Volume XVII contains the history and rosters of the North Carolina Junior Reserves. The Junior Reserves were 17-year-old boys drafted in the last year of the war, as the Confederacy faced a disastrous shortfall in manpower. Between the spring and fall of 1864, North Carolina raised eight battalions of Junior Reserves that were later consolidated into three regiments and one independent battalion. These young men were originally intended to guard bridges and depots in North Carolina, but eventually were drawn into combat. The Junior Reserves saw action in a number of minor clashes in eastern North Carolina and southeastern Virginia, as well as the major battles of Fort Fisher and Bentonville.

An authoritative 120-page history begins the volume, followed by a complete roster and service records of the officers and men who served in the Junior Reserves. The service records include important information such as full name, rank, county of birth and residence, occupation, place and date of enlistment, age, whether the individual was wounded, captured, hospitalized, paroled, transferred, or promoted, and whether or not he died during the war. A thorough index completes the volume.

Matthew M. Brown received a B.A. in history from the University of Virginia and a J.D. from the UNC- Chapel Hill. Michael W. Coffey received a Ph.D in history from the University of Southern Mississippi.

“North Carolina Troops, 1861–1865: A Roster (Volume XVII: Junior Reserves)” (hardbound; pp. xvi, 509; index) costs $63.38 ($58.04, libraries), which includes tax and shipping. Order from the Historical Publications Section (N), Office of Archives and History, 4622 Mail Service Center, Raleigh, NC 27699-4622. For credit card orders call (919) 733-7442, ext. 0, or visit the section’s secure online store at http://nc-historical-publications.stores.yahoo.net/. Volume XVII is also available through Amazon.com.

The Historical Publications section is administered by the Office of Archives and History, part of the N.C. Department of Cultural Resources, the state agency dedicated to the promotion and protection of North Carolina’s arts, history and culture. Information is available at www.ncculture.com.

RALEIGH — All 27 N.C. State Historic Sites will be open on Independence Day, Saturday July 4. A number of the sites are planning special programs, including the State Capitol in Raleigh, Historic Halifax, the Battleship North Carolina in Wilmington, Roanoke Island Festival Park in Manteo and Tryon Palace Historic Sites and Gardens in New Bern.

All sites will be closed Friday, July 3, for the state holiday. For more information on individual sites’ schedules and programs, go to http:///www.nchistoricsites.org.

The Division of State Historic Sites and Properties is part of the N.C. Department of Cultural Resources, the state agency dedicated to the promotion and protection of North Carolina’s arts, history and culture. Join the Cultural Resources 2009 theme observance of “Treasure N.C. Culture.” For more information, visit www.ncculture.com.

Like other state historic sites, the Aycock Birthplace will be closed Friday, July 3, but open to visitors on Saturday, July 4.

It is often said that a house is not a home. So last week, after reconstruction of the childhood home of Governor Charles B. Aycock in Fremont finally was done, the first thing that Aycock Birthplace staff and other N.C. Historic Sites professionals did was to begin moving tables, chairs, beds, dressers and pictures back into the historic structure.

Most of these pieces had been salvaged from a fire that damaged the house on Jan. 24, 2008. The old furnishings included a dresser, five beds, four night stands, four blanket chests, a cradle and a small drop-leaf table. All these pieces were smoke damaged so they had to be cleaned by staff using special erasers and enzymatic solutions. Some of the furnishings needed extra care and were hauled to Historic Sites Conservator Jennifer French’s office in Durham.

Professional textile conservators were called in to help gently clean bed linens and other fabrics damaged in the fire. Cleaning historical artifacts is a painstaking process so it took several months to restore them. The staff also installed a few new pieces in the house, such as a 19th-century Victorian sofa and a slant-top desk.

After a few remaining furnishings are placed in the house and the tour information is updated to include information about the fire, plans are for tours of the governor’s family home to resume in late July.

Though the 2008 fire seriously damaged the main house, the state historic site subsequently reopened to the public and continues to present public programs. The period one-room schoolhouse and the historic area, including the kitchen, corn crib and smokehouses, have all remained open.

Visitors may also tour exhibits in the state historic site’s visitor center and watch a video on the late governor and his family.

A new exhibit recently installed at Aycock Birthplace State Historic Site also explains the governor’s key role in improving educational opportunities for deaf and blind North Carolinians, along with the evolution of a separate educational system for these populations.

Anyone wanting to aid in the home’s restoration may do so by contributing to the Aycock Birthplace Recovery and Restoration Fund. Contributions may be sent to Gov. Charles B. Aycock Birthplace, P.O. Box 207, Fremont, N.C. 27830.

Aycock Birthplace’s mission is to preserve and interpret the birthplace and history of Charles B. Aycock, emphasizing his contributions to public education in North Carolina. To reach the site, take U.S. 117 north nine miles from Goldsboro or U.S. 117 south 14 miles from Wilson. Turn right (from Goldsboro) or left (from Wilson) on Gov. Aycock Road. The site is 1-1/2 miles on the right. From I-95 take the U.S. 301 exit at Kenly. Take N.C. 222 east for 10 miles to Fremont and turn right on U.S. 117. Go two miles and turn left on Gov. Aycock Road.

Administered by the Division of State Historic Sites, Aycock Birthplace is part of the N.C. Department of Cultural Resources, the state agency dedicated to the promotion and protection of North Carolina’s arts, history and culture. Join the Cultural Resources 2009 theme observance of “Treasure N.C. Culture.” For more information, visit www.ncculture.com.

Burnt Swamp Baptist Church was founded on Oct. 2, 1877, by 20 Lumbee Indians, with encouragement from two local white churches. The Lumbee community had held impromptu church services for about two decades. After four years and continued growth, two additional churches were formed. On Jan. 22, 1881, elders of the three churches adopted a resolution forming the Burnt Swamp Missionary Baptist Association of Mixed Race. After years of struggling to gain acceptance and several name changes, the Burnt Swamp Missionary Baptist Association was admitted to the Baptist State Convention in 1929.

The association was instrumental in efforts to establish American Indian schools in Robeson and surrounding counties. Members helped to organize the Croatan Normal School in 1887. A source of pride to the area’s American Indian community, the school was the forerunner of UNC-Pembroke. Today the association includes Indian churches in nine counties in North and South Carolina as well as in Baltimore, Md., representing 69 churches and a mission. Members are associated with the Haliwa-Saponi, Lumbee, Pee Dee Coharie, Waccamaw-Siouan, and Tuscarora tribes.

For additional information on the marker dedication, call Rev. Michael Cummings, (910) 521-9850. For information on the Highway Historical Marker program, call Michael Hill, (919) 807-7290. The Highway Marker program within the Office of Archives and History is part of the N.C. Department of Cultural Resources, the state agency dedicated to the promotion and protection of North Carolina’s arts, history and culture. Now podcasting 24/7 with information about the Department of Cultural Resources, all available at www.ncculture.com

Children and teens up to age 18 are invited to sign up for “Be Creative @ Your Library” through Aug. 31 with the NCLBPH, which is operated by the State Library of North Carolina, a division of the N.C. Department of Cultural Resources. Young NCLBPH readers will read books of their choosing to explore new places, cultures, people and adventures, and will receive prizes for every five books completed.

To harmonize with the theme of creativity, the event will explore the worlds of art, music, dance and more with special stories about creative people with disabilities and a craft activity in which participants will make Native American rain sticks. All interested young readers who are eligible for NCLBPH services are invited to attend. Refreshments will be served.

The 2009 Summer Reading Program and related events are free, thanks to support provided by the Friends of the NCLBPH and by corporate sponsors Food Lion and Chic-Fil-A.

Registration for the 2009 Summer Reading Program is open to eligible readers until Aug. 1. For registration packets call the North Carolina Library for the Blind and Physically Handicapped at (919) 733-4376 or (888) 388-2460.

The Department of Cultural Resources is the state agency dedicated to enriching lives through opportunities to experience excellence in the arts, history and libraries.

“As our state struggles with an economic crisis not seen since the Great Depression, services to support North Carolina’s residents are especially crucial,” states Mary Boone, State Librarian. “Our staff has identified sites that are free or provided at reduced cost to support individuals and families struggling to make ends meet.”

Resources on the PEARL Web site are organized by the following topic areas: careers, family caregivers of children and adult dependents, health and wellness, housing and mortgage, personal finance, seniors, transportation and veterans. The site identifies many state and federal government resources available to the residents of North Carolina.

One resource already proven very popular is the Job Search Toolkit developed by the State Library in partnership with the Department of Commerce’s JobLink Career Centers, NC LIVE, the Employment Security Commission, and library staff from around the state. The toolkit provides a collection of resources for both library staff responding to the needs of job seekers, and job seekers hunting for employment. You can find out more at http://statelibrary.ncdcr.gov/ld/jobsearchtoolkit.html or by visiting your local public library.

The State Library is a division of the Department of Cultural Resources, the state agency dedicated to the promotion and protection of North Carolina’s arts, history and culture. It is now podcasting 24/7 with information about the Department of Cultural Resources, all available at www.ncculture.com.

In his 1883 publication of “Inquiries of Human Faculty,” Sir Francis Galton envisioned improving natural selection and “the inborn qualities of a race” by influencing intelligence. Beginning with Indiana in 1907, sterilization laws were passed in 32 states. The North Carolina legislature authorized sterilizations of patients or inmates of public institutions in 1929 “for the public good,” and authorized county commissioners to order sterilizations at the public expense of “any mentally defective or feeble-minded resident.” In 1933 the Eugenics Board was created to review all sterilization requests.

The science behind eugenics was discredited by the 1940s, but North Carolina policymakers held to the position that sterilization protected the poor and helped break the cycle of poverty. After 1945, the numbers of non-institutional sterilizations increased, many of whom were considered “uncontrollable” teenaged girls.

In 1972 the Eugenics Board became the Eugenics Commission, and the next year the legislature transferred to the judicial system the responsibility for sterilization procedures due to mental retardation or mental illness. The Eugenics Commission was abolished in 1977.

To view works from the Eugenics Board visit the State Library of North Carolina’s Eugenics digital collection.

For additional information on the N.C. Highway Historical Marker program, call Mike Hill, (919) 807-7290. The Highway Marker program is administered by the Office of Archives and History in the N.C. Department of Cultural Resources, the state agency dedicated to the promotion and protection of North Carolina’s arts, history and culture. Now podcasting 24/7 with information about the Department of Cultural Resources, all available at www.ncculture.com.

Selections from Cultural Resources Secretary Linda Carlisle were “The Speed of Trust” by Stephen Covey and “Look Homeward Angel,” by Thomas Wolfe – that after a trip to the Thomas Wolfe Memorial in Asheville. Chief Deputy Secretary Debra Derr endorsed “Passing Strange,” by Martha Sandweiss, the story of a white intellectual and geologist who chooses to pass as a black Pullman porter; and Deputy Secretary Jeffrey Crow read up on Andrew Jackson in “American Lion,” by John Mecham.

Other classics on the reading list include “Les Miserables,” by Victor Hugo, “Sense and Sensibility,” by Jane Austen, and “To Kill a Mockingbird,” by Harper Lee. Of 62 respondents and 135 titles, only five occurred twice. They are the Bible, “Look Homeward Angel,” “The Last Days of Blackbeard the Pirate,” by Kevin Duffus, “Slavery and Public History: The Tough Stuff of American Memory,” by James Oliver Horton and Lois E. Horton, and a Cultural Resources Book Club selection, “A Walk in the Woods,” by Bill Bryson.

Several other books on the topic of slavery were on the reading lists. Selections included “The Slave Ship,” by Marcus Rediker, “From Slavery to Freedom,” by John Hope Franklin, and “Slaves in the Family,” by Edward Ball.

Among books on the lives of women listed were “Elizabeth I,” by Anne Somerset, “Mrs. Lincoln: A Life,” by Catherine Clinton, and “Without Precedent: The Life of Susie Marshall Sharp.” Other titles are “Work and Women in Southern Colonies,” by Julia Cherry Spruill, “Governess: The Lives and Times of Real Jane Eyres,” by Ruth Brandon, and “The Mommy Myth: The Idealization of Motherhood and How it Has Undermined Women,” by Susan J. Douglass.

Among books of Faith on the list, other than the Bible, are “A Moment of Weakness,” by Karen Kingsbury, “Release Your Anointing: Tapping the Power of the Holy Spirit Within You,” by T.D. Jakes, “God’s Problem: Why the Bible Fails to Answer Our Most Important Question—Why We Suffer,” by Bart Ehrman, and “The Last Lecture,” by Randy Pausch.

North Carolina topics also made the list. “The North Carolina Gazetteer: A Dictionary of Tar Heel Places,” by William S. Powell, “Home to Holly Springs,” by Jan Karon, and “The USS Albemarle During World War II,” by Everett Green.

Self-help and How-to books are represented. “Eat this and Not That: A Supermarket Survival Guide,” by David Zinczenco, “How Parents Can Ignite the Hidden Strength of Teenagers,” by Peter L. Benson, “Genesis: The Single Woman’s Guide to Real Estate,” by Donna Raskin and Susan Hawthorn, and
“Act Like a Lady, Think Like a Man,” by Steve Harvey.

Summer reading is great for all ages, and there are scores of titles waiting to temp vacationers and stay-cationers as well. The public library has many books to loan to the truly budget conscious. The State Library is within the N.C. Department of Cultural Resources, the state agency dedicated to the promotion and protection of North Carolina’s arts, history and culture. Now podcasting 24/7 with information about the Department of Cultural Resources available at www.ncculture.com.

Michael was trying to find the actors participating in the performance Life/Theater: The Dash and marking his results on a special playbill/scorecard. Michael, along with all the other baseball fans at the stadium, were given a playbill/scorecard by the Southeastern Center for Contemporary Art (SECCA) outlining the roles that nine volunteer actors would be performing throughout the game. As the actors emerged out of the crowd and circulated through the stadium, fans checked off each performance on their scorecards as they spotted it in the stadium.

Both actors and fans were participating in an interactive performance event organized by Greensboro-based artist Lee Walton. His project Life/Theater: The Dash was part of SECCA’s larger Inside Out: Artists in the Community ll public art series. Walton’s project was co-presented by SECCA and the Winston-Salem Dash

SECCA curator Steven Matijcio said, “As people in the stands began to look more closely at one another and everything that surrounds the game on the field, this project became a ‘game within a game,’ like a visual scavenger hunt.”

The actors were subtle (and not-so-subtle) caricatures of fans who regularly add color and humor to the baseball-game experience. The roles included a fan with too much popcorn, a clumsy fan with drinks, a couple wearing matching outfits and a fan who stumbled as he walked up and down the aisles.

“The best one was the Stumbler,” said Michael. “It was really cool — the guy actually stumbled right over me. It was great.”

Patrick and Tina Boesel and their children Kyle and Erin also got a kick out of seeing how quickly they could spot the actors in the crowd. “We come to the Dash baseball games regularly,” Patrick said. “But playing ‘I Spy’ for these actors really adds to the good time we’re having as a family tonight. It’s given us all something extra to enjoy especially during down time on the field.”

Tina felt the most difficult characters to spot were the couple dressed alike. “Until you’re looking for something like this, you don’t realize just how many couples and families dress alike when they come to a ball game. When we spotted them we noticed that they even wore flowered sneakers alike — it was very clever.”

Lee Walton is also a UNC Greensboro art professor who organizes performance-based work out in the community. As a former college baseball player and avid sports fan, Walton often incorporates elements of athletics and sports events in his work. For more information on his work, visit his Web site at www.leewalton.com or www.secca.org.

Inside Out: Artists in the Community ll is supported by a grant from The Arts Council of Winston-Salem and Forsyth County with funding from the National Endowment for the Arts, which believes that a great nation deserves great art, and by a program grant provided by the James G. Hanes Foundation. In-kind support is provided by the Sundance Plaza Hotel, Spa and Wellness Center and AdColor.

SECCA is designed to involve audiences in the art of our time. SECCA is an operating entity of the North Carolina Museum of Art, an agency of the N.C. Department of Cultural Resources. SECCA is also a funded partner of The Arts Council of Winston-Salem and Forsyth County.

RALEIGH – Middle schoolers and kids everywhere can explore the wreck of Blackbeard’s purported flagship, Queen Anne’s Revenge (QAR), in the new Blackbeard’s Escape video game. It was June 1718 that the Queen Anne’s Revenge ran aground in Beaufort Inlet. Players now get to fire cannon and attack a ship in flashbacks to the 1700s, and also learn about recovering and conserving artifacts today from the QAR wreck site.

The game comes with instructions and explanations on how it works as well as the research and design process. It will help students and teachers learn to navigate and appreciate the game, downloadable at www.BlackbeardsEscape.com. It requires the full version of Unreal Tournament 3 and the 2.0 patch to run. Instructions on downloading are provided. Blackbeard’s Escape is a non-violent educational game, but parents should note that some violent games also are on the Unreal 3 platform.

Developed by computer science and industrial design students at N.C. State University (NCSU), the game lets students learn while having fun. Computer science students of Dr. R. Michael Young, and industrial design students of Dr. Timothy Buie, formed teams to develop this game and a futuristic pirate based game employing light and physics. Blackbeard’s Escape is played in the role of a junior archaeologist who uses a pneumatic chisel to clean shipwreck recovered objects, and also visits the time period when the item was in use. Developed in cooperation with historians and conservators from the N.C. Department of Cultural Resources, the game likely is the most accurate game depiction of piracy available. Players learn about good diving practices and artifact recovery as well. Teachers and students too can learn more about pirates and the shipwreck recovery process.

After an exhaustive few weeks of wrap up, the game was kid-tested at project presentations at semester’s end at NCSU. The student designers were delighted that Blackbeard’s Escape was a hit. “We were surprised at how well they took to it,” recalls Mike Winters, team leader. “In some cases they were better than us.”

“Some of the kids referred to other games they had, like Halo and Call of Duty,” explains Tyler Arehart, who worked on artificial intelligence. “They quickly figured it out.”

The probable QAR shipwreck was located in November 1996 by Intersal, Inc., with information provided to Operations Director Mike Daniel by company President Phil Masters. Subsequent research led by state archaeologists over 12 years supports the shipwreck identity as the QAR.

For additional game information contact Mike@mike-winters.com. For shipwreck information contact Fay.Mitchell@ncdcr.gov or (919) 807-7389 o. The Queen Anne’s Revenge Shipwreck Project is administered by the Office of Archives and History in the N.C. Department of Cultural Resources, the state agency dedicated to the promotion and protection of North Carolina’s arts, history and culture. Now podcasting 24/7 with information about the Department of Cultural Resources available at www.ncculture.com.