Charlotte Mecklenburg Library

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1772 - Moravian Girls School

Salem Female Academy opens. In these colonial days, few women can obtain the education afforded to men. Mecklenburg families who want their daughters to receive higher education send the young women to Salem, nearly 100 miles away.

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1775 - Mecklenburg Declaration

May 20, 1775 - The Mecklenburgers announce their freedom with a proclamation called the Mecklenburg Declaration of Independence. The document dissolves forever the colonists' bonds with Britain. In the anxious days that follow these emotional events, people will disagree when recalling exactly what happened. Some will doubt the Meck Dec ever existed. Even two hundred years later historians will debate these questions, but the May 20 date will be commemorated on North Carolina's state flag.

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1712 - Carolina Divides

May 9, 1712 - The center of government is in Charleston, inaccessible to people in the colony's northern and western parts. In addition, legislation designed to recognize the Church of England as the established church creates a division between the Anglicans on one side and on the other the Presbyterians and the Quakers thus increasing political tensions in the state. To solve these problems, the Lords Proprietors divide the colony in two: North and South Carolina. Edward Hyde (1667-1712) becomes the first governor of the newly formed colony of North Carolina.

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1755 - Great Wagon Road

Northern colonies in Pennsylvania, Maryland and Virginia are becoming crowded, and settlers move south to North Carolina. They follow Thomas Spratt's route, now called the great wagon road. Many of the families seek religious and economic freedom. Some have come from Germany. Others come from Scotland via Ireland; they become known as the Scots-Irish.

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1775 - Crown's Strong Arm

August 1775 - It becomes clear that no solution is possible for the bitter disagreements between the American colonists and the rulers in their homeland. The British monarchy sends 20,000 Hessian soldiers to America. But these men from Germany are not fighting because they are loyal to Britain -- they are soldiers who are paid to fight, called mercenaries.

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The 1957 Saint Patrick's Day Parade

'Twas a Great Day for The Irish of All Nationalities

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03/16/1957