by Charly Mann

Over the last two decades I have heard from dozens of current and former Chapel Hillians about their declining connection to the people and places in town. This may partly be a consequence of our internet age. We e-mail, text, twitter, talk on our cell phones, play computer games, but are more socially isolated from one another. From the 1920s through the 1970s Chapel Hill neighborhoods were filled with children, every church in town was overflowing on Sunday, neighbors regularly had other neighbors over for dinner, and downtown was the prime destination for dinning, entertainment, and shopping. Most of us had a strong sense of belonging to a community then. Where ever we went we ran into people we knew and almost always took the time to converse with them for a few minutes. More remarkably many of us also delighted in talking to strangers we would meet around town.

This quote resonated with me the first time I heard it in about 1956. It is now engraved in stone within a sidewalk on the UNC campus near Phillips Hall. 

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by Charly Mann

In the summer of 1968 I was 18 years old and looking forward to entering UNC as a freshman in the Class of 1972 that fall. I was also, like many of the left-leaning youth of the time, critical of the tremendous income disparity in our country. That year it was the not the top 1% we were outraged at, it was the top 2%. These were the families who had an income of $20,000 or more a year. (No that is not a typo – that is $20,000 a year.) In Chapel Hill I suspected that fewer than 1% were making that much, but I was determined to find some of them and see how decadently they lived.

Earlier that year a friend of mine told me there were only two questions that most people would not answer: “How much money do you make? and, How often do you masturbate?” I was not interested in asking the second, but I was not afraid of asking the first. I decided to type up a questionnaire which I had mimeographed. (This was prior to copying machines. A mimeograph was stenciled paper that included ink which very slowly produced multiple copies of a page.) I then handed them out to those I suspected were the wealthiest individuals in Chapel Hill based on the size and grandeur of their homes. I told them that I was conducting a survey on family budgeting and promised not to use their names or addresses when I published my results. In about a week I went back to the homes to find that almost half (4 out of 10) had completed my questionnaire.

One of these families had one the largest houses in my childhood neighborhood and the husband was a Chapel Hill dentist. He reported an income of $19,000 (Not quite super rich class, but close enough for me.) They had three children and the wife was a stay at home mom. They paid $360 yearly for a maid that cleaned their house once a week. They also spent $2400 a yearly on food and $1800 on clothing – primarily for his kids. Their biggest expense was their mortgage which was $2760 a year. Earlier that summer they had spent about $800 on a family trip to Disneyland. They had also bought a new Ford Mustang for $2,638. That year they had also had a new electric door installed on their garage for $380. The family spent about $30 going out to dinner twice a week, usually to The Rathskeller and The Pines. After paying for taxes and various insurance premiums they said they were not able to put any money into their savings account that year.

Beautiful historic home at 516 East Franklin Street in Chapel Hill

Another family who had a magnificent home on Country Club Drive admitted to making right at $20,000 a year, but did not seem to be living as decadent a lifestyle as I imagined. Not only did they not have a maid, which was still common in those days in Chapel Hill, but they had not been even able to afford a vacation. They had three kids under the age of ten and their largest expense outside taxes was food which was $2000 a year. Their clothing expenses were $1000 and their mortgage was $1635 annually. The husband owned a Chapel Hill insurance company and the wife was a homemaker. They had two nice cars, a Buick and a Pontiac, which cost them almost $1860 a year in finance payments, insurance, and maintenance. They had recently purchased a new refrigerator for $287. Like the previous family they had not saved any money in the previous year.

Former home of Dr. Maurice Newton on Old Mill Road

The owner of one of Chapel Hill's most successful restaurants made $20,600 in the previous year. He had just moved into a new seven room home on Mt. Bolus and bought two color TV sets for the home, one that cost $800 and the other $700. They had four children and spent $1200 a year on groceries and $400 on Christmas presents. They were also members of the Chapel Hill County Club and paid $500 a year in dues. Golf clubs and balls had been an additional $240 expense that year. In addition to this they had UNC season basketball and football tickets for 5 which cost $135. They had also sent their oldest daughter to Camp Sea Gull for one month during the summer at a cost of $400. One of their sons was enrolled in 3rd grade at Durham Academy where the tuition was $845 a year.

Large home on Glandon Drive in Chapel Hill

Finally a prominent Chapel Hill attorney who had recently paid $42,000 for a large 13 room historic downtown house made $21,700. They had two children. One took ballet classes from Mrs. Bounds for $90 a year, and the other was enrolled in Mrs. Bagby’s social dancing for $95. They had mortgage payments of $2868 a year and owned two cars, a Chevy Corvette which cost $4470 and a Volkswagen Beetle that they paid $1,689 for. They had recently purchased a self-cleaning oven for $625 and a black and white console TV for $125. The previous year they had gone to Washington DC on vacation which cost $175 for the round trip flight for the four and two nights at a hotel. While in Washington they went to a Washington Redskins football game that cost $21. They had two season tickets for the Playmaker's Theater that cost $50. In the previous year they had saved just over $3000.

Not only the rich, but most Chapel Hillian's of moderate means could enjoy an elegant steak or seafood dinner for about $2.00 in 1968. This ad is for the Char-Steak House which was located on East Franklin Street then.     

To put things it a bit of perspective, the first week of August 1968 I bought a loaf of Roman Meal whole wheat bread for 27 cents and carton of Dr. Peppers for 59 cents at Fowler's Grocery Store. At the Winn-Dixie at the Eastgate Shopping Center a six pack of Budweiser beer was 94 cents. Marlboro Cigarettes were 30 cents a pack or $2.50 a carton at Sutton's Drug Store. On Morgan Creek Road there was a four bedroom house for sale on two acres for $35,000. Every brand of candy bar was 5 cents throughout Chapel Hill, and a box of Oreos was 44 cents at the A&P store on West Franklin Street. At Norwood Brother's Esso a gallon of regular gas was 33 cents, which meant you could fill up an average car for about $5.00.

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by Charly Mann

In March of 1973 The Carolina Barber Shop which was located at 131 East Franklin Street closed. It had been the oldest operating business downtown, opening its doors 55 years earlier in January of 1918 under the ownership of barber P.R. Perry. Now that it was gone Lacock's Shoe Shop, operated by 83 year old Wilson Lacock, became the senior business on the block. During the same month The Tar Heel Barber Shop located at the corner of Franklin and Henderson which had started in 1927 also closed.

In 1956 there were four barbershops in downtown Chapel Hill employing nineteen barbers. The combined population of Chapel Hill and the UNC student body was then about 1/20 of what it is today

The causes of these closures were twofold. First the rents on Franklin started going through the roof around 1972. In 1965 the rent for The Carolina Barber Shop was $125 a month, and by the time it closed it had been raised to almost $2,000. The second was the long-haired look that was started in 1964 with the Beatles. In each of the successive years since then there was a continual decline in Chapel Hill men getting haircuts. In 1963 The Carolina Barber Shop employed seven barbers and customers often waited thirty minutes or more for an available barber. By 1973 they were down to four barbers and it was not unusual for a barber to have to wait 90 minutes until someone came in for a cut.

The Carolina Barber Shop was then owned by head barber David "Red" Marley who came to work at the shop when he was 21 in 1939. For the next 24 years business was so good that barbers never even had a lunch break and many earned more than most UNC faculty members. One amazing fact about Marley I will never forget is that he almost always smoked a cigar as he cut hair or shaved a customer’s face.

David "Red" Marley owner of the Carolina Barber Shop in Chapel Hill cutting the hair of a customer in 1972

During the 1950s and 60s The Carolina Barber Shop was the gathering point and social center of Chapel Hill. People would sit in the waiting chairs and talk and argue for hours with the barbers and other customers about politics, religion and the most recent UNC or Chapel Hill High School sporting event. Mayor Sandy McClamroch, UNC basketball coach Frank McGuire, and UNC President Bill Friday were among the regulars. Another reason so many men enjoyed spending an hour or more in the Carolina Barber Shop was because its large windows made it the best location on Franklin street for looking out at passing beautiful Chapel Hill women.

By the end of 1974 there were no traditional barbers left on Franklin Street. The Professional Barber Shop charged almost twice as much as The Carolina Barber Shop did ($10) for their "professional" styled cut.

The Carolina Barber Shop always had at least one shoe-shine man. He was usually the only black person in the shop. The shoe-shine station was along the west wall opposite the barbers. Customers would climb into one of two raised chairs to get their shoes shined. Almost everyone wore nice shoes then. Bass Weejuns were the most casual shoes anyone wore. Tennis shoes were only worn in those days when you were actually involved in an athletic activity. Shoe-shines were inexpensive and the shoe-shine man did a great job, with what he referred to as a "spit-shine". Many customers brought in several pairs of shoes to have shined that they would pick up at the end of the day. It was common to see more than fifty bags of shoes next to the shoe-shine stand.

During the six decades The Carolina Barber Shop was on Franklin Street more than a dozen businesses occupied the adjacent building spaces including a small grocery store, a soda fountain, a sandwich shop, and a hardware store. When they closed, The Treasure Chest was located on their east side and the N.C. Cafeteria was on the west. The next tenant of thier space was A.M. (Bucky) Rosemond's store called The Electric Construction Company. They sold radios, pans, toasters, pots, blenders, strainers, percolators, and silverware.

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by Charly Mann

During the fall of 1968 Chapel Hill endured a severe drought which threatened the water supply of the entire community. As a result, The Chapel Hill Merchants Association sponsored a contest at UNC for the dorm which would use the fewest gallons of water per resident in the month of October. The winner of the contest was Ruffin Dormitory which was officially named the Dirtiest Dorm on the UNC campus. During October its residents averaged only 837 gallons of water usage. This was is in contrast to an average use of 2000 gallons per student at most other dorms and fraternities.

W.L. MacIIwinen, president of the Chapel Hill Merchants Association, awards prizes to the winners of the Dirtiest dorm, fraternity, and sorority in Chapel Hill

During the fall semester of 1968 I was one of a handful of UNC students that Dean of Men J.O. Cansler labeled as student activists because of our involvement in the anti-war movement. He warned the other students that they should be "both sympathetic and skeptical" of people like me. He stressed that more than 90% of UNC students were apathetic about politics while 10% felt "culturally alienated and rejected the status-quo." He complimented the minority I was part of as idealists who were "articulate and relentless" and said we were having considerable success bringing attention to our opposition of the war in Vietnam. He went on to say "that the political activists at UNC are the most gifted intellectually, the most sensitive, and the most perceptive" students on campus. On the other hand he blamed our proclivity to demonstrate and stage sit-ins on Dr. Spock and his book which most of our parents had used to raise us, The Common Sense Book of Baby and Child Care, which he said emphasized too much "permissiveness".

Male UNC students surround the home of Chancellor Sitterson in November 1968 to demand visitation rights with female students

There were however demonstrations on the UNC campus that Fall by "the apathetic majority". Sex, not politics, galvanized these students to demand radical changes in campus life. Hundreds of students marched to Chancellor Sitterson's house and demanded that visitation rights be liberalized so that male and female students could visit each other's dorm rooms well into the evening hours without supervision. More than 4,000 students even signed a petition demanding that each dorm be allowed to set its own visitation policy. Later, more than 1,000 students marched across campus demanding that coeds be allowed to visit male dorms. UNC Student Body President Ken Day went further and called for UNC to "evaluate" the possibility of allowing men and women to share the same dorms. He proposed that a number of dorms on South Campus be converted to contain coed quarters in one-half to one-third of the buildings. This he said could be accomplished by housing female students on the lower floors and males on the uppers. Less than ten years earlier in 1959, I remember the "sexual uproar" was to allow coeds to wear skits that were only 2 inches below the knee. Ten years before this in 1949 UNC had shocked the academic community by giving coeds permission to stay out past ten o'clock if they could prove they were attending a play that lasted past that hour.

1968 was a time of transition. B & R Glam-O-Rama, across from Brady's Restaurant, was a hold-over from an earlier era. Within a decade most of this part of East Franklin street would be transformed into office buildings and an upscale hotel.

UNC students of both sexes were ready in 1968 to make interaction between one another far more informal, and eliminate barriers that would prevent them from spending time in one another's rooms. Fraternities throughout Chapel Hill already had few rules for preventing female visitors, and it was not unusual then to find a coed in a fraternity brother's bedroom with a beer can in one hand. UNC men had learned long before that beer in sufficient quantities was the easiest way for coeds to submit to their sexual desires. On the weekends women and empty beer cans were usually plentiful in most Carolina fraternities.

There were several music clubs around Chapel Hill in the late 1960s, but almost all the performers were local. Touring musical acts did not start playing Chapel Hill clubs until the early 1970s. 

At Lenoir Hall, George Prillaman director of UNC Food Services, introduced a new concept to dining: self-service. The Carolina Room became a self-service snack bar where students could get their own fountain soft drinks, sandwiches, and an assortment of snacks. This was my favorite study room between classes, and it also contained a jukebox filled with all the latest hits. The room was painted Carolina blue with a white trim, and there were UNC pendants hanging throughout. On the other side of Lenoir Hall was The Campus Room which was the first self-serve college cafeteria in the country. One advantage was that it now took two workers instead of the six they had needed before on the line. And the prices in 1968 at the Campus Room were cheap. You could eat all the food you wanted for dinner for $1.00.

Honey's was to Chapel Hill in 1968 what Breadmen's Restaurant is today. Note what full prices were then, and that you could get all these items for half that price after 9 PM.

LUMS was a popular West Franklin street restaurant in the late 1960s. Up until about that time hot dogs were more popular than hamburgers in Chapel Hill.

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by Charly Mann

The Old Well at the University of North Carolina on a cold and snowy evening

One of the best things about Chapel Hill is that it has four distinct seasons. The most memorable and glorious for me was winter because that was when snow would often blanket the town for a week or more.

This is the author, Charly Mann, in front of his home in downtown Chapel Hill enjoying the snow at the corner of North and Hillsborough Streets in 1951.

As a child the best thing about snow was that it meant school was closed and I would invariably build a snowman using coal for its eyes, a carrot for the nose, and a corncob pipe to represent his mouth.

A snowman being built in the center of Y-Court on the UNC campus in Chapel Hill in the early 1960s

I also remember students engaged in playful snowball fights all over the University of North Carolina campus whenever it snowed. Magically as soon as snow lay on the ground almost every merchant in town had sleds for sale that were usually prominently displayed outside their stores. My two favorite places for sledding were down the top of Stagecoach Road to Greenwood Road and along the hills of the old Chapel Hill Country Club golf course off Laurel Hill Road.

Some things never change: On top a snowball fight among UNC students in front of the Old Well in 1912, and below a snowball fight on the back steps of South Building in 1940

Throughout my almost forty years in Chapel Hill I always took long walks in the woods when it snowed especially in Battle Park, along Morgan Creek, and below Gimghoul Castle. I really do not think there is anything more beautiful than a pine forest covered in snow.  It is simply amazing how snow changes everything. As a small boy I was transfixed, after going to bed on a winter day when it was brown and barren outside, when I was awoken in the morning by the especially bright glow of the sun reflecting off a thick blanket of snow. Throughout my life I have always found watching snow falling an almost mystical experience.

A lovely UNC coed sits on a snowman in front of the University of North Carolina library in 1946

Snow also really changes the pace of life in Chapel Hill. There are far fewer cars on the road and everyone is driving much slower. Many offices and businesses open later or not at all, so one can sleep in. Most of all everything is just so peaceful. Even if it snows all day, snow, unlike rain, makes no noise and the big flakes, which are common here, are stunningly serene as they add what looks like icing to trees.

Snow-covered downtown Chapel Hill along Franklin Street in front of Harry's Deli in 1948

I know a lot of my readers do not like cold weather, but just stand in the midst of a snow-covered forest and let yourself hear the peace and see the beauty, and the chill will soon transcend into serenity.

Chapel Hillians sledding on the hills of the golf course of the Chapel Hill Country Club off Laurel Hill road in 1962

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by Charly Mann

The primary purpose of this website is to connect the reader to what Chapel Hill and the University of North Carolina were like in the past. I am often surprised that when I reach into my own recollections how the people I knew and events I experienced still seem so fresh to me. Last week, for example, I had the good fortune to begin corresponding with my Chapel Hill girlfriend of more than forty years ago. As we talked about those times I was amazed at how vivid they were. I could recall every detail about the apartment we shared, the way we passed our time, the music we listened to, the friends we had, and the entire ambience of Chapel Hill and the UNC campus of that period as if it were yesterday. Alas, life really does go by in the blink of an eye, and while the essence of a person rarely changes, the world around us is far different from how it was then.

Corresponding with my old flame made me think, as I often do, about how much must have changed in our community before my time. As I reflected, a selection of songs from the early 1920's was playing on my iPad. What would Chapel Hill and UNC have been like for a student fifty years before I entered the university? I then began to recall several stories I had heard from an alumnus of the Class of 1925 when I was fifteen. He seemed very old to me, but was actually only 61. I called a couple of people I knew, now both in their seventies, whose fathers had attended UNC during this time and was rewarded with several more anecdotes from this period.

Student Life at UNC from 1921 to 1925

Most students got to University of North Carolina by train in the first half of the 1920s, and incoming freshman were usually dismayed when they discovered the train went only as far as Carrboro. Then one would have to slowly push, pull, or carry all their luggage down two miles of dirt and often muddy streets to their lodgings.

New students usually spent their first few nights at the Carolina Inn until they had registered and been assigned a dorm room. They were usually surprised at how dilapidated that building was, and those not familiar with the loose boards underfoot on the front porch often literally fell through to the ground on their first visit.

Annual UNC Class Tug-o-War in 1923. This picture shows the entire freshman class pulling against the junior class. Imagine trying to do this today! 

In the spring of 1925 the UNC basketball team won the Southern Conference tournament, and there was so much excitement on campus that a bonfire was built on "Y Court". Afterwards more than a hundred students walked the sixteen miles to Durham whooping and hollering the entire way.

Swain Hall, the UNC cafeteria, was almost the only place for students to eat in Chapel Hill at this time, and the food was so bad that most people called it "Swine Hall."

Each year in the 1920s the freshmen were given an examination by the upper classmen on the "UNC Catalog". One common question was "Why was Davie popular?"  (Those reading this who do not know the answer can contact me at chmemories@gmail.com.)

The UNC library in 1922. The beautiful Louis Round Wilson library was not built until 1929.

In those days it was mandatory for students to attend classes and professors always called the roll. If you wanted to "cut" a class you needed to have a friend answer "here" when your named was called.

There were about than 800 male students attending UNC then, but only between 15 to 20 coeds. As a result every male student on campus knew the first and last name of every female. In 1924 there was a small fire at the women's dorm one night and several hundred gallant UNC men ran in unannounced to rescue the damsels in distress. Most of them had already left, but one poor girl unaware of the situation was leisurely taking a bath when several men came in and offered to help her out. The embarrassed coed asked the boys to leave and said she could get out fine by herself.

A very popular and rare UNC coed displaying some Carolina colors in 1924

In the early 1920s the most popular extra-curricular activity on the UNC campus was not football or basketball, but dumping. Dumping was the act of a group of students sneaking into another student's room in the middle of the night and with loud screams and bangs freighting the sound asleep student awake while turning his bed upside down with him still in it. While I can find no record of the poor victim being physically harmed by a dumping, it was not uncommon for one of the escaping perpetrators to break an ankle or leg while rapidly descending unfamiliar stairs in the dead of night.

This is the UNC Arboretum in 1924 looking almost exactly as it does today.

In the 1920s there was no admission test for students at Carolina, and students were accepted primarily on the recommendation of a distinguished alumni or faculty member. One's high school grades were also an important consideration.

This is the Tin Can in 1924 shortly after being completed. It was perhaps the ugliest building ever constructed on the UNC Campus. It was next to Woollen Gym and was used for sporting events, dances, and concerts for more than forty years.

Hopping trains was a common way for students to travel, especially when going to away sporting events. Once when a group of students hopped in a freight car they thought was going to Atlanta, where UNC was going to play Georgia Tech, they found themselves instead arriving in Philadelphia after a very cold two day ride.

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