Qualla: North Carolina Museum of History

North Carolina Museum of History: Introduction

Sat, 30 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit XeresNelro, CC BY-SA 4.0. Fred Olds liked stories more than objects. In the late nineteenth century, the newspaperman traveled to every one of North Carolina's hundred counties, at least once each, collecting whatever pieces of the past people would give him, and writing down what those people said about them. He came home with a studded shoe buckle once owned by founding father James Iredell, the death mask of Confederate General Robert Hoke, and the philosophy that still runs the museum today: the artifact is only the door, the story is the room. On December 5, 1902, Olds merged his private collection with what the state already had on display, opened the doors as the Hall of History, and never really retired.

Image: XeresNelro | CC BY-SA 4.0

North Carolina Museum of History: Thirty-Seven Cases and the Father of the Museum

Sat, 30 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Abbylabar, CC BY-SA 3.0. The Hall of History opened with thirty-seven display cases inside a corner of the State Museum, which has since grown into the modern North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences. Olds's collection mixed the grand and the strange. There were tools and weapons, photographs and clothe...

Image: Abbylabar | CC BY-SA 3.0

North Carolina Museum of History: A Twenty-Nine-Million-Dollar Home on Edenton Street

Sat, 30 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit DiscoA340, CC BY-SA 4.0. On June 16, 1988, the state broke ground for a dedicated museum building at 5 East Edenton Street, in the block between the State Capitol and the Legislative Building. The new museum opened in 1994. It cost over twenty-nine million dollars and gave the collection 55,000 square fe...

Image: DiscoA340 | CC BY-SA 4.0

North Carolina Museum of History: Tar Heel Junior Historians

Sat, 30 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Daderot, Public domain. In 1953 the North Carolina General Assembly authorized the Tar Heel Junior Historian Association. Seven decades later, it is still one of the largest history-focused youth networks in the country. Free clubs operate in public, private, and home schools across the state, in 4-H gr...

Image: Daderot | Public domain

North Carolina Museum of History: The North Carolina Sports Hall of Fame

Sat, 30 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Alexisrael, CC BY-SA 3.0. On the third floor, 4,000 square feet are devoted to the North Carolina Sports Hall of Fame, founded in February 1963 by the Charlotte Chamber of Commerce. Inductees donate mementos. The gallery now holds Richard Petty's race car, Dale Earnhardt's fire suit, Arnold Palmer's Ryder...

Image: Alexisrael | CC BY-SA 3.0