watching american history tv every weekend on c-span 3 explore our nation's past american history tv on c-span 3 created by america's cable television companies and today we're brought to you by these television companies who provide american history tv to viewers as a public service. the c-span cities tour travels the country exploring the american story since 2011. we've been to more than 200 communities across the nation like many americans our staff is staying close to home due to the coronavirus. next a look at one of our city's tour visits. today we are on the campus of the university of north carolina at chapel hill. unc chapel hill is the first state university in the country. this is a contested claim that we argue with the university of georgia about in both schools. have a good claim to make university of georgia was chartered first. they received their charter in

1785. the unc's charter came a few years later, but unc was first to open and had already graduated a couple of classes before the university of georgia the university in the city were founded at the same time. so when this area was selected as the side of the university, there was no town or village here. there were a few neighboring farms. there was an anglican chapel located on what's now the side of the caroline in but there was no town to speak of so on the day that they laid the cornerstone for the first university building. i also had an auction of town lots so that you know, they understood that if the university was going to succeed they needed to be a town around it to support it for, you know to provide businesses places for people to live. and so really the town of chapel hill university where and in essence born on the same day the university was chartered in 1789 the ground broke for the first building in 1793, and then it was about a year and a half later in 1795 when the university opened they held an opening ceremony in january

1795. they had, you know events on campus here. no students showed up it took another few weeks before the first student arrived. his name was hinton james and he came over 100 miles from near the coast of north carolina and he was the entire student body for about two weeks before more students gradually drifted onto campus for its first century. it was a school for white man only and it was only until the 1890s that women were first admitted to the university in the university did not integrate admitting african-american and other students of color until the 1950s. it's really impossible to talk about the history of the university without talking about slavery and slave people were involved in the construction of all of the early campus buildings the earliest oldies the one behind me now south building in the in the construction and can subsequent renovation. we also know that slavery played a role in the financing of the university and this was due to the fact that the state legislature did not originally a lot funding for the university instead. they provided funds through what they call this sheets and this

meant that any unclaimed property. so if somebody north going to died without a legal air that property would revert to the become the ownership in the university the university would sell it and and take the proceeds. this is usually in the form of land but there are a number of cases where the university clearly inherited enslaved people and immediately ordered them to be sold to finance the university. so leading up to the civil war slavery was an integral part of life in the town of chapel hill and and at the university of north carolina and students and faculty were were overwhelmingly, you know on the side of the confederacy the campus kind of dwindled in the years up to the civil war a lot of students left to enlist the university stayed open, but but barely at the only at the end of the war did troops make it into the village of chapel hill and the university administrators and other state leaders managed to negotiate to prevent the

university from from being destroyed. but there were, you know soldiers from from many united states regiments, you know housed on campus and in nearby towns so things really begin to change for the university and the town in the 1880s and 1890s in 1880s a branch of the railroad finally came to town. it was actually just west of chapel hill and what we know it was carrboro a couple of textile mills developed there and so finally industry for the the town in nearby communities began to develop outside of the university in the 1890s the university really began a drive toward or becoming a modern research university. so this meant, you know expanding enrollment developing a graduate school and really making a more concerted effort to be involved in a positive way with the life of the entire state of north carolina. so university really began to grow in prestige and in national reputation, i would say in the 1920s and 30s. and this was when it was embarking on a really ambitious

building and and growth campaign in some extents inspired by state universities in the midwest and and other parts of the country but the university begin to engage with not just the state of north carolina, but also the region and those kind of academic programs attracted students from all over the country and they also brought a lot of attention to university faculty and you know begin to develop this, you know reputation as it, you know, a regional leader certainly, but also a national leader in public higher education. the university today is dramatically different from from how it was when it was founded. you know, some of the buildings are still here, but it's it's hard to imagine this kind of rustic isolated place from 200 years ago and the bustling public university it is now so what unc is now is a modern global public university has deeply committed to the state of north carolina, but also has ties to programs and and research facilities all over the

world. so it's it's right still located in the heart of the state and it's still at the center of you know public life in north carolina, and i think that's something that's really important. you can watch this and other programs on the history of communities across the country at c-span.org cities tour. this is american history tv only on c-span 3. each week on reel america. we journey through the century with archival films in the next two hours. we'll focus on the 1930s great depression era. first three newsreels produced by mgm studios for the 1934 governors campaign and we'll talk with journalist greg mitchell who argues they were the first modern attack ads in 40 minutes the first of three interior department films that highlight the efforts of the civilian conservation corps or ccc. it's emergency conservation work in the great smoky mountains

national park from 1936. in 50 minutes we travel back to 1937 outdoors in the garden stage shows young men employed by the ccc working to protect and maintain new jersey state parks. and finally