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Carl Sandburg in Chapel Hill

Posted on October 13, 2011 by Staff

A Thousand Words
By Jock Lauterer


Carl Sandburg, Pulitzer Prize-winning poet, author and historian, was a Midwesterner by birth, but he chose to be a North Carolinian for the last 22 years of his prodigiously productive writing life. What may be less appreciated is Sandburg’s connection to Chapel Hill. During the ’40s and ’50s, when he was doing research for his books, Sandburg was drawn to the resources of UNC’s Wilson Library, led at the time by Head Librarian Charles E. Rush. Happily for me, Charlie Rush was my beloved granddad – and the resulting friendship between the writer and the librarian blessed me (sitting rapt at Sandburg’s knee) with memorable joke-swapping, storytelling and folksinging sessions. All this came to mind during a recent visit to the local studios of WUNC-FM, where this lovely black-and-white photograph hangs on the wall. It appears to have been shot in the mid-’60s when Sandburg agreed to an interview during WUNC’s early days in the Swain Hall studios. (A visit to “Connemara,” Sandburg’s home in Flat Rock, just west of Hendersonville, should be on every Tar Heel’s bucket list. Check out this National Historic Site at nps.gov/carl

A THOUSAND WORDS
Do you have an important old photo that you value? Email your photo to jock@email.unc.edu and include the story behind the picture. Because every picture tells a story. And its worth? A thousand words.
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