On March 1, 1898, the Bank of Smithfield, now known as First Citizens Bank, opened for business.
The bank, Johnston County’s first, was founded by Allen W. Smith who remained president until 1906. The institution became First National Bank of Smithfield before merging with Citizens National Bank to become First and Citizens National Bank. In 1929, the company adopted the now-familiar moniker of First Citizens Bank & Trust Company.
On March 1, 1876, moonshiner Lewis Redmond murdered U.S. Deputy Marshall Alfred Duckworth near East Fork in Transylvania County.
Born in 1854, Redmond grew up during a time when the production of distilled alcohol was an additional source of income for many Southern farmers. In the post-Civil War South, many illegal distillers, or moonshiners, attempted to circumvent the payment of taxes on their products, leading to conflict with the Federal Bureau of Revenue.
On February 29, 1964, Boone Trail High School held off Angier High School to win the longest high school basketball game on record, 54-52.
The game, that year’s Harnett County high school championship, was played in Campbell University’s Carter Gym. The gym was small in size and could seat only 947 spectators. There is no known record of how many were in attendance that day.
On February 28, 1869, Thomas Bickett, North Carolina’s World War I governor, was born in Monroe.
After studying law at UNC, Bickett settled in Louisburg and was elected to represent Franklin County in the state House in 1906. During his single term in the General Assembly, Bickett made his mark as the sponsor of the “Bickett Bill,” which set aside a half-million dollars to help care for the mentally ill.
On February 28, 1935, the General Assembly passed the Uniform Driver’s License Act, placing in the pockets of authorized drivers the state’s official sanction putting them behind the wheel. The bill, sponsored by Senator Carroll Weathers of Wake County, was a response to the fact that more than 1,000 deaths had occurred on the state’s highways since the rise of the automobile 30 years earlier. The automobile age in North Carolina had begun in earnest with the introduction of the “Buggymobile” in New Bern in 1903 and other primitive vehicles soon after.
On February 27, 1964, black feminist activist, scholar and educator Anna Julia Haywood Cooper died at the age of 105.
Born enslaved in 1858 in Raleigh, Cooper graduated from St. Augustine’s Normal School and then earned a B.A. and an M.A. in mathematics from Oberlin College in Ohio. She taught for a few years in Raleigh before moving to Washington, D.C., to teach there.
On February 27, 1760, Fort Dobbs was attacked by a force of more than 60 Cherokee warriors. The fort had been constructed four years earlier to protect the western frontier during the French and Indian War.
Fighting between the British settlers and their former allies broke out in 1759 as settlers were killed in revenge for the murder of several Cherokee the year before. As the only permanent fort on the colony’s frontier, the fort served as a safe-haven for settlers, and its garrison of soldiers helped to defend the region.
On February 27, 1776, Loyalist forces commanded by Colonel Donald McDonald discovered a Patriot encampment near Moores Creek that, unbeknownst to them, had been abandoned. They were confused because the campfires were left burning.
On February 26, 1865, ten miles northeast of downtown Wilmington, Union and Confederate forces began negotiations that saw a total of 8,684 Union soldiers (including 992 commissioned officers and 120 African American troops) exchanged for an unknown number of Confederate prisoners of war. Many of the Union troops had been prisoners at Salisbury Prison.
On February 26, 1909, the Roanoke Rapids Paper Manufacturing Company produced the first sulphate processed kraft paper in the United States. The sulphate name refers to the use of sodium sulphate, or sulphur. Kraft paper has long been used in applications ranging from butcher paper to concrete sacks. It is usually coarse and strong and is often light brown in color.