Restrictions to Access

No restrictions. Open for research.

Restrictions to Use

No usage restrictions.

Copyright Notice

Copyright is retained by the authors of items in these papers, or their descendants, as stipulated by United States copyright law.

Preferred Citation

[Identification of item], in the William Kennedy Blake Recollections, #71-z, Southern Historical Collection, The Wilson Library, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

Alternate Form of Material

Microfilm copy available.

Acquisitions Information

Received prior to 1940.

Location of Originals

Original privately held in 1940.

Additional Descriptive Resources

A copy of the original finding aid for this collection is filed in folder 1.

Sensitive Materials Statement

Manuscript collections and archival records may contain materials with sensitive or confidential information that is protected under federal or state right to privacy laws and regulations, the North Carolina Public Records Act (N.C.G.S. § 132 1 et seq.), and Article 7 of the North Carolina State Personnel Act (Privacy of State Employee Personnel Records, N.C.G.S. § 126-22 et seq.). Researchers are advised that the disclosure of certain information pertaining to identifiable living individuals represented in this collection without the consent of those individuals may have legal ramifications (e.g., a cause of action under common law for invasion of privacy may arise if facts concerning an individual's private life are published that would be deemed highly offensive to a reasonable person) for which the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill assumes no responsibility.

Processed by: SHC Staff

Encoded by: Noah Huffman, December 2007

Updated by: Kate Stratton and Jodi Berkowitz, January 2009; Nancy Kaiser, August 2020

This collection was rehoused and a summary created with support from the National Endowment for the Humanities.

This finding aid was created with support from NC ECHO.

The following terms from Library of Congress Subject Headings suggest topics, persons, geography, etc. interspersed through the entire collection; the terms do not usually represent discrete and easily identifiable portions of the collection--such as folders or items.

Clicking on a subject heading below will take you into the University Library's online catalog.

• Ansonville (N.C.)--Social life and customs.
• Autobiographies--Southern States.
• Blake, William Kennedy, 1824-1897.
• College presidents--South Carolina--History--19th century.
• Confederate States of America--Social conditions.
• Education--North Carolina--History--19th century.
• Fayetteville (N.C.)--Social life and customs.
• Frontier and pioneer life--Texas--Leon County.
• Greensboro (N.C.)--Social life and customs.
• Leon County (Tex.)--Social life and customs.
• Merchants--South Carolina--History--19th century.
• Methodist Church--Education--South Carolina.
• Spartanburg (S.C.)--History--19th century.
• Teachers--Southern States--History--19th century.
• Universities and colleges--North Carolina--History--19th century.
• University of North Carolina (1793-1962)--Students--History--19th century.
• Women's colleges--South Carolina--History--19th century.

William Kennedy Blake (1824-1897) was born in Fayetteville, N.C., where he spent most of his childhood. He attended Randolph Macon College in Boydton, Va., 1843, and graduated from the University of North Carolina in 1846. In October 1848 Blake married Ella Lavainia Hawley and moved to Leon County, Tex., where he worked as a teacher and lawyer until 1850. In 1850, he returned to North Carolina and continued to work as a teacher until 1859. He became president of a Methodist women's college in Spartanburg, S.C., in 1859 where he remained until shortly after the Civil War, at which point he began a mercantile business.

The 90-page typescript copy of "Pen Sketches of My Life, Written for the Gratification of my Children," is an unordered collection of William Kennedy Blake's recollections written by Blake between 1893 and 1895. Included are descriptions of Blake's family and boyhood in Fayetteville, N.C.; his education at Randolph Macon College in Boydton, Va., and the University of North Carolina; teaching and frontier life in Leon County, Tex., 1848-1850; teaching at schools in Fayetteville, N.C., Greensboro, N.C., and Ansonville, N.C., in the 1850s; and serving as president of a Methodist women's college in Spartanburg, S.C., from 1859 until shortly after the Civil War. He describes life in Spartanburg during the Civil War and briefly mentions his mercantile business in Spartanburg thereafter.

Also mentioned in the narratives are Lorenzo Dow, the Fayetteville Independent Light Infantry, a comet of 1836, scarlet fever and cholera outbreaks, and other tangential events and persons.

• Microfilm (M-00071/1)