Durham is a city in the U.S. state of North Carolina and the county seat of Durham County. Small portions of the city limits extend into Orange County and Wake County. With a population of 283,506 in the 2020 census, Durham is the fourth-most populous city in North Carolina and the 70th-most populous city in the United States. The city is located in the east-central part of the Piedmont region along the Eno River. Durham is the core of the four-county Durham–Chapel Hill metropolitan area, which had an estimated population of 608,879 in 2023. The Office of Management and Budget also includes Durham as a part of the Raleigh–Durham–Cary, NC Combined Statistical Area, commonly known as the Research Triangle, which had an estimated population of 2,368,947 in 2023.
The American Tobacco Company was a tobacco company founded in 1890 by J. B. Duke through a merger between a number of U.S. tobacco manufacturers including Allen and Ginter, Goodwin & Company, and Kinney Brothers. The company was one of the original 12 members of the Dow Jones Industrial Average in 1896. The American Tobacco Company dominated the industry by acquiring the Lucky Strike Company and over 200 other rival firms. Federal Antitrust action begun in 1907 broke the company into several major companies in 1911.
Benjamin Newton Duke was an American tobacco, textile and energy industrialist and philanthropist. He served as vice-president at American Tobacco Company, being also founder of Duke Energy.
James Buchanan Duke was an American tobacco and electric power industrialist best known for the invention of modern cigarette manufacture and marketing techniques, and his involvement with Duke University. He was the founder of the American Tobacco Company in 1890.
Washington Duke was an American tobacco industrialist and philanthropist. During the American Civil War he enlisted in the Confederate States Navy. In 1865, Duke founded the W. Duke, Sons & Co., a tobacco manufacturer that would be merged with other companies to form conglomerate American Tobacco Company in 1890.
Watts Hospital, located in Durham, North Carolina was the city's first hospital, operating between 1895 and 1976.
John Sprunt Hill was a North Carolina lawyer, banker and philanthropist who played a fundamental role in the civic and social development of Durham, North Carolina, the expansion of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and the development of rural credit unions in North Carolina during the first half of the 20th century.
Duke Memorial United Methodist Church is a historic Methodist church at 504 W. Chapel Hill Street in Durham, North Carolina. It was originally established in 1886. The congregation's growth paralleled Durham's growth as a manufacturing center in the textile and tobacco industries and has maintained a close connection with Duke University. From its beginning, the church has counted among its members many of Durham's educational and industrial elite. It is named in honor of tobacco magnate and philanthropist Washington Duke and his sons, who were instrumental in the building of the church.
Mary Duke Biddle Trent Semans was an American heiress, activist, politician, and philanthropist. She was the granddaughter of Benjamin N. Duke and the great-granddaughter of Washington Duke, both tobacco and energy tycoons who helped start Duke University. Semans is remembered for her support and work towards promoting the arts and humanities through various philanthropic entities.
Lincoln Hospital was a medical facility located in Durham, North Carolina founded to serve the African Americans of Durham County and surrounding areas. With original hospital construction financed by the Duke family, Lincoln served as the primary African American hospital in Durham from its opening in 1901 until 1976, when it closed and transferred its inpatient services to Durham County General Hospital.
Erwin Mill was a textile mill in Durham, North Carolina that operated between the years of 1893 and 1986. After seeing the success of other cotton mills in the Northeast and locally in Durham, entrepreneur Benjamin N. Duke incorporated the mill in 1892 and recruited William H. Erwin to manage the enterprise. The mill's success in the late 19th and early 20th centuries was the result of Erwin's and his successors' exceptional management tactics, even when the factory hit obstacles such as the Great Depression and the unionization of its workers. The mill grew quickly in the late 19th century and early 20th century, became one of North Carolina's largest cotton mills. It originally produced muslin pouches for tobacco, but the mill would later expand its production to other fabrics, becoming one of the largest producers of denim in the world during the early 1900s. Workers at the mill enjoyed some of the best working conditions and highest wages in textile factories throughout the southern United States. Mill employees would later sign union-friendly labor agreements that were radical to the southern textile industry in the early to mid 20th century. The establishment of homes, businesses and recreation areas in the mill village was a significant factor in the development of the West Durham, especially the Ninth Street business district and the Old West Durham Neighborhood. Erwin Mill No. 1 is on the National Register of Historic Places and the mill village of West Durham is a National Historic District. An apartment complex, office building and shopping center of the same name that are built on the original site also commemorate the factory.
Trinity Historic District, also called Trinity Park, is a national historic district and residential area located near the East Campus of Duke University in Durham, North Carolina. The district encompasses 751 contributing buildings in a predominantly residential section of Durham. They were built between the 1890s and 1960 and include notable examples of Queen Anne and Bungalow / American Craftsman style architecture. Located in the district are the separately listed "Faculty Row" cottages: the Bassett House, Cranford-Wannamaker House, Crowell House, and Pegram House. Other notable buildings include the George W. Watts School (1917), Julian S. Carr Junior High School (1922), Durham High School (1923), Durham Alliance Church (1927), Trinity Avenue Presbyterian Church (1925), Watts Street Baptist Church (1925), Great A & P Tea Company (1927-1929), Grace Lutheran Church, and the former Greek Orthodox Community Church.
The Edgemont neighborhood is a community of mill works located in Durham, North Carolina. Previously known as Smoky Hollow, this area developed around the Durham Hosiery Mills in the late 19th century. Durham was a “raw whistle-stop village” along the Great North Carolina Central Rail Road that transformed into one of the largest tobacco cities in the United States. The Durham City Bull became one of the better-known tobacco trademarks with the help of the big players in the industry, W. T. Blackwell and Company and Julian Carr. The success of these tobacco mills started overflowing into other industries, mainly textile mills that produced cloth bags, socks, and other hosieries. As demands rose, communities began growing and changing around the factories. A shift in the racial make up of the workforce was reflected in Edgemont's shift to a more African American dominant community as the years progressed. Julian Carr Jr. was one of the first to allow black workers in factory level jobs to help cope with the high demands. This industrialist's decision to reach over the race barrier is part of what made Durham “the City of the New South.” The Edgemont Neighborhood is just one of many examples of how Durham became one of the more progressive and tolerant locations for African Americans in the country.
Charles DeWitt Watts was an African-American surgeon and activist for the poor. Watts was the first surgeon of African-American ancestry in North Carolina. Earning his medical degree in 1943 from Howard University College, he was the first African-American board-certified surgeon to serve in North Carolina. After surgical training at Freedman's Hospital in Washington, D.C., in 1949, he moved to Durham, North Carolina, in 1950 and established a clinic to provide access to medical services for the poor. Breaking the social customs of racial obstacles, he advocated for certification of African-American medical students. He also became a member of many professional colleges including the National Academy of Science's Institute of Medicine and the American College of Surgeons. He served as chief of surgery at Durham's Lincoln Hospital and was later one of the key figures in converting it to the Lincoln Community Health Center, a low-priced clinic for the poor.
The following is a timeline of the history of the city of Durham, North Carolina, USA.
Measurement Incorporated is an educational testing company based in Durham, North Carolina. The company was founded in 1980 by Dr. Henry Scherich. Measurement Incorporated currently administers state-wide standardized tests for Arizona, California, Michigan, and Washington State. Measurement Incorporated also administers the Independent School Entrance Examination (ISEE) for the Educational Records Bureau.
Brodie Leonidas Duke was an American entrepreneur, often credited with starting the tobacco manufacturing industry in Durham, North Carolina. Founder of Semper Idem, and co-founder of W. Duke, Sons & Co., Brodie produced and sold tobacco products across North Carolina for over 20 years. He mainly worked out of his property around Downtown Durham, including from his famous warehouse, the Brodie Duke Warehouse.
Walltown is a historically African-American neighborhood in Durham, North Carolina. The neighborhood is located between West Durham Historic District and Trinity Historic District, north of Duke University East Campus. Historically, the neighborhood was a working class neighborhood for African-American employees of Duke University and local tobacco and textile mills in Durham. Walltown was named after George Wall, a former enslaved person, who was one of the first people to purchase a lot in the area. Members of the community were active in the civil rights movement and desegregation in Durham. Since the beginning of the twenty-first century, Walltown has been undergoing gentrification.
Sara Virginia Ecker Watts Morrison was an American nurse, heiress, philanthropist, and civic leader. She was first married to financier George Washington Watts, whom she met while working as a nurse at Johns Hopkins Hospital. Left widowed with a vast fortune in 1921, she became active in her late husband's philanthropic endeavors. She later married Cameron A. Morrison, who was serving as Governor of North Carolina, becoming First Lady of North Carolina. She served as First Lady from 1924 to 1925.
Trinity Avenue Presbyterian Church is a Presbyterian church in the Trinity Park neighborhood of Durham, North Carolina. The congregation was established in the late 19th century for workers at the Pearl Cotton Mill. The current church building was completed in 1925.
