Topics Related to Things to Do

The Charlotte Hawkins Brown Museum is open for Black History Month tours during February. Join the museum staff for tours daily at 10 a.m. and 3 p.m., departing from the Visitor’s Center. Tours will include the grounds of the former Palmer Memorial Institute and Canary Cottage, the former home of Dr. Charlotte Hawkins Brown. Come learn about Dr. Brown’s social justice activism, civic work, and the impact that she had on her students. Tours are $2 per adult and $1 per child.

Two days after surviving the battle of Bentonville, Lt. Col. William E. Strong reflected on “those brave and gallant companions in arms who will come back to us no more. Peace to the gallant dead, sleeping, some of them in far away and unmarked graves.” Bentonville Battlefield State Historic Site will reflect on the battle’s casualties during the 157th-anniversary commemoration, “Peace to the Gallant Dead.” This illumination event will take place on the evening of March 19, 2022.

Students at the state’s Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) will have the opportunity to learn and earn this summer through a 10-week paid summer internship within the N.C. Department of Natural and Cultural Resources.

A lot can happen in half a century. For that matter, a lot can happen in a year. At the end of calendar year 2021, Fort Fisher State Historic Site achieved its goal of more than one million visitors annually, a first for Fort Fisher or any historic site within the NC Division of State Historic Sites. When the turnstiles stopped at year’s end, total onsite visitation for calendar year 2021 reached 1,052,270.

Stokes Early College High School (SECHS) in Walnut Cove, N.C. is the recipient of this year’s grant from Horne Creek Farm’s “Instructional Heirloom Apple Orchard for Schools” program. The school will receive four apple trees grafted from those in the Southern Heritage Apple Orchard (SHAO) to establish a min orchard at the school.

 Let the feeling of the holidays inspire you this year with a visit to a state historic site, museum, state park or aquarium. You can take a hike up Jockey's Ridge, enjoy a candlelight tour of Tryon Palace or a ride a Holiday Train at the North Carolina Transportation Museum. For more information visit https://www.ncdcr.gov/things-to-do/trips-travel-ideas/holidays. 

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The State Archives of North Carolina will host a virtual roundtable, “Holiday Flavors of the Past,” Tuesday, Dec. 14, 7-8:30 p.m.

State Archives staff will share stories about holiday foods from the collection including the tradition of Old Christmas in Rodanthe and its foodways, holiday feasts on military bases, and 150-year-old recipes that can become DIY holiday gifts.

Panelists will include Samantha Crisp, director of the Outer Banks History Center; Matthew Peek, Military Collection Archivist; and Callie Beatty, intern.

The Charlotte Hawkins Brown Museum at the Palmer Memorial Institute State Historic Site is excited to announce its slate of holiday programs for the 2021 season.



Starting the first week of December, the Visitor’s Center will be open to the public and staff will have children’s craft bags available along with a story walk featuring “The Nutcracker in Harlem” by T. E. McMorrow with illustrations by James Ransome. Staff will also be giving candlelit holiday-themed tours of the campus on Saturday, Dec. 11 and Dec. 18 at 5:30 p.m. and 7 p.m.

 By December of 1756, Fort Dobbs was complete. Its garrison of 50 North Carolina soldiers prepared to spend the first of many winters in the building as they guarded the western edge of settlement in the British colony during the French and Indian War. 

Join the State Capitol and Governor Roy Cooper for the return of the annual tree-lighting tradition on Thursday, Dec. 9! The festivities will begin on Capitol Square at 5:30 p.m. with holiday music performed by the Raleigh Concert Band. The governor, Dept. of Natural and Cultural Resources Secretary Reid Wilson and other dignitaries will make their way to the South grounds at 6:15 p.m. to officially begin the ceremony. The lit tree will be visible the length of Fayetteville Street.