Topics Related to Things to Do

A fun activity soon will return to Reed Gold Mine.

Visitors again will be able to pan for gold from April 1-Oct. 31, Tuesdays through Saturdays, weather permitting. Tickets are $3 per pan (plus tax) for individuals 8 and older and are available for sale at the site gift shop counter. Space is limited and there is a limit of two tickets per person. There are no advance reservations and tickets will be sold first-come, first-served. Session times will be sold and filled in order throughout the day.

 In 2022, the North Carolina Department of Natural and Cultural Resources is celebrating 50 years as a state cabinet-level agency with regional celebrations and online content throughout the year. DNCR is responsible for North Carolina treasures literally from A to Z – from the arts to the zoo – spanning the entire state.

A free online program hosted by the Western Office of the N.C. Department of Natural and Cultural Resources will examine the formation of the Ku Klux Klan. Historian Steven Nash will present an in-depth look at the rise of the Ku Klux Klan during Reconstruction and its terroristic campaign against the biracial Republican political coalition that emerged in the late 1860s.

Tickets are now available for Bentonville Battlefield State Historic Site’s illumination event, which will take place on the evening of March 19.

The program will commemorate the 157th anniversary of the battle with luminaries for all 4,133 of those killed, wounded, or missing from the battle. Gates will open at 6:30 p.m., with the last admission at 9 p.m.

The CSS Neuse Civil War Interpretive Center is expanding.

The Center will unveil its final phase of permanent exhibits to the public March 12. Entitled “The Civil War in Eastern North Carolina,” these exhibits will examine a variety of aspects of the Civil War including causes, military engagements and personalities, and the involvement of African Americans and women.

The CSS Neuse Civil War Interpretive Center is growing again.

Fort Dobbs State Historic Site will offer a glimpse of the harrowing days of the Anglo-Cherokee War Feb. 26.  The Cherokee and British had been allies when the French and Indian War started, but tensions quickly spiraled into hostilities. The fort was engaged by up to 70 Cherokee warriors in a confusing night-time skirmish on Feb. 27, 1760.

Somerset Place State Historic Site will commemorate Black History Month with a virtual program, “The Anthropology of Adornment and Identity at Somerset Place.” 

Reconstruction remains one of the most misunderstood periods in our nation’s history. Broadly, it was about the meaning of citizenship as African American enslaved people seized their freedom and the restoration of the former Confederate states to the Union. At the local or regional level within the American South, however, these broad issues played out very differently.   

The State Archives of North Carolina will host a virtual presentation, “Discovering and Telling Lost and Unknown Stories: A Family Odyssey,” Wednesday, Feb. 23, 2-3 p.m.  

Deputy Secretary for Archives and History, Dr. Darin Waters, will discuss his research into the Rice and Waters families of western N.C., the importance of the State Archives and other public collections, and his donations of family materials. 

Join this free webinar to celebrate Black History Month and consider the significance of family and regional history for North Carolina.