Join Chapel Hill Public Library staff and community members as we uncover the untold histories of Chapel Hill, from the inside out and bottom up. In our first season, we are exploring the histories behind the monuments and markers of Chapel Hill.
In June, 2019 we honored the lives of two Chapel Hillians whose names were added to the Peace and Justice Plaza marker in downtown Chapel Hill.
Image credit: Mark Losey/Town of Chapel Hill
Mama Dip. Mildred Council was a culinary and community matriarch known for her traditional Southern cooking and her community service. She served on the Orange County Prison Board and was known for hiring and helping prisoners once they were released. Council co-founded the Community Dinner, an annual event that highlights diversity in the community and asks attendees to “sit down with a stranger and leave with a friend.”
Harold Foster. As a high school student, Harold Foster led the Chapel Hill Nine, a group of students who sparked the Civil Rights Movement in Chapel Hill. On February 28,
1960, Foster and the other students entered the Colonial Drug Store, s
Image credit: Mark Losey/Town of Chapel Hill
at down at the counter, and asked for the same service afforded to white customers. It is believed to be one of the first such sit-ins organized by high school students. Foster and the rest of the Nine were later arrested for this action, which ignited the movement locally.
Awesome podcast production team: Mandella Younge, Sam Bermas-Dawes, Klaus Mayr, and Ryan Chamberlain. With thanks to Aaron Keane for audio recording, technical assistance and production coaching.
Season one of Re/Collecting Chapel Hill was supported by grant funds from the Institute of Museum and Library Services under the provisions of the federal Library Services and Technology Act as administered by the State Library of North Carolina, a division of the Department of Natural and Cultural Resources.
This episode’s Spotify playlist, inspired by the lives of Harold “Hobo” Foster and Mildred “Mama Dip” Council:
Episode Links:
- Peace and Justice Plaza | Town of Chapel Hill, NC — The Peace and Justice Plaza honors the energy and spirit of the thousands who have stood in the shadow of the Courthouse and exercised their rights to assembly and speech and have spoken out on issues as diverse as the Vietnam War, environmental justice, women’s rights, gay rights, the death penalty, and racial justice.
- Chapel Hill leaders honored at Peace and Justice Plaza ceremony – The Daily Tar Heel — Council and Foster join the names of 15 other Chapel Hill leaders and activists on the Peace and Justice Plaza plaque, including UNC basketball coach Dean Smith and North Carolina’s first openly gay elected official Joe Herzenberg.
- G-0099 :: Southern Oral History Program Interview Database — Mildred Council, African American business owner and author of cookbooks, with interviewer Donna Clark. 14 November 1994
- “Juba This, Juba That:” the history and appropriation of patting juba — Juba came from dances in Africa (where it was called Giouba) and Haiti (known as Djouba). Another name for the dance is Hambone. This name, which also has origins in slavery, supposedly originated from “hand-bone,” the hard part of the hand that makes the most sound.
- BLUES JUNCTION Productions – HamboneAn ingredient for delicious soup,or an instrument for scorn, or for strong rhythm,or for hot sex?byErwin Bosman — “The hambone represents heritage, lessons and triumphs; a strong symbol of survival through creativity.”