A small step, but this change paved the way for more. Who  would have guessed then that women would become the majority of all Tar Heels less than 100 years later?

All materials are from the University Archives’ Collection #40019 Office of Chancellor of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill: Robert Burton House Records, 1917-1957 (bulk 1940-1957). Box 6 Folder: Women, Admission to Chapel Hill campus 1932-43.

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From the Bauhaus to the Hills of North Carolina

Posted on January 15, 2013 by Megan Williams, Graduate Assistant

The artist Josef Albers (1888-1976) had many ties to the state of North Carolina and to our own university. Born in Germany, Albers attended the Bauhaus in 1920 and, in 1925, became the first student to be offered a faculty position. He worked there until 1933, when the Nazis forced its closure. Albers and his wife Anni emigrated to America, where Albers became head of the art department at Black Mountain College near Asheville, NC. He remained there until 1949, when he left to become the chairman of the department of design at the Yale University Art School.

Letter from Josef Albers (from the Department of Art Records, #40077, University Archives).

Albers was already an established artist and well known professor when he arrived in the United States, and he was soon lecturing and exhibiting frequently throughout the country. During his tenure at Black Mountain College, he had three shows at UNC’s Person Hall Art Gallery, the precursor to the Ackland Art Museum.

In 1937, Albers wrote to the North Carolina State Arts Society to inquire about showing his abstract work in Chapel Hill. Russell T. Smith, the University’s first full-time teacher of art and head of UNC’s newly established art department, responded a year later, inviting Albers to exhibit at the Person Hall Art Gallery with W. Lester Stevens, a landscape painter from Massachusetts.

Receipt of Delivery (from the Department of Art Records, #40077, University Archives).

The show, which ran from January 8 to January 31, creatively juxtaposed 17 of Albers’s non-objective, “ultra-modern” works with the conservative, New England landscapes by Stevens.

Although there are no photographs, or even a program from the exhibition, since the show later traveled and the Gallery had to ship his paintings to the next venue, we know the titles of the works that were shown because of a receipt of delivery from the Addison Gallery of American Art in Massachusetts.

Letter from Albers (from the Department of Art Records, #40077, University Archives).

Albers exhibited again in 1943 and 1949 at the Person Hall Gallery. In 1943, his works were shown along side the weavings of his wife, Anni. His one-man show of 1949 would be his last at Person Gallery and his last as a resident of North Carolina. In June of that year the Albers resigned from their positions at Black Mountain and relocated to Connecticut.

In 1967, The UNC Art Department recognized Josef Albers with an honorary Doctorate of Fine Arts for his many artistic and academic accomplishments.

You can find more records related to the Albers exhibitions in the Department of Art Records, collection 40077, in the University Archives.

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University President David Lowry Swain Born 212 Years Ago Today

Posted on January 4, 2013 by Lawrence Giffin, Records Services Archivist

 

David Lowry Swain, university president from 1835 to 1868 (and North Carolina governor from 1832 to 1835) was born on this day back in 1801 in Buncombe County near Asheville. Swain worked to grow the university from 89 students to more than 450. He oversaw the construction of Smith Hall (now Playmakers Theater), New East, and New West, and was able to keep the university open during the Civil War, when funding and students became scarce, graduating only three students in 1866. He died August 27, 1868.

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