On December 4, 1994, Charlotte Smith, then a member of the UNC Tar Heels women’s basketball team, became the second collegiate women’s player ever to dunk.
On October 26, 1895, UNC fullback Joel Whitaker threw the first forward pass in football to his teammate George Stephens.
On March 29, 1982, UNC basketball Coach Dean Smith and his Tar Heels won the school’s first national title since 1957.
On March 13, 1953, UNC-Chapel Hill students Carl Kasell and Charles Kuralt stepped up to the microphone for WUNC’s inaugural FM broadcast.
On February 12, 1795, Hinton James became the first student to enter the University of North Carolina. James, who had walked to Chapel Hill from his home in New Hanover County, was the only student for the first two weeks of the school year.
On February 9, 1956, basketball legend Phil Ford was born in Kannapolis.
Ford was raised in Rocky Mount, where he graduated from high school in 1974.
There aren’t many places in North Carolina—or the country, even—where you can see the power of archaeology more than at Town Creek Indian Mound in Montgomery County.
All this month we’re bringing you stories from North Carolina’s black history. Check back here each weekday for a new tidbit from our state’s African American’s past.