On November 14, 1892, U.S. Senator and Chief Justice of North Carolina A.S. Merrimon died. Born in 1830 in Transylvania County, Merrimon studied law alongside Zebulon B. Vance in Asheville. Before the Civil War, he held a variety of public offices in Asheville, serving as a solicitor for Buncombe County and in the legislature in 1860 and 1861.
Topics Related to This Day in North Carolina History
On November 14, 1937, a team of Emory University professors revealed the transcription of a message carved on a rock discovered by Louis Hammond in Chowan County earlier that year. The text of their transcription reads:
[Side 1]
Ananias Dare &
Virginia Went Hence
Unto Heaven 1591
Anye Englishman Shew
John White Govr Via
[Side 2]
On November 14, 1953, the Colonial label in Chapel Hill released Andy Griffith’s monologue “What It Was, Was Football.”
On November 13, 1997, Harrah’s Cherokee Casino—the first casino in North Carolina—opened in Cherokee on the reservation of the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians (EBCI). Owned by the EBCI and operated by Caesars Entertainment Corporation, the casino complex recently expanded and now offers live table games, slot machines and traditional video gaming machines, as well as a spa. Its amenities also include a 21-story hotel, conference center, events center and several restaurants.
On November 13, 1989, award-winning artist Francis Speight died at age 93 in his Greenville home.
Speight grew up on a Bertie County plantation before enrolling in college at Wake Forest. While there he took art lessons at Meredith College. After briefly serving in the Army during World War I, Speight studied and taught at the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts, where he would remain for more than 40 years.
On November 12, 1903, the North Carolina Literary and Historical Association appointed a committee to investigate and report on the various claims made about North Carolina’s involvement in the Civil War.
The following spring the group received the committee’s report, boasting that North Carolinians indeed had been “First at Bethel, Farthest at Gettysburg, Farthest at Chickamauga, and Last at Appomattox,” as a popular saying coined by editor and state Supreme Court Justice Walter Clark suggested.
Specifically, the saying refers to claims that:
On November 12, 1836, Phineas Taylor " P.T." Barnum arrived in Rocky Mount after leaving Aaron Turner’s Traveling Circus. Barnum convinced some of the Turner acts to join his own traveling circus.
Each November 11, Americans celebrate Veterans Day, which was once called Armistice Day. The date marks the end of World War I, fought by America in 1917 and 1918.
On November 11, 1949, the Memorial Belltower, a prominent landmark on the campus of North Carolina State University, was dedicated. Gov. Gregg Cherry was one of the many dignitaries in attendance.
Conceived as a memorial to those alumni who died in service to the country during World War I, the Belltower is a symbol of the university and a gathering point for the campus community. The cornerstone was laid in 1921, with sections added in 1924, 1925 and 1926.
On November 11, 1976, WRAL-TV broadcast the last segment of Viewpoint, a nightly series of political editorials, which ran on the station for nearly 16 years.