ACCBoards

Quote:Votes key to town's future
Lot 5, Greenbridge go to council this month

By Jesse James DeConto, Staff Writer
CHAPEL HILL -- This is the month.
February brings two major decisions that could radically change the Chapel Hill skyline and foreshadow the town's future growth pattern.

On Monday, the Town Council will vote on a final contract with Ram Development Co. to build a $75-million, eight-story project on a town-owned parking lot at the corner of Franklin and Church streets. The town would contribute $7.25 million toward underground parking.

Elected officials and business leaders have heralded the proposed condominium tower on Parking Lot 5 as the spark that will prompt other developers to invest downtown.

"This was a signal event," said David Godschalk, a former Town Council member, retired professor of city and regional planning, and critic of the Lot 5 plan. "The council basically announced they were taking the lid off development downtown. ... The sky's the limit."

Already, a group of private developers is pursuing permits for a $50-million, 10-story, eco-friendly condominium complex called Greenbridge along West Rosemary Street between North Graham Street and Merritt Mill Road. On Feb. 26, the council will consider creating a new zoning district, rezoning 1.3 acres of land and granting a land-use permit for Greenbridge.

These two projects alone would bring hundreds of new residents to downtown, not to mention other major developments being planned near downtown.

Just what that means for Chapel Hill depends on whom you ask.

Village or city?

In her online Web log, Town Council member Laurin Easthom wrote that coming decisions will determine "whether or not Chapel Hill remains a town in which you seem to know everyone, or a small city."

Easthom said increasing density downtown is the price to pay for preserving the countryside north and west of Chapel Hill-Carrboro. As long as people want to move to Chapel Hill, she said, developers will want to build here. The Town Council wants to push them downtown rather than into the wilderness.

"I lament the fact that we are going to see density, but I also understand that we need to do that in order to preserve the rural buffer," Easthom said. "I want Chapel Hill to be the small town that I've known it to be forever."

Council member Mark Kleinschmidt, on the other hand, does not believe a denser downtown will destroy the small-town appeal. He envisions a small city where neighbors do know each other, perhaps better than they do under the dominant pattern of developing vacant land into sprawling subdivisions on large lots.

That pattern, he said, "diminished the village quality that a lot of people romanticize when they think of Chapel Hill."

If downtown develops as Kleinschmidt envisions, residents will be able to walk to work and shop, greeting each other and shopkeepers along the way.

"These kinds of redevelopments, particularly in our downtown core, actually bring us back to those elements of our village past that made our community such an attractive place to live," he said.

Mayor Kevin Foy said the character of Chapel Hill is intangible.

"We live in an urban area, no matter how you want to characterize it," he said. "I think that if we keep our values, we will keep Chapel Hill -- whatever its population."

Foy said one of those values is including "people in all socioeconomic conditions as part of the community," but some say upscale residences downtown could gentrify Northside, a nearby neighborhood that still remains affordable for working class people.

Mai Nguyen, a professor in the city and regional planning department at UNC, said the condominium towers may erode the sense of community in Northside by raising property values and forcing out low-income residents who can't afford the taxes. That, she said, would prevent Chapel Hill from becoming a strong city.

"You're not going to have this richness and diversity that makes cities interesting," she said.

As it is, said Emil Malizia, the chairman of Nguyen's department, Chapel Hill functions more like a bedroom community for the rest of the Triangle, and downtown development -- unless it brings lots of jobs -- probably won't change that.

"I don't really think that individual projects like Greenbridge or what's going on at Lot 5 are significant enough in scale to change the character of a place," he said.

Michael Cucchiara, one of the partners in the Greenbridge development, said Chapel Hill really doesn't aspire to become a full-fledged city.

"There are vibrant college towns, like Burlington, Vt., Madison, Wis., Boulder, Colo., which are better models for what Chapel Hill could become," Cucchiara wrote in an e-mail. "There's a proper middle ground between a withering town and a big city that our town leaders have in mind."

Out of scale?

But others worry whether the "village" can survive the sort of change in scale that Lot 5 and Greenbridge would entail.

"When you start to change the character of a very important part of your community, you have to be careful," said Godschalk, the former Town Council member and planning professor.

"Both of these projects, especially (Greenbridge), have a tremendous potential to be an absolute failure, largely because they do not take into account the human scale," said Dierdra Mitra, a Carrboro resident with a graduate degree in urban planning. They ignore "the lesson of Europe, the lesson of the small town where people want to hang-out in the square."

The developers have tried to deal with this concern by including public plazas -- potential hang-outs -- in their plans. The question remains whether local people will want to gather at the foot of an eight- or 10-story building.

Town Council member Bill Thorpe, in particular, has resisted the zoning change that would raise the town's maximum height from 90 feet to 120 feet. The town established the 90-foot limit when North Carolina National Bank built what is now the Bank of America Center in the 1970s.

"Ninety feet is bad, but that's what we already have," Thorpe said. "I just don't want it to be taller than we already have."

Still, he concedes his resistance may be futile.

"The village was lost a long time ago," he said.

http://www.chapelhillnews.com/100/story/5399.html

Carrboro's a Little to the Left of Chapel Hill

http://www.chapelhillnews.com/107/story/6034.html

Quote:Strong performance
Former Chapel Hill player sets an NCAA III tournament record

From Staff Reports
Ben Strong of Chapel Hill scored an NCAA Division III Tournament-record 59 points last weekend in a Guilford College win over Lincoln (Pa.) University.
Strong, a 6-11 junior, hit 20-of-27 shots from the field and 19-of-22 at the free throw line. His last point came on a free throw with 14 seconds left in the third overtime to clinch Guilford College's 129-128 win Friday night over Lincoln.

Strong's performance stands second in NCAA men's basketball championships history only to Austin Carr's 61-point showing in Notre Dame's first-round win over Ohio on March 7, 1970.

Strong also broke David Smith's Guilford record of 50 points set versus Atlantic Christian in 1971.

Guilford advanced to Saturday's national quarterfinal at the Batten Center, where the exhausted Quakers fell, 81-71, to Virginia Wesleyan College on the Marlins' home court.

Guilford's final 24-5 record includes the most wins by the Quakers since they were 29-5 and were the 1972-73 NAIA national champions. Saturday's Elite Eight game marked the farthest Guilford advanced in the national tournament since joining the NCAA.

Friday, Strong had 24 points in the three overtime periods, including 11 in the second OT. His 17-foot jumper with 2.8 seconds left in the second overtime tied the game at 120.

His former Chapel Hill High School teammate Caleb Kimbrough added nine points Friday.

Guilford senior Jordan Snipes (formerly of Siler City Jordan-Matthews) forced the first overtime with a banked 30-footer at the regulation horn. Unlike his buzzer-beating 85-foot game-winner in 2005, this trifecta merely tied the game at 97. He finished with 22 points and career-high 11 rebounds.

Strong's dunk with 1:52 remaining in the third extra frame opened a 126-123 Guilford lead, but the Lions (20-9) tied the game for the 14th and final time on an Earl Miller three-pointer with 28 seconds left.

That just set the stage for a frantic, final 20 seconds.

With four Lincoln students already disqualified with five fouls, Guilford pounded the ball inside to Strong again. He drew 6-7 sophomore Brandon Wilchcombe's fifth foul and made the first of two free throws.

Lincoln had two shots in the final 14 seconds, but Strong prevailed at the defensive end. Strong blocked Sami Wylie's runner with five seconds left. His fourth block of the game bounded over the end line with 3.4 seconds left. The Lions inbounded the ball to their leading scorer Tyreek Byard (19 points), who dribbled the ball off his leg before recovering in the lane and heaving an errant shot through traffic, which Strong corralled as time expired for his game-high 17th rebound.

A day after scoring an NCAA Division III Tournament-record 59 points, Strong found enough energy for 34 points and 13 rebounds against Virginia Wesleyan, both game-highs. He made 10-of-20 field goals and 14-of-16 free throws in his seventh 30-point game of the season. Strong received the sectional tournament's Most Outstanding Player Award after averaging 46.5 points and 15 rebounds in the two games.

On Monday, Strong received the Guilford College Student-Athlete of the Week Award.

Strong finished with 737 points this year, the fourth-highest point total in 93 Guilford basketball seasons.

The 2006-07 ODAC player of the year, Strong averaged 25.4 points and 11.4 rebounds per game for coach Tom Palombo's Quakers.

Strong, son of Sarah Haskett and Ed Strong, was the 2003-04 Piedmont Athletic Conference Player of the Year at CHHS. He helped the Tigers reach the third round of the 2004 state 4-A playoffs and was named to the Northcarolina.ihigh.com 4-A All-State team. A sport management major, he made Guilford's 2006 honor roll.

Virginia Wesleyan (27-4), the defending national champion, gave Guilford three of its five losses this year.

VWC's No. 4-ranked Marlins take on Washington University of St. Louis (24-4) in the NCAA Div. III semifinals on Friday. Massachusetts' Amherst College (28-2), also returning to the Final Four for the second consecutive season, faces Ohio's College of Wooster (29-3) in the other semifinal game.

Some folks just don't like a Free Carrboro

Quote:Carr Mill Mall
Good Neighbor Rules

1. Carr Mill Mall buildings, lawn, and parking lots are only for the use of customers while shopping and dining, and for tenants and their invited guests.

2. Solicitation and distribution of literature or handbills is prohibited.

3. Loitering or sleeping on benches is prohibited.

4. Unauthorized performances and large or publicly advertised gatherings are prohibited.

5. Dogs must be well behaved, leashed, attended, promptly cleaned up after, and watered with disposable bowls.

6. Stay out of all trees, garden areas, and the podn. The edge of the pond can be used for seating, but not for walking or running. Do not throw anything in the pond.

7. Alcoholic beverages can be consumed only in eating areas, and not near the entrance to the offices or the edge of the lawn.

Thank you.

News is that the sign was improperly worded, has been taken down, but another will soon be erected.

http://www.weaverstreetmarket.coop/artic...hp?id=1489

^ New wording

Ugh! I hate the pseudo hippie liberalism that is the Paris of the Piedmont. Doesn't all this stem from the ban of the Dancing Dude?

Actually TDM it sounds like you've got it pretty much wrong...this is related to the ban of the Dancing Man but is the work of the corporation that manages Carr Mill. Nathan Milian Properties

Here's a good post from the owner of a business located inside of Carr Mill

Quote:When I walked outside the other day, I thought to myself “Cool! they finally put up a sign letting people know there are cool things inside the building.” Boy was I wrong.
I figured it was only a matter of time until the reaction came.. and sure enough it did.

Having seen the Chapel Hill Herald Newspaper today, it prompted me to do a websearch to read more about it and it brought me here. After reading this, I thought maybe I should do the unthinkable and post something - I hope I don’t regret it.

Overall it’s an interesting discussion. I mean, there’s this one aspect that people need to respect the property and rights of the mall, and then there is the fact that people feel it’s an affront and a slap in the face - because “duh” of course all those things on there are common sense and the mgmt is just being oppressive.

It’s a very interesting discussion, and knowing how the mall managment is, they probably saw this move as a ‘hedge’ on enforcing their rights as property owners. This building very easily could have been bulldozed years ago with condos and a parking garage or something put up. I’m glad they didn’t do that.

I want to also say that my personal opinion about signs is that they are annoying and get them out of my face. I also don’t entirely aggree with all the stuff that’s on there - and I don’t have to like it, but I do have to respect it. That being said.. there are people around here that are so self absorbed and not even paying attention that unless you hit them in the face with a bag of clues they will touch wet paint, walk into doors, leave children unattended in the fountain (even with the sign saying to please don’t).

I saw mention of using smaller signs, that aren’t as intrusive. I can tell you that non-direct signs that are small DO NOT WORK. There are currently small signs placed throughout the inside of the mall about running, soliciting, etc - but no one ever bothers to read them. I frequently have people asking us for money, to buy their crap, and foot races in the hall towards unsuspecting old ladies carrying their sewing machines.

They clearly want people to get a message - so they went the other way and boldly placed the signs; probably so everyone would notice them and to send a message.. “treat our property with respect.” I’m not saying I agree with the manner in which it’s done - but it’s clearly gotten some attention for sure!

Personally I think the signs could be thrown out if people in general treated everyone else and the grounds with the same respect you’d extend to visiting a new friends house. Maybe they should move them, but where would they be as affective? We could change the security officer for a courtesy officer then. But this isn’t a Dr. Seuss book, it’s the real world and in it are people that aren’t always “nice”.

So how did this happen? Where does it come from? For a long time, the mall management has been fast and loose with rules - giving people the flexibility to skirt around certain things. But, with a few incidents and changes in population - I think they now feel that they have to dictate what those rules are and remind people who owns the property. Trust me, there are rules I really don’t like - but I’d rather work with the property management than affront them, using that as a last resort. Trying to embarrass them about it doesn’t help and makes them dig in. Nathan believe it or not is actually pretty easy to talk to, and whenever I’ve had a problem I’ve pretty much went and talked to him about it. He may not agree, but he does listen and repsonds best when you give him solutions versus problems.

My main concern is two-fold…

1) It would be very easy for Carr Mill to say, “No drinking on the Lawn - period”, “No Live performances”, “No large gatherings”. They could severly enforce parking (which might not be a bad idea). They could even ‘censor’ the types of materials distributed, promoted, and displayed. If they wanted they could blacktop the whole thing, not that I think they would ever consider that. It’s a slippery slope. If you go to battle over the content of the signs or their placement - you errode your stance on the next issue. Instead, suggest where they could move them instead of saying “MOVE THEM!” I doubt the content is debatable at this point though. But Maybe if the community pushes about a sign, they push back harder. Maybe they rule outsome of those things listed above - namely the drinking at all. I don’t know about you, but I enjoy having a beer while ’sitting’ on the fountain wall. I also don’t want these rules impacting our business. If they rule those things out next, it would really suck for us since we have fairly big openings on the 2nd Friday of each month for the artwalk - with beer, and music, and lots of people gathering informally. Even with the signs - it’s still a pretty open environment downtown generally speaking.

And .. don’t think that Carr Mill Management doesn’t own other properties downtown that you might care about. Maybe that space next to Open Eye would be developed differently based on how things occur at Carr Mill - (the big ugly yellow steel building). I think the big problem is that there is no dialog with the community and mall management - instead of boycotting shops in Carr Mill (all we do is pay rent and try to survive - if we die, it doesn’t hurt the mall) and instead of writing an indignant letter campaign as a first step - write them a proposal stating how to change things or make them more manageable. Give them solutions, choices. Then if that doesn’t work go another route.

2) If Weaver St. Lawn is boycotted, or people decide not to come down town - then the entire downtown economy is hurt (not that it isn’t already). The landscape of the downtown, socially will change. My biggest fear is that people won’t come downtown, it gets redeveloped into something else, and we have to move to southpoint or somewhere else that’s less organically developed and a big structured pile of crap. It’s not like there are alot of choices for downtown businesses currently in carrboro - trust me I’ve looked. The reality is that people need to find a way to work and communicate with the management. Maybe propose a cooperative ‘ethics’ committee to them that’s staffed with volunteer activists that engage and communicate with the community. Instead of demanding rights, offer a solution. I just want to see Carrboro flourish and be even more of a cool awesome place. But if you run off to Southern Village or somewhere else, you lose your opportunity to affect downtown carrboro.

Speaking of Awesome places … i won’t be able to respond to this because I’m going to SxSW in a few hours (that’s austin, tx). If you don’t know where to find us - we are ‘in’ Carr Mill.

It will be interesting to see what works out when I get back next week.

-mike @ wootini

This fellow has his thinking cap on to a degree...

A little CDisobedience at the expense of the sign this morning

Ahh-thank you for setting me straight!

Are you being sarcastic now? You know I'm no fan of earth crunchin' tree huggers myself

Who's property is it?

Actually, this once, I am not being sacastic! We don't get The Chapel Hill Bird Cage Liner-errr-News out here in the sticks. What tiny, teeny bit I have read, has been online.

How are the ladies at your house? [she quickly changes topics-still not being sacastic ]

jws...it is private property.

Recently Published Novels set in Orange County

http://www.lib.unc.edu/ncc/ref/fic/county.html#orange

Quote:Orange County

Alice Adams. A Southern Exposure. New York : Alfred A. Knopf, 1995.

Alice Adams. After the War. New York: Knopf, 2000.

Daphne Athas. Entering Ephesus. New York: Viking, 1971.

Ellyn Bache. Activist's Daughter. Duluth, Minn.: Spinsters Ink, 1997.

Doris Betts. Souls Raised From the Dead. New York: Knopf, 1994.

Jimmy Carter. The Hornet's Nest: A Novel of the Revolutionary War. New York: Simon & Schuster, 2003.

Doug Marlette. The Bridge. New York: HarperCollins, 2001.

Joanna Catherine Scott. The Road from Chapel Hill. New York: Penguin, 2006.

J. B. Stanley. A Killer Collection. New York: Penguin, 2006

Martha Witt. Broken as Things Are. New York: Henry Holt, 2004.

Hotlinks at the site link to a synopsis of each...

I also understand that this:

Quote:Thomas Wolfe

O Lost. Columbia: University of South Carolina Press, 2000.

O Lost is the original, unedited version of Look Homeward, Angel, Thomas Wolfe's classic novel about a sensitive young man growing up in pre-Depression Altamont, a fictional version of the author's hometown of Asheville. Wolfe's manuscript was cut and reshaped by the author with the help of legendary editor Maxwell Perkins. Now readers can see the raw material for themselves, including a long introductory section on protagonist Eugene Gant's ancestors in the Civil War.

...has a significant portion set in Chapel Hill and on campus. Much of that was cut from the original and appears here.

Speaking of books...a small press in Leesville, NC is reissuing a couple of John Ehle's books

http://www.press53.com/BioEhle.html

Quote:John Ehle (Ee-Lee) is the author of seventeen books--eleven fiction and six nonfiction-- including Trail of Tears: The Rise and Fall of the Cherokee Nation. His novel, The Land Breakers, first published in 1964 by Harper & Row, was the first in a seven-book series that begins with the settling of the Appalachian Mountains in western North Carolina.



Mr. Ehle is a member of the North Carolina Literary Hall of Fame, and has received the North Carolina Award for Literature, the Thomas Wolfe Prize and the Lillian Smith Award for Southern Fiction. He is also a five-time winner of the Sir Walter Raleigh Award for Fiction. He has been recipient of the Mayflower Award, the Governor's Award for Meritorious Service and the John Tyler Caldwell Award for the Humanities. Mr. Ehle holds honorary doctorates from UNC-Chapel Hill, UNC-Asheville, the North Carolina School of the Arts, and Berea College.

If you haven't read anything by Ehle you should. They will also be reissuing The Freemen a non-fictional account of the Civil Rights Movement as it unfolded in Chapel Hill.

Quote:LocoPops: They're crazy
Mango chile, green tea, gazpacho just some of the Mexican pop flavors


By Emily Matchar, Staff Writer
CHAPEL HILL -- Fruit, sugar, cream. Maybe a few spices. Mix. Freeze.
Simple, right?

Maybe so, but there's something about the wildly flavored paletas -- Mexican-style popsicles -- at Chapel Hill's new LocoPops shop that makes people a little bit nutty.

"There's, like, a white board and there's freezers and people act like they're walking into a room full of gold or something," said employee Lauren Lickwar, describing a typical customer reaction.

The popsicles, a modern take on a Mexican summer favorite, have been winning fans at a LocoPops shop on Hillsborough Road in Durham since May 2005. The response has been so good that store owners Summer Bicknell and Connie Semans decided to open a second location. The Chapel Hill LocoPops debuted in The Courtyard building on West Franklin Street early this month.

"We really hope to kind of make a footprint in the community," said Semans, working the cash register on a slow Saturday afternoon, her 5-week-old son Tucker slung across her hip.

In Mexico, paletas are sold at paleterias -- street front popsicle shops -- and from wandering vendors with pushcart freezers, in flavors like coconut, mango, tamarind and sweet rice.

LocoPops founder Summer Bicknell studied paleta-making techniques with the experts, working as an apprentice at a paleteria in the Mexican state of Michoacan. Michoacan, on the southwestern side of the country, is famous for its ice cream and its paletas, so much so that many ice cream and popsicle stores across the country are called "La Michoacana."

Stateside, commercially manufactured paletas are sold at Hispanic markets like Don Jose's Tienda in Carrboro, which has a cooler of fruit-flavored pops near the front counter.

At LocoPops, the white board lists the flavors for that day, divided into two columns: paletas de crema (cream-based) and paletas de agua (water-based). There are regulars -- mojito, tamarind, mango chile, as well as a rotating list of "guest star" flavors like thin mint and lychee lemongrass as well as two "FUN-ky" flavors -- green tea and Mexican gazpacho for this week.

Bicknell, who was working in management in Nashville before getting the inspiration to open the shop, is responsible for the bulk of the popsicle making. She's been working out of a kitchen in the back of the Hillsborough Road shop, but she's got plans to open a larger kitchen with a small sales counter in downtown Durham. Semans came on board in January of 2006, after getting to know Bicknell through her own pilgrimages to the Durham store with her two young daughters.

"Like Summer, I'd kind of been looking for something else to do," she said, explaining how a partnership in LocoPops seemed like a fun alternative to her job in corporate information technology.

Though Semans focuses more on the business than the culinary side of things, she does brainstorm some flavors of her own. Like the white chocolate lemon peppermint stick popsicle, inspired by the fresh lemons with peppermint sticks that she used to enjoy at local fairs growing up in the Chesapeake Bay area.

And neither Semans nor Bicknell is afraid to be adventurous. Take the case of the Sun Gold cherry tomato pops. Sure, tomatoes are technically a fruit, but what do they taste like in a popsicle?

"We loved it, but it's certainly not for everybody," Semans said.

They've got some mighty bizaare sabores to be sure...

Town/Gown issues:

From the Carrboro Citizen

Quote:UNC offers three scenarios for Carolina North
By Kirk Ross
Staff Writer

Three new words have entered the lexicon in the saga of Carolina North. So get ready for the definition and the ensuing conversation about Centers, Interwoven and Grid.

University planners revealed three initial plans—the preferred term is scenarios—for Carolina North at the first of a series of public meetings on the possibilities for the 963-acre parcel.

Jack Evans, executive director of the university’s Carolina North effort, said the scenarios are each meant to emphasize a design strategy. They’re intended to start a discussion about the different approaches.


The university intends to have a final plan ready for review by th UNC Board of Trustees by late summer, Evans said. A final vote by the trustees is expected in September and a presentation to the town for review in October.

Even with a quick glance at each concept for Carolina North, it’s obvious that one thing is missing: an airport. Last week, the Board of Trustees agreed on a plan for construction at Raleigh Durham International Airport of a 21,000 square-foot hanger and offices that will be home to the school’s Medical Air Operations, which flies mainly for the statewide Area Health Education Centers program. Moving AHEC has long been a contentious issue.

Concerns about AHEC along with a strong lobbying effort by the Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association derailed efforts in 2002 to close the airport.

But with a new hanger on the way for AHEC, the end of flights out of Horace Williams is on the horizon.

Scenarios

At Tuesday’s meeting, the first up-close look at the three possible scenarios for Carolina North were accompanied by three explanations of what might be located within the development.

So while three groups stood around posters of what things might look like, they got an explanation from the School of Pharmacy about new drug therapies and UNC spin-offs, a presentation from the Renaissance Computing Institute about outpatient home monitoring and new storm forecasting and the UNC Institute for the Environment about a community carbon reduction project and energy research.

What the three plans have in common is that they each disturb roughly 250 acres of land and focus development along the flat airport land and the area near Martin Luther King Boulevard now occupied by the town’s public works department. All three plans also make use of the rail corridor that runs along Seawell School Road.

Two of the plans, Centers and Grid, concentrate development closer to Estes Drive Extension and the airport land. The other, Interwoven, shows a road network and development extending north through the site.

The three concepts, along with public comments on them, will be available on the university’s Carolina North Web site carolinanorth.unc.edu.

Quote:O'Dell, Douglas "Doug"

Douglas "Doug" O'Dell, 53, Chapel Hill, March 23.
Published in The News & Observer on 4/14/2007.

Obituaries...owner of Chapel Hill Rare Books

Quote:Douglas Dell
Doug O'Dell, a 35- year resident of Chapel Hill, passed away on March 23, 2007, at the age of 53. He was a Morehead Scholar, a graduate of the University of North Carolina, and, for over 25 years, the owner and operator of Chapel Hill Rare Books.
He is survived by his wife of 32 years, Maureen O'Dell and a sister, Kayse Dean of Creve Coeur, MO.
A memorial service is being planned for Sunday, May 20, 2007 in the afternoon. If you would like to be informed of the details of the service, please write to: infochapelhillrarebooks.com or Chapel Hill Rare Books, P.O. Box 456 Carrboro, NC, 27510.
In lieu of flowers, please send a donation to Doctors without Borders (http://www.doctorswithoutborders.org).
Doug was a native of the Shenandoah Valley in Virginia. He lived for a time in coastal North Carolina, but called Chapel Hill home for most of his adulthood. He came to his chosen profession, that of a rare book seller, early in life. Always a voracious reader, he learned how to buy and sell books for profit as a youth, just to be able to purchase volumes for his own library. He was aided in this endeavor by a nearly photographic memory, enabling him to recall, in literally thousands of instances, the detailed minutiae which separates rare and valuable books from the commonplace. His keen intellect was also manifested in his academic studies and was reflected in his receipt of the prestigious Morehead Scholarship at the University of North Carolina. He excelled at science as well as antiquarian pursuits, and worked for a time in the bacteriology laboratory of the University of North Carolina Hospital.
He was also a championship runner, wrestler, and weight lifter in high school and college. He was an enthusiastic amateur herpetologist, who once collected venomous species for medical science and enjoyed raising the colorful, but harmless Honduran milk snakes. He loved to hunt and fish, to tell the stories that come with all sport, and to watch the Tar Heels win. He frequently found his recreation on the golf course and around the pool table.
Most of his time, however, was devoted to his work as the proprietor of Chapel Hill Rare Books. After founding the business in 1977, Doug soon became recognized as one of the leading dealers in the country, who had few rivals in the South. He was a longstanding member of the Antiquarian Booksellers Association of America and the International League of Antiquarian Booksellers, and was widely respected for his scholarship as well as his business acumen. His specialty was the history and literature of the Southeastern United States, and his inventory contained some of the finest books, maps, and manuscripts to ever describe the region. A Virginian by birth and a North Carolinian by choice, Doug had a deep appreciation for the richness of Southern history. He was a leading authority on the published history and manuscript records of the Confederacy, but he also sold rare books and manuscripts documenting the experiences of all walks of life. He was particularly interested in African American history, and in few places outside of his shop would one expect to find original photographs of Langston Hughes and John Lee Hooker, or the correspondence of Booker T. Washington and Ralph Bunche, laid so near to the original letters of Robert E. Lee and Stonewall Jackson. His interests were in no way restricted to an individual time or place, and his inventory included eyewitness accounts of early travel from around the globe; original 19th and early 20th century photographs of the West, American Indians, and the Klondike Gold Rush; works on all subjects illustrated with fine engravings or color plates; accounts of important advances in medicine, botany, and zoology; hand-press books dating from first century of printing (the 1400's) and from the first decades of printing in his native Shenandoah Valley; beautiful copies of many of the great modern first editions; the personal correspondence of Tennessee Williams, John Steinbeck, Willa Cather, D.H. Lawrence, and William Faulkner; and other treasures too diverse and numerous to mention here.
Part of his success as a bookseller lay in his acquisition of some of the finest private collections which became available locally and around the nation. Many of these collections were owned by people with little knowledge of rare books, who placed their trust in Doug to deal with them honestly. He gained this trust with his respectful, friendly, and forthright manner, and his well- deserved reputation for fairness. He believed in the open and free dissemination of information, and generously shared his expertise with anyone who would ask.
Doug will be affectionately remembered as an accomplished scholar, an esteemed businessman, a worthy sportsman, a loyal friend, and a loving husband. He will be missed.

"Stop All the Clocks"
Stop all the clocks,
cut off the telephone,
Prevent the dog from barking with a juicy bone,
Silence the pianos and with
muffled drum
Bring out the coffin, let the mourners come.

Let aeroplanes circle
moaning overhead
Scribbling on the sky
the message He is Dead,
Put crepe bows round the white necks of the public doves,
Let the traffic policemen wear black cotton gloves.

He was my North, my South, my East and West,
My working week and
my Sunday rest,
My noon, my midnight,
my talk, my song;

I thought that love would last for ever: I was wrong.

The stars are not wanted now: put out every one;
Pack up the moon and dismantle the sun;
Pour away the ocean and sweep up the wood.
For nothing now can ever come to any good.

-- W.H. Auden.

Published in The News & Observer on 4/15/2007.
Guest Book • Flowers • Gift Shop • Charities

That was sad news about Doug. I do find it a bit strange that the obit took so long to appear. I hadn't seen him much over the last couple of years since I really don't do the bar scene much these days. RIP.

Well he had been absent from the Socialist Club since an altercation with Jack. I believe he frequented the Speakeasy and Tyler's though I never ran into him there (I too am less "out and about" these days).

I did run into him near his office a week before he died and we talked briefly. And now he's dead. He was a mighty smart man. I missed talking NC history with him.

I saw him at the Speakeasy almost a year ago I believe. I always got along with him just fine. He was quite smart and I'll miss talking with him about a lot of things.

Not Chapel Hill but environs...Hillsborough:

http://www.chapelhillnews.com/110/story/6671.html

Quote:Troy named poet laureate
Chapel Hill bar owner has a verse for every occasion

By Emily Matchar, Staff Writer

HILLSBOROUGH -- From Homer's Greece to 15th-century Japan to Victorian England, wandering poets have entertained the public from street corners, pub stools and the steps of city hall.
In Hillsborough, Mike Troy is a modern version of the street corner bard. The barrel-chested 69-year-old is famous around these parts for greeting friends and strangers alike with a recitation of original verse from his perch at Cup A Joe coffee shop on King Street.

"Everybody knows Mike Troy," said Hillsborough resident Elizabeth Woodman.

Now, Troy is Hillsborough's first poet laureate.

Troy was chosen out of three applicants for the title by a committee of five local writers and artists. He will serve a two-year term, acting as a spokesman for the town, writing poems for special events and finding ways to promote Hillsborough through poetry, such as scheduling regular readings. The honorary title does not come with a salary.

Town board member Eric Hallman proposed having a town poet laureate, as Hillsborough has long been known as a haven for writers of all kinds. Carrboro appointed its first poet laureate in 2002 -- the winner reads his or her poems at town celebrations, including the annual Independence Day festivities.

A crowd of 50 gathered Saturday at the antebellum Burwell School building on North Churton Street to hear the announcement. Guests listened as Mayor Tom Stevens read a poem called "How to Eat a Poem" by Eve Merriam and public information officer Catherine Wright read an original poem about her grandfather.

Lucile Noell Dula, born in Hillsborough in 1914, was honored as poet laureate emerita for her work, which has included writing couplets for Hog Day and a Thanksgiving hymn that is sung every year at St. Matthew's Church.

"I can think of few things that have meant more to me than this," said Dula, a tiny white-haired woman who sat on a pillow in the front row during the ceremony.

Selection committee member Elizabeth Matheson said Troy stood out for his "evident joy" at living in Hillsborough.

"Every time I go downtown ... here comes Mike Troy, trotting up and thrusts a poem in my hand," she said. "And I just think, I am so glad I live here."

Woodman, who attended the ceremony, said she often runs into Troy while shopping or eating downtown.

"Every few weeks I'll chat with him and he'll recite a poem," she said. Woodman once went to Cup A Joe with a friend's 4-year-old, and, seeing Mike Troy, asked the little boy if he'd like to meet a poet.

"Mike immediately started quoting a wonderful poem about a growl-y bear," she said.

"Look at all this attention," said Troy, holding a satchel full of his own poems, printed on pink and green paper. "I know everybody."

A lawyer and owner of popular Chapel Hill beer garden He's Not Here, Troy grew up in Durham and spent much of his life in Chapel Hill before moving to Hillsborough four years ago.

So far he's published one volume of poetry, a marigold-orange pamphlet called "Joy Is a Garden."

In simple rhyming verse, he muses about why cats sit on their own tails, the zen of being a minnow, the pleasure of morning coffee in his own garden and his affection for Hillsborough's community of writers.

"Here in Hillsborough is just the best place in the world to be a poet," he said.





I Wish


By Mike Troy

There is a place where poets walk

And talk the talk that poets talk.

It isn't far or hard to find --

It lives in every heart and mind.

It's near a little hardware store

That always has an open door;

And from the door it's just one hop

To a magic coffee shop.

And while we're wishing, let's just say,

Next door we'll have a French cafe.

Out back, a bookshop on an alley

Completes our local Place Pigalle.

At sidewalk tables, people natter

Of anything that doesn't matter

In a dusky limelit time

Where dogs don't bark and poems rhyme.

Feel the pleasing rhyme and rhythm

Of human living that's filled with them.

Through all seasons, in all weather,

Living is what we do together.

So grab a table, take a cup,

Pull up a chair and fill a dish;

Lift your face -- the sun is up,

Close your eyes and say ... I WISH.

This is just wrong...

http://www.chapelhillnews.com/100/story/6704.html

Quote:Visitors bureau wants new slogan

By Mark Schultz, Staff Writer
CHAPEL HILL — You know that feeling you get when the Bradford pears are in bloom, when families in Carolina blue descend on Kenan, or anytime the students are gone?
You know, that feeling.

“When I bring my little girl downtown, we have this day together,” Dan Dunlop told the Chapel Hill Town Council Wednesday night. “We have lunch at Ham’s. We go to The Shrunken Head. I can’t tell you what that feeling is, but it’s a great feeling.”

The Chapel Hill/Orange County Visitor’s Bureau knows that feeling. Or at least Dunlop’s employer, Jennings, does. They’re thinking of tapping it for a new slogan to fill the county’s 1,400 hotel rooms:

“Chapel Hill — the feeling never leaves you.”

The only problem?

Chapel Hill already has a slogan, “The Southern Part of Heaven.”

It’s been around since Chapel Hill’s William Meade Prince called his memoir that in 1950. And Prince, now resting in the Old Chapel Hill Cemetery, isn’t the only one who might roll over at seeing it replaced after a half century.

When visitor’s bureau director Laurie Paolicelli and Jennings representatives introduced the possible new slogan, council member Mark Kleinschmidt noted other groups have tried new slogans too.

What’s wrong with the one we have? he asked.

Apparently plenty.

“It’s tough for all of us to think as the visitor,” Paolicelli said.

“The Southern Part of Heaven is a warm emotion that evokes happiness in all of us,” she said.

But in visitors? Not so much.

Based on interviews, outsiders said the phrase made them think of other things associated with the South: “a little bit conservative,” Paolicelli said. “Religious fundamentalism.”

“It was a surprise response,” she told the council.

And not at all what the bureau is going for: “a magic, an intangible, a feeling I want to come back,” Paolicelli said.

In a phone interview Friday, she emphasized that the bureau has not signed off on the new slogan. It will discuss it Wednesday and is considering ways to include Carrboro and Hillsborough in the slogan, either directly or alongside it on the bureau’s Web site.

Council member Sally Greene said the proposed slogan seems too generic.

“What I find missing is that ‘the feeling that never leaves you’ never says anything about our distinctive regional identity,” she said.

“You have a phrase that really could be applied to any city, any country in the world.”

They want to take away the "southern part of heaven?"

I say NO