Topics Related to This Day in North Carolina History
On July 24, 1874, poet John Charles McNeill was born in Wagram. In October 1905, McNeill won first place in the competition for the inaugural Patterson Cup, the first literary contest held in North Carolina, earning him the unofficial title of North Carolina's Poet Laureate. McNeill died at age 33.
On July 24, 1924, Leo Haid, abbot and founder of Belmont Abbey, died.
Born in Pennsylvania in 1849 as Michael Hite, he attended school at the nearby Benedictine abbey. Haid entered the order as a novice in 1868 and assumed the religious name Leo. Formal vows as a monk and priest followed four years later. He worked as a teacher and chaplain until 1885, when the Church promoted him to the abbacy of Maryhelp in North Carolina.
On July 23, 1868, western North Carolina’s first Universalist congregation was organized in Haywood County after traveling preacher Benjamin F. Strain converted a handful of citizens.
Universalists, also known as Hell Redemptionists, were a denomination whose beliefs were based on a benevolent God and salvation as opposed to damnation.
On July 23, 1985, James “Kay” Kyser, popular radio personality and bandleader, died in Chapel Hill.
On July 23, 1840, John Hyman, the first African American to represent North Carolina in the United States Congress, was born into slavery in Warren County.
On July 22, 1996, Vermont Connecticut Royster, a journalist affiliated with the Wall Street Journal for 60 years, died.
Born in 1914 in Raleigh, Royster was not the only one in his family to have unusual first and middle names. His great-grandfather started the tradition of naming people after places and relatives had such names as Arkansas Delaware and Iowa Michigan.
American poet, journalist, biographer and folk musician, Carl Sandburg wrote a third of his works and spent the last 22 years of his life at Connemara, his antebellum home in Flat Rock. There, in an upstairs garret, Sandburg wrote, and in a downstairs bedroom, he died at age 89.