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The Charlotte Male Academy opens to instruct pupils in Classical subjects, such as Latin and Greek. Young women who attend the new Charlotte Female Academy, which opened one year ago, have new course offerings for this year. They can study astronomy, chemistry, ethics and history.
February 22, 1865 - Columbia, South Carolina has suffered the destruction and occupation by General William T. Sherman's Union troops. Now Sherman begins to move north. The people of Charlotte brace for the attack. But the maneuver is a trick.
Edward Dilworth Latta opens a clothing store in Charlotte. Soon, this South Carolina descendent of Mecklenburg planter James Latta will become known as one of the Queen City's most influential men. He begins the Charlotte Consolidated Construction Company, called the 4Cs. E.D.
December 18, 1867 - Union forces who have been stationed in Charlotte finally depart. The city's residents have cooperated with the federal troops.
African American novelist Charles Waddell Chestnutt (1858-1932) leaves his home in Fayetteville and arrives in Charlotte to teach school. He is fifteen years old. Chestnutt would eventually become an assistant to the principal.
May 18, 1891 - The old horse-drawn trolley cars of downtown Charlotte have been replaced. Now, there is a street railway unlike anything seen before in the Queen City. The trolley is powered by electricity!
October 19, 1905By the time President Theodore Roosevelt visits Charlotte, the town has begun to transform itself into a New South city. It boasts cotton mills, its first suburbs, an electric trolley system, colleges, a concert hall and a library.
No other hotel will enhance the city's image as a modern business center more than the Selwyn, located at the corner of Trade and Church streets. It is named for Lord Selwyn, a British noblemen who once owned the land where Charlotte was settled.
On 1220 acres of farmland southeast of downtown Charlotte, landscape architect John Nolen is at work. He designs a neighborhood of winding streets, much different from the downtown grid pattern, for a new area called Myers Park. At the same time, developer E.D.
A Charlotte woman died because she was too embarrassed to let a male doctor examine her. Dr. Annie Alexander returns to Charlotte to become the city's first female physician. She has just earned the highest score in her class on Maryland's medical exams. Dr.
May 20, 1916 - The man who attended Davidson College for one year comes to Charlotte. He is now President Woodrow Wilson. It is blisteringly hot on Meck Dec Day, Mecklenburg's celebration of Independence. Mayor T.L.
Mayor Frank McNinch and other officials convince the federal government to build a military training facility west of downtown Charlotte. Camp Greene is named for General Nathanael Greene, who defended Mecklenburg from British attack during the Revolutionary War.
Cameron Morrison is the third Charlottean to serve as North Carolina's governor. His tireless campaign for better roads will earn him a nickname: the Good Roads Governor. In 1926, he will build a farm southeast of Charlotte and call it Morrocroft.
October 24, 1924 - The old dirt track has been replaced, and the first race is run on Charlotte's Speedway's new wooden track south of town. The 250-mile race draws nearly 50,000 fans. The track will operate until 1927, then close.
August 25, 1919 - Five men are killed and several more are wounded by police protecting Charlotte's streetcar barns against trolley workers who have walked off the job in a labor dispute, called a strike.
March 14, 1938 - Old #85 makes its last run as buses replace Charlotte's streetcars. The city continues to grow, and the streetcars that made turn-of-the-century suburban development possible are being replaced.
November 19, 1956 - The Public Library of Charlotte and Mecklenburg County boasts a new, modern facility on the North Tryon Street site of the old Carnegie Library.
September 11, 1955 - Named for outspoken civic leader David Ovens, the auditorium honoring him opens. Ovens once convinced Enrico Caruso, the world-renowned opera singer, to perform in the Queen City. Caruso claimed he had never sung anywhere smaller than Charlotte!
Civic leaders realize the importance of residential living in the center city. Charlotte banks, led by NCNB and First Union, offer low-interest loans to people willing to restore Fourth Ward's older homes and develop new housing in the old neighborhood.
September 11, 1974 - On approach to landing, Eastern Airlines flight 212 from Charleston, South Carolina, crashes into farmland three miles short of the runway at Charlotte-Douglas Airport. Most on board, 72 people, are killed. Only 10 people survive.