research triangle park

Research Triangle Park

Written By North Carolina History Project

During the mid-1950s, business and government leaders worried about North Carolina’s economic future.   The per capita income ($1,049) was one of the lowest in the Southeast and in the nation, and the state seemed dependent on manufacturing jobs in the agriculture, forestry, and furniture, and textile industries.  Leaders, including Robert Hanes, the president of Wachovia Bank and Trust Company, and Romeo Guest, a Greensboro contractor, planned how to attract modern industries to the Tar Heel State.   Research Triangle Park (RTP) was their brainchild, and it later became one of the top five research centers in the United States.   According to historian Numan V. Bartley, RTP was the “South’s most successful high-technology venture.”

Since 1952, UNC sociologist Howard Odum had suggested that the state should take advantage of the Triangle’s three research universities: UNC-Chapel Hill, North Carolina State, and Duke University.  Leaders decided that RTP should be a private endeavor, with cooperation from the universities, instead of being a government-sponsored action.

Developers had to overcome a few problems. Leaders worked to rehabilitate the state’s image to attract companies (and their employees) from across the nation.  One, the rest of the nation watched and read news reports detailing the Civil Rights Movement.  Two, developers had to convince prospective companies that the South was capable of handling such a research park.  Developers also needed to raise money and purchase land.

The first couple years were uneventful, but when the venture changed from profit to non-profit status, the proposed research center seemed possible.  With Governor Luther Hodges’s endorsement, the Research Triangle Committee was formed in 1956, and its executive director, George Simpson, approached Karl Robbins in 1957 to develop land for the proposed research park. Robbins created Pineland, Inc., a stock venture to purchase land for the potential center.  Few people purchased stock in the company, so developers sought corporate and institutional funding.  The Research Triangle Institute (RTI) was formed in 1958 and operated independently from the area universities. In a year, RTI had raised $1.5 million.

Five companies located in RTP at the end of 1959, and the research center continued to attract more.  (The Research Triangle Foundation was formed in 1959, and it managed RTP.)  By the mid-1960s, public confidence in the feasibility of the Park’s long-term success was solidified: International Business Machines (IBM) announced its plans for a 400-acre, 600,000 square foot research facility in RTP, and the U.S. Department of Health, Education, and Welfare publicized its plans to establish its National Environment Health Service Center at RTP.

According to Research Triangle Park: Evolution and Renaissance , the Park annually averaged six companies and 1,800 new employees over the next four decades.  During the 1990s technological boom, RTP’s employment numbers reached its peak at approximately 45,000.  Today, RTP houses nearly 140 businesses that employ approximately 38,000.  Corporations include GlaxoSmithKline, IBM, Nortel Networks, and Cisco Systems.

Numan V. Bartley, The New South, 1945-1980: The Story of the South’s Modernization (Baton Rouge, 1995); William S. Powell, Encyclopedia of North Carolina (Chapel Hill, 2006); Rick L. Weddle, Elizabeth Rooks, and Tina Valdecanas, Research Triangle Park: Evolution and Renaissance.  Paper presented to International Association of Science Parks World Conference, 2006.

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• Primary Source: Will of Susanna Robisson, 1709
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• Primary Source: Will of Samuel Nicholson, 1727
• Primary Source: Will of William Cartright, Sr., 1733
• Primary Source: Probate Inventory of James and Anne Pollard, Tyrrell County, 1750
• Primary Source: Will of Richard Blackledge, Craven County, 1776
• Primary Source: Probate Inventory of Richard Blackledge, Craven County, 1777
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• Primary Source: Orange County Inhabitants Petition Governor Tryon
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• Timeline of Resistance, 1763–1774
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• Primary Source: The First Provincial Congress
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• Primary Source: Backcountry Residents Proclaim Their Loyalty
• Primary Source: The Committees of Safety
• Primary Source: Loyalist Perspective on the Violence in Wilmington
• Timeline of the Revolution 1775–1779
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• Primary Source: The Mecklenburg Resolves
• Josiah Martin and His Exit from New Bern
• "Liberty to Slaves": The Response of Free and Enslaved Black People to Revolution
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• Primary Source: Lord Dunmore's Proclamation
• Primary Source: A Virginian Responds to Dunmore's Proclamation
• The Battle of Moores Creek Bridge
• Primary Source: Mary Slocumb at Moores Creek Bridge: The Birth of a Legend
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• Primary Source: Minutes on The Halifax Resolves
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• Primary Source: The Transylvania Purchase and the Treaty of Sycamore Shoals, March 17, 1775
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• Primary Source: Cherokee Leaders Speak About Land Cessions
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• The Southern Campaign
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• Primary Source: Nathaniel Macon on Democracy
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• Primary Source: Rachel Allen's Experience as Midwife and use of Herbal Medicine
• Primary Source: A Father's Advice to His Sons
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• Primary Source: Excerpt from Schoepf on the Auction of Enslaved People in Wilmington
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• Into the Wilderness: Circuit Riders Take Religion to the People
• A Camp Meeting Scene
• What a Religious Revival Is
• Primary Source: Description of a Nineteenth Century Revival
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• Primary Source: "Be saved from the jaws of an angry hell"
• Primary Source: John Jea's Narrative on Slavery and Christianity
• Primary Source: Excerpt from "Elizabeth, a Colored Minister of the Gospel, Born in Slavery"
• John Chavis
• The Development of Sacred Singing
• Searching for Greener Pastures: Out-Migration in the 1800s
• Migration Into and Out of North Carolina: Exploring Census Data
• Primary Source: North Carolina's Leaders Speak Out on Emigration
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• Primary Source: "A poor, ignorant, squalid population"
• Primary Source: Archibald Murphey Proposes a System of Public Education
• Primary Source: Archibald Murphey Calls for Better Inland Navigation
• Canova's Statue of Washington
• Primary Source: A Free School in Beaufort
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• The University of North Carolina Opens
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• Primary Source: A Bill to Prevent All Persons from Teaching Slaves to Read or Write, the Use of Figures Excepted (1830)
• Primary Source: Advertisements for Child Academies
• Primary Source: First Year at New Garden Boarding School
• A Timeline of North Carolina Colleges (1766–1861)
• The North Carolina Gold Rush
• The Reed Gold Mine
• Primary Source: From the North Carolina Gold-Mine Company
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• Primary Source: The Workings of a Gold Mine
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• Primary Source: Elisha Mitchell Explores the Mountains
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• The Expansion of Slavery and the Missouri Compromise
• Nat Turner's Rebellion
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• Primary Source: "Fear of Insurrection"
• Primary Source: Reporting on Nat Turner: The North Carolina Star, Sept. 1
• Primary Source: Reporting on Nat Turner: The Raleigh Register, Sept. 1
• Primary Source: Reporting on Nat Turner: The Raleigh Register, Sept. 15
• Primary Source: News Reporting of Insurrections in North Carolina
• Primary Source: Hysteria in Wilmington
• Primary Source: Letter Concerning Nat Turner's Rebellion
• Primary Source: Remembering Nat Turner
• The Cherokee and the Trail of Tears
• The Cherokee Language and Syllabary
• Primary Source: Andrew Jackson Calls for Indian Removal
• Primary Source: "We have unexpectedly become civilized"
• Primary Source: The Indian Removal Act of 1830
• Primary Source: Cherokee Nation v. the State of Georgia, 1831
• Primary Source: Chief John Ross Protests the Treaty of New Echota
• Primary Source: A Soldier Recalls the Trail of Tears
• Primary Source: The Legend of Tsali
• Whigs and Democrats
• Reform Movements Across the United States
• Primary Source: 1835 Amendments to the North Carolina Constitution
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• Primary Source: North Carolina's First Public School Opens
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• Dorothea Dix Hospital
• Primary Source: Dorothea Dix Pleads for a State Mental Hospital
• Primary Source: The Raleigh Female Benevolent Society
• Distribution of Land and Slaves
• Social Divisions in Antebellum North Carolina
• Primary Source: North Carolina v. Mann
• Primary Source: The Quakers and Anti-Slavery
• Levi Coffin and the Underground Railroad
• Negotiated Segregation in Salem
• Primary Source: Ned Hyman's Appeal for Manumission
• Primary Source: A Petition to Free a White Slave
• Primary Source: A Sampling of Black Codes
• Primary Sources: Advertising Recapture and Sale of Enslaved People
• Primary Source: Freedom-Seekers and the Great Dismal Swamp
• Primary Source: Antislavery Feeling in the Mountains
• Primary Source: James Evan's Seasons on a Farm
• Primary Source: Henry William Harrington Jr.'s Diary
• Primary Source: Diary of a Farm Wife
• Primary Source: The Duties of a Young Woman
• Primary Source: Southern Cooking and Housekeeping Book, 1824
• Primary Source: Thomas Bowie's diary
• Primary Source: Court Days
• Primary Source: A Bilious Fever
• Bright Leaf Tobacco
• Primary Source: Frederick Law Olmstead on Naval Stores in Antebellum North Carolina
• Primary Source: Stagville Plantation Expenses Records
• Plantation Records: Property
• Primary Source: Stagville Plantation Expansion Records
• Antebellum Homes and Plantations
• The Life of an Enslaved Person
• Primary Source: Excerpt from James Curry's Autobiography
• Primary Source: Interview with Fountain Hughes
• Primary Source: Harriet Jacobs Book Excerpt
• Primary Source: Lunsford Lane Buys His Freedom
• Primary Source: James Curry Escapes from Slavery
• Jonkonnu in North Carolina
• Primary Source: Cameron Family Plantation Records
• Towns and Villages
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• Businesses by County, 1854
• Thomas Day, Black Craftsman
• American Indian Cabinetmakers in Piedmont North Carolina
• The Nissen Wagon Works
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• Estimated Cost of the North Carolina Rail Road, 1851
• The Wilmington and Weldon Railroad
• Primary Source: Railroad Timetables
• The Fayetteville and Western Plank Road
• Primary Source: Jane Caroline North's Traveling Diary
• Joining Together in Song: Piedmont Music in Black and White
• Primary Source: African American Spirituals
• Primary Source: The Gospel Train
• Primary Source: I'm Gwine Home on de Mornin' Train
• Primary Source: Long Way to Travel
• Frankie Silver: Female Folklore Legend
• Primary Source: The Ballad of Frankie Silver
• Primary Source: All Hail to Thee, Thou Good Old State
• Primary Source: The Old North State
• George Moses Horton
• Primary Source: George Moses Horton's "Death of an Old Carriage Horse"
• From Pro-Slavery to Secession
• The Mexican-American War
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• Primary Source: Hedrick's Defense
• Primary Source: UNC Dismisses Benjamin Hedrick
• Primary Source: Helper's The Impending Crisis of the South
• Primary Source: Furor Over Hinton Helper's Book
• The Election of 1860
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• Fort Sumter
• Primary Source: North Carolinians Debate Secession
• Primary Source: A Virginia Boy Volunteers
• Primary Source: A UNC Student Asks to Sign Up
• Primary Source: North Carolina Secedes
• Primary Source: The North Carolina Oath of Allegiance
• Primary Source: "The Southern Cross"
• North and South in 1861
• Timeline of the Civil War, July 1861-July 1864
• The Civil War: from Bull Run to Appomattox
• North Carolina as a Civil War Battlefield: May 1861-April 1862
• The Union Blockade
• Primary Source: Rose O'Neal Greenhow Describes the Battle of Manassas
• Tar Heels Pitch In
• Primary Source: Girls Helping the Cause
• The Burnside Expedition
• War on the Outer Banks
• Primary Source: The Battle of Roanoke Island
• Primary Source: The Burning of Elizabeth City
• The Battle of New Bern
• North Carolina as a Civil War Battlefield, May 1862–November 1864
• Primary Source: The Raleigh Standard Protests Conscription
• Primary Source: Running the Blockade
• Primary Source: Cargo Manifests of Confederate Blockade Runners
• Primary Source: Freed People at New Bern
• Primary Source: The Emancipation Proclamation
• Primary Source: Iowa Royster on the March into Pennsylvania
• African American Soldiers
• The Thomas Legion
• Primary Source: The Capture of Plymouth
• Civil War Casualties
• The Life of a Civil War Soldier
• Small Arms in the Civil War
• Civil War Uniforms
• Soldiers' Food
• Primary Source: Rose O'Neal Greenhow to Jefferson Davis
• Primary Source: "My dear little darling"
• Primary Source: Life in Camp
• Primary Source: A Plea for Supplies
• Civil War Army Hospitals
• Primary Source: Enduring Amputation
• Salisbury Prison
• Primary Source: Vance's Proclamation Against Deserters
• Primary Source: "I am sorry to tell that some of our brave boys has got killed"
• Primary Source: "My dear I ha'n't forgot you"
• Zebulon Vance
• The Roanoke Island Freedmen's Colony
• Paper Money in the Civil War
• Primary Source: Pleading for Corn
• Primary Source: A Female Raid
• Primary Source: "No one has anything to sell"
• The Shelton Laurel Massacre
• Primary Source: The Home Guard
• Primary Source: A Civil War at Home: Treatment of Unionists
• The Lowry War
• Primary Source: Life Under Union Occupation
• Timeline of the Civil War, August 1864–May 1865
• North Carolina as a Civil War Battlefield, November 1864–May 1865
• Primary Source: The Destruction of the CSS Albemarle
• Wilmington, Fort Fisher, and the Lifeline of the Confederacy
• Primary Source: Lincoln's Plans for Reconstruction
• Primary Source: An Account of Stoneman's Raid
• Sherman's March Through North Carolina
• Primary Source: "Where Home Used to Be"
• Primary Source: The Battle of Bentonville
• The Assassination of Abraham Lincoln
• Johnston Surrenders
• Mustering Out of the Confederate Army
• Primary Source: Parole Signed by the Officers and Men in Johnston's Army
• Primary Source: "For us the War is Ended"
• Primary Source: Catherine Anne Devereux Edmondston and the Collapse of the Confederacy
• Primary Source: May 1865 Advertisements
• Primary Source: What Justice Entitles Us To
• Primary Source: Character of Men Employed as Scouts
• Early Schools for Freed People
• Primary Source: Freedmen's Schools the school houses are crowded, and the people are clamorous for more
• Primary Source: Louisa Jacobs on Freedmen
• Primary Source: Address of The Raleigh Freedmen's Convention
• Primary Source: Reuniting Families
• Making Marriages Legal
• Primary Source: Charges of Abuse
• Reconstruction
• Timeline of Reconstruction in North Carolina
• Reconstruction in North Carolina
• Primary Source: Johnson's Amnesty Proclamation
• Primary Source: Amnesty Letters
• Primary Source: Black Codes in North Carolina, 1866
• Primary Source: Catherine Edmondston and Reconstruction
• Primary Source: Amending the U.S. Constitution
• African Americans Get the Vote in Eastern North Carolina
• Primary Source: Military Reconstruction Act
• Disabled Veterans of the Civil War, Part I
• Disabled Veterans of the Civil War, Part II
• Disabled Veterans of the Civil War, Part III
• Carpetbaggers
• John Adams Hyman
• The 1868 Constitution
• Redemption and Redeemers in the South
• Primary Source: Republican Rule
• Primary Source: Conservative Opposition
• Primary Source: The Rise of the Ku Klux Klan
• Primary Source: Governor Holden Speaks Out Against the Ku Klux Klan
• The Kirk-Holden War
• Primary Source: The Murder of "Chicken" Stephens
• Primary Source: "Address to the Colored People of North Carolina"
• The Compromise of 1877
• The Lost Cause
• Life on the Land: The Piedmont Before Industrialization
• A Revolution in Agriculture
• Sharecropping and Tenant Farming
• Primary Source: Life on the Land: Voices
• Primary Source: A Sharecropper's Contract
• The Struggles of a Tenant Farmer
• Primary Source: The Evils of the Crop Lien System
• Tobacco Farming the Old Way
• The History of the State Fair
• The African American State Fair
• Growth and Transformation: the United States in the Gilded Age
• Primary Source: Henry Grady and the "New South"
• Industrialization in North Carolina
• The Growth of Cities
• Immigration in U.S. History
• Railroads in Western North Carolina
• The Dukes of Durham
• The Tobacco Industry and Winston-Salem
• The Textile Industry and Winston-Salem
• Primary Source: Small-Town Businesses, 1903
• Primary Source: New Machine Shop in Plymouth, N.C.
• The Belk Brothers' Department Stores
• Work in a Textile Mill
• Primary Source: Working in a Tobacco Factory
• Life in the Mill Villages
• Primary Source: Mill Villages
• Mill Village and Factory: Voices
• Inventions in the Tobacco Industry
• The Bonsack Machine and Labor Unrest
• Workers' Pay and the Cost of Living
• The Struggles of Labor and the Rise of Labor Unions
• Primary Source: The Knights of Labor
• Primary Source: Opposition to the Knights of Labor
• Primary Source: Tobacco Workers Strike
• Timeline of North Carolina Colleges and Universities, 1865–1900
• North Carolina State University
• A Women's College
• Primary Source: Student Life at the Normal and Industrial School
• Primary Source: Wealth and Education by the Numbers, North Carolina 1900
• The Colored State Normal Schools
• Primary Source: African American College Students, 1906
• The Biltmore Forest School
• Biltmore Estate
• Primary Source: Charles Waddell Chesnutt's "The Bouquet"
• Primary Source: Southern Women and the Bicycle
• Primary Source: Bicycles and the Public
• The Roller Skate Craze
• Advertising New Products
• Cities and Public Architecture
• Sanitariums
• Primary Source: Warm Springs Hotel Advertisement
• Primary Source: Tourism Advertisement for Southern Pines, NC
• Richard Etheridge
• Expansion and Empire, 1867–1914
• The Spanish-American War
• Primary Source: "The duty of colored citizens to their country"
• The Third North Carolina Regiment
• Ensign Worth Bagley
• The Rise of Populism
• Populists, Fusionists, and White Supremacists: North Carolina Politics from Reconstruction to the Election of 1898
• Primary Source: Leonidas Polk and the Farmers' Alliance
• Primary Source: Chatham County Farmers Protest
• Marion Butler and Fusion Politics
• George Henry White: a Biographical Sketch
• Primary Source: The Wilmington Record Editorial
• Primary Source: The Democrats Appeal to Voters
• The Wilmington Coup
• Primary Source: The "Revolutionary Mayor" of Wilmington
• Primary Source: Letter from an African American Citizen of Wilmington to the President
• Primary Source: J. Allen Kirk on the 1898 Wilmington Coup
• Primary Source: The Suffrage Amendment
• Voter Registration Cards
• Primary Source: Governor Aycock on "The Negro Problem"
• Wilmington Massacre November 1898
• Primary Source: New Bern Daily Journal on Municipal Electric Services
• Electric Streetcars
• Idol’s Dam and Power Plant
• Primary Source: Max Bennet Thrasher on Rural Free Delivery
• Primary Source: Consequences of the Telephone
• The Road to the First Flight
• Announcing the First Flight
• Primary Source: Newspaper Coverage of the First Flight
• Henry Ford and the Model T
• Primary Source: Women and the Automobile
• Primary Source: Letter Promoting the Good Roads Movement
• WBT Charlotte in the Golden Age of Radio
• Sour Stomachs and Galloping Headaches
• Reform and a New Era
• Primary Source: History of Women's Clubs
• Primary Source: Charles Brantley Aycock and His Views on Education
• Primary Source: Woman's Association for Improving School Houses
• Statewide Prohibition
• Primary Source: Railroad Quarantines
• Winston-Salem's Early Hospitals
• Primary Source: Food Adulteration
• Primary Source: Upton Sinclair's The Jungle
• Primary Source: Bulletin on Sanitation and Privies
• Timeline of World War I
• The United States and World War I
• Propaganda and Public Opinion in the First World War
• "Over There"
• The War and German Americans
• The Increasing Power of Destruction: military technology in World War I
• Primary Source: The Importance of Camp Bragg
• Primary Source: Speech on Conditions at Camp Greene
• Primary Source: Diary of a Doughboy
• Primary Source: Letter Home from the American Expeditionary Force
• Primary Source: Governor Bickett's speech to the Deserters of Ashe County
• Rescue at Sea
• North Carolina and the "Blue Death": The Flu Epidemic of 1918
• Primary Source: Bulletin on Stopping the Spread of Influenza
• Primary Source: Speech on Nationalism from Warren Harding
• African American Involvement in World War I
• The Treaty of Versailles
• Timeline of Women's Suffrage
• The Long Struggle for Women's Suffrage
• Primary Source: Equal Pay for Equal Work
• Gertrude Weil
• Primary Source: Proceedings from the North Carolina Equal Suffrage League
• Primary Source: Alice Duer Miller's "Why We Oppose Votes for Men"
• Our Idea of Nothing at All
• Votes for Women
• Gertrude Weil Urges Suffragists to Action
• North Carolina and the Women's Suffrage Amendment
• Gertrude Weil Congratulates — and Consoles — Suffragists
• Lillian Exum Clement
• The Birth of "Jim Crow"
• A Sampling of Jim Crow Laws
• Primary Source: Letter Detailing Triracial Segregation in Robeson County
• Primary Source: George White Speaks Out Against Lynchings
• The Great Migration and North Carolina
• Durham's "Black Wall Street"
• W. E. B. Du Bois on Black Businesses in Durham
• The North Carolina Mutual Life Insurance Company
• Charlotte Hawkins Brown
• Primary Source: Charlotte Hawkins Brown's Rules for School
• Primary Source: 1912 Winston Salem Segregation Ordinance Enacted
• Rosenwald Schools in North Carolina
• Black Student Activism in the 1920s and 1930s
• The Booming Twenties
• How the Twenties Roared in North Carolina
• "Eastern North Carolina for the farmer"
• "Home folks and neighbor people"
• North Carolina Debates Evolution
• Thomas Wolfe
• Asheville Reacts to Look Homeward, Angel
• From Stringbands to Bluesmen: African American Music in the Piedmont
• Hillbillies and Mountain Folk: Early Stringband Recordings
• Jubilee Quartets and the Five Royales: From Gospel to Rhythm & Blues
• The "Flapper"
• Going to the Movies
• Child Labor
• Why Belong to the Union?
• Work and Protest, 1920–1934
• Work and Protest: Voices
• Alice Caudle Talks About Mill Work
• The Carolina Coal Company Mine Explosion
• The Southern Highland Craft Guild
• The Gastonia Strike
• Primary Source: The Loray Mill Strike Begins
• An Industry Representative visits Loray Mills
• A Union Organizer Blames the Mill
• The Strikers Move Into Tents
• Congress Considers an Inquiry Into Textile Strikes
• The Police Chief is Killed
• The Mill Mother's Lament
• The Great Depression: An Overview
• The Economics of the Great Depression
• The Depression for Farmers
• Herbert Hoover and the Great Depression
• The Bonus Army
• Roosevelt and the New Deal
• Primary Source: Roosevelt on the Banking Crisis
• The Economics of Recovery and Reform
• Ending Child Labor in North Carolina
• Primary Source: Excerpt of Child Labor Laws in North Carolina
• Primary Source: Statute on Workplace Safety
• The Fair Labor Standards Act
• Tobacco Bag Stringing: Life and Labor in the Depression
• Primary Source: Interviews on Rural Electrification
• Primary Source: Mary Allen Discusses a Farm Family in Sampson County
• The Live at Home Program
• 4-H and Home Demonstration During the Great Depression
• Eugenics in North Carolina
• Primary Source: Records of Eugenical Sterilization in North Carolina
• The Blue Ridge Parkway
• Roads Taken and Not Taken: Images and the Story of the Blue Ridge Parkway “Missing Link"
• The Great Smoky Mountains National Park
• Primary Source: Louella Odessa Saunders on Self-Sufficient Farming
• Primary Source: A Textile Mill Worker's Family
• Primary Source: Juanita Hinson and the East Durham Mill Village
• Primary Source: Begging Reduced to a System
• Primary Source: Working as a Waitress
• Primary Source: Federal Writers' Project, "He never wanted land till now"
• Health and Beauty in the 1930s
• Paul Green's The Lost Colony
• Krispy Kreme
• Primary Source: Lasting Impacts of the Great Depression
• The Coming of War
• Timeline of World War II: 1931–1941
• Pearl Harbor
• Primary Source: Roosevelt's "A date which will live in infamy" Speech
• Primary Source: Americans React to Pearl Harbor
• Mobilizing for War
• The United States in World War II
• Timeline of World War II: 1942–1945
• The Science and Technology of World War II
• The USS North Carolina
• Primary Source: Landing in Europe, Through the Eyes of the Cape Fear
• Liberating France
• Primary Source: Soldier Interview on Battle of the Bulge
• Primary Source: Enlisting for Service in World War II
• Primary Source: Basic Training in World War II
• Face to Face with Segregation: African American marines at Camp Lejune
• Primary Source: Black Soldiers on Racial Discrimination in the Army
• Music and Morale
• Primary Source: The Story of a B-17 crew
• Primary Source: Richard Daughtry on Surviving the Blitz
• Primary Source: James Wall on Serving in the Air Force
• Primary Source: Norma Shaver and Serving in the Pacific
• Primary Source: Roosevelt's Fireside Chat 21
• Primary Source: Roosevelt's Fireside Chat 23
• North Carolina's Wartime Miracle: Defending the Nation
• Japanese-American Imprisonment: Introduction
• Japanese-American Imprisonment: WWII and Pearl Harbor
• Japanese-American Imprisonment: Executive Order 9066 and Imprisonment
• Japanese-American Imprisonment: Prison Camps
• Japanese-American Imprisonment: Legal Challenges
• Japanese-American Imprisonment: Closing Facilities and Life After
• Primary Source: Poster Announcing Japanese American Removal and Relocation
• Rosie the Riveter
• Germans Attack Off of North Carolina's Outer Banks
• Primary Source: Wartime Wilmington, Through the Eyes of the Cape Fear
• Primary Source: Margaret Rogers and Prisoners of War in North Carolina
• Covering the Beat: UNC in the WWII Era
• Food for Fighters
• Victory Gardens
• 4-H and Home Demonstration Work during World War II
• Primary Source: 4-H Club Promotional Materials
• Primary Source: 4-H Club Instructions
• Primary Source: Joining a 4-H Club
• Primary Source: Report on 4-H club contributions to the war effort
• Primary Source: North Carolina's Feed a Fighter Contest
• Victory in Europe
• The Atomic Bomb
• Primary Source: Harry Truman on using the A-Bomb at Hiroshima
• Classroom Activity: A Tale of Two Cities
• Victory over Japan
• Primary Source: Veteran Discusses Occupying Japan
• Primary Source: Dead and Missing from North Carolina in World War II
• Into the Postwar Era
• Introduction
• The Cold War: An Overview
• The Origins of the Cold War
• The Korean War
• Living with the Bomb
• The Cold War in the 1950s
• Sputnik and Explorer
• John F. Kennedy
• Bombs over Goldsboro
• The Space Race
• The GI Bill
• The Interstate Highway System
• Interstate Highways from the Ground Up
• Changes in Agriculture 1860-
• Growing Tobacco
• The Influence of Radio
• The Grandfather Mountain Highland Games
• The Andy Griffith Show
• Selling North Carolina, One Image at a Time
• More than Tourism: Cherokee, North Carolina, in the Post-War Years
• The Singing on the Mountain
• Scottish Heritage at Linville
• The Harriet-Henderson Textile Workers Union Strike: Defeat for Struggling Southern Labor Unions
• W. Kerr Scott: From Dairy Farmer to Transforming North Carolina Business and Politics
• Governor Terry Sanford: Transforming the Tar Heel State with Progressive Politics and Policies
• Origins of the Civil Rights Movement
• April 1947: Journey of Reconciliation
• The Piedmont Leaf Tobacco Plant Strike, 1946
• Desegregating the Armed Forces
• Primary Source: A Black Officer in an Integrated Army
• Primary Source: The 1950 Senate Campaign
• Alone but Not Afraid: Sarah Keys v. Carolina Coach Company
• The Montgomery Bus Boycott
• The Lumbees Face the Klan
• Robert F. Williams and Black Power in North Carolina
• The NAACP in North Carolina: One Way or Another
• Pauli Murray and 20th Century Freedom Movements
• Brown v. Board of Education and School Desegregation
• Primary Source: Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas
• The Pupil Assignment Act: North Carolina's Response to Brown v. Board of Education
• With All Deliberate Speed: The Pearsall Plan
• Perspective on Desegregation in North Carolina: Harry Golden's Vertical Integration Plan
• Primary Source: Billy Graham and Civil Rights
• The Little Rock Nine
• Desegregation Pioneers
• Youth Protest: JoAnne Peerman
• Primary Source: Interview with William Culp
• Primary Source: Swann v. Charlotte-Mecklenburg Board of Education
• The Impact of Busing in Charlotte
• Opposition to Busing
• Perspectives on School Desegregation: Fran Jackson
• Perspectives on School Desegregation: Harriet Love
• Religion and the Civil Rights Movement: Malcolm X Visits North Carolina in 1963
• The Women of Bennett College: Unsung Heroes of the Civil Rights Movement
• The Greensboro Sit-Ins
• Primary Source: Picketers Wanted
• The Freedom Riders
• Desegregating Public Accommodations in Durham
• Desegregating Hospitals
• The March on Washington, 1963
• The Precursor: Desegregating the Armed Forces
• The Civil Rights Act of 1964
• The Struggle for Voting Rights
• The Selma-to-Montgomery March
• The Voting Rights Act of 1965
• The Lumbee Organize Against the Ku Klux Klan January 18, 1958: The Battle of Hayes Pond, Maxton, N.C.
• Lyndon Johnson and the Great Society
• The North Carolina Fund
• Primary Source: Billy Barnes on Fighting Poverty
• Harold Cooley, Jim Gardner, and the Rise of the Republican Party in the South
• Primary Source: UNC Students Against The Speaker Ban
• Primary Source: Jesse Helms' Viewpoint on the Speaker Ban
• The Women's Movement
• Primary Sources: Segregated Employment Ads
• Primary Source: Bill Hull on Gay Life in Midcentury North Carolina
• The Aftermath of Martin Luther King's Assassination
• Interpreting Historical Figures: Howard Lee
• Interpreting Historical Figures: Senator Sam Ervin
• Outline of the Vietnam War
• The Vietnam War: A Timeline
• Something He Couldn't Write About: Telling My Daddy's Story of Vietnam
• A Soldier's Experience in Vietnam: Herbert Rhodes
• A Soldier's Experience in Vietnam: Tex Howard
• A Soldier's Experience in Vietnam: John Luckey
• A Soldier's Experience in Vietnam: Robert L. Jones
• A Soldier's Experience in Vietnam: Johnas Freeman
• The My Lai Massacre - March 16, 1968
• Anti-War Demonstrations
• Campus Protests
• Nixon, Vietnam, and The Cold War/ Nixon's Accomplishments and Defeats
• The Wilmington Ten
• The 1971 Constitution
• North Carolina's First Presidential Primary
• The Election of 1972
• The Equal Rights Amendment
• The Greensboro Killings
• Early Childhood
• Country Memories
• Rebecca Clark and the Change in Her Path in Education
• Race Relations
• The Carter Years
• A Society in Transition
• The Reagan Years
• The Presidency of George H. W. Bush
• The United States in the 1990s
• The War on Terror and the Presidency of George W. Bush
• The Raleigh News and Observer
• "Senator No"
• The 1984 Senate Campaign
• Urban Renewal and the Displacement of Communities
• Urban Renewal and Durham's Hayti Community

Research Triangle Park

• The Closing of a Factory
• Key Industries: Banking and Finance
• Key Industries: Biotechnology
• Key Industries: Furniture
• Key Industries: Hog Farming
• Key Industries: Information Technology
• Economic Change: From Traditional Industries to the 21st Century Economy
• Key Industries: Tobacco
• The Environmental Justice Movement
• Moving Cape Hatteras Lighthouse
• Coastal Erosion and the Ban on Hard Structures
• The Impact of Hog Farms
• Regulating Hog Farms
• Cane Creek Reservoir
• Air Pollution
• Drought and Development
• The Mountains-to-Sea Trail
• Hugh Morton and North Carolina's Native Plants
• Grandfather Mountain: Commerce and Tourism in the Appalachian Environment
• Ten years Later: Remembering Hurricane Floyd's Wave of Destruction
• Hurricane Floyd's Lasting Legacy
• How Does a Hurricane Form?
• Understanding Floods
• Mapping Rainfall and Flooding
• The Evacuation
• Rising Waters
• Damage from Hurricane Floyd
• Floyd and Agriculture
• Cleaning Up After the Flood
• The Problems of Flood Relief
• Preventing Future Floods
• Reclaiming Sacred Ground: How Princeville is Recovering from the Flood of 1999
• Natural Disasters and North Carolina in the second half of the 20th Century
• Languages and Nationalities
• Latino Immigration
• Five Faiths
• A Hindu Temple in Cary
• The Montagnards
• Immigration from Africa
• Population and Immigration Trends in North Carolina
• Appendix A. Reading Primary Sources: an introduction for students
• Appendix B. Wills and inventories: a process guide
• Appendix C. John Lawson
• Appendix D: Rip Van Winkle
• Appendix E: The Confessions of Nat Turner
• From 1788–1840
• From 1820-1860
• From 1870–1900
• From 1896-1929
• Appendix G: North Carolina's Governors
• Appendix H. The Election of 1860: Results by State
• Appendix I: Remembering the Revolution
• Appendix J: Reading Narratives of Enslaved People from the WPA interviews
• Appendix K: Organization of Civil War armies
• Appendix L: A March in the Ranks Hard-Prest, and the Road Unknown
• Appendix M: Memorial Day
• Appendix N: Pilot Training Manual for the B-17 Flying Fortress
• Reading Primary Sources: thinking about thinking
• What is the nature of this source?
• Who created this source, and what do I know about her, him, or them?
• When was the source produced?
• Where was the source produced?
• What do I know about the historical context of this source?
• What do I know about how the creator of this source fits into that historical context?
• Why did the person who created the source do so?
• What factual information is conveyed in this source?
• What opinions are related in this source?
• What is implied or conveyed unintentionally in the source?
• What is not said in the source?
• What is surprising or interesting about the source?
• What do I not understand about the source?
• How does the creator of the source convey information and make his or her point?
• How is the world descibed in the source different from my world?
• How might others at the time have reacted to this source?
• How does this source compare to other primary sources?
• How does this source compare to secondary source accounts?
• What do I believe and disbelieve from this source?
• What do I still not know — and where can I find that information?
• Appendix A: Transcription of Letters
• Appendix B: John Adams to Abigail Adams Letter 1, July 3, 1776
• Appendix C: John Adams to Abigail Adams Letter 2, July 3, 1777
• Reading Newspapers: advertisements
• Appendix A: Transcribed Carolina Watchman Ads, January 7, 1837
• Appendix B: Carolina Watchman Ads, January 7, 1837
• Reading Newspapers: editorial and opinion pieces
• Appendix A: Abner Jordan, Narrative of an Enslaved Person
• Reading Newspapers: Reader Contributions
• Reading Newspapers: Factual Reporting
• Analyzing Political Cartoons
• Partners and Contributors
• Staff and Advisors
• ANCHOR FAQs
• Pacing Guide
• ‹ The Changing Economy
• The Closing of a Factory ›

Table of Contents

• Introduction to NC Digital History, ANCHOR
• Two Worlds: Prehistory, Contact, and the Lost Colony (to 1600)
• Colonial North Carolina (1600-1763)
• Revolutionary North Carolina (1763-1790)
• Early National (1790-1836)
• Antebellum (1836–1860)
• Civil War and Reconstruction (1860-1876)
• North Carolina in the New South (1870-1900)
• North Carolina in the Early 20th Century (1900–1929)
• The Great Depression and World War II (1929 and 1945)
• Postwar North Carolina (1945-1975)
• Guides for Reading Primary Sources
• About ANCHOR

The Research Triangle Park (RTP) was founded by a committee of government, university, and business leaders as a model for research, innovation, and economic development. By establishing a place where educators, researchers, and businesses come together as collaborative partners, the founders of the Park hoped to change the economic composition of the region and state, thereby increasing the opportunities for the citizens of North Carolina.

The Research Triangle Park is located within 600 miles of 50 percent of the nation's population.

RTP is at the center of the dynamic Raleigh-Durham region with a population of 1.3 million within the defined metropolitan area and nearly 3 million within a 60-mile radius of the Park. The "Triangle" from which RTP was named is formed by the geographic location of the region's three highly regarded educational, medical, and research universities...the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Duke University, and North Carolina State University. In addition, RTP draws on the intellectual capacity of a host of other community colleges and higher education institutes. Together, these institutes create knowledge assets and provide a steady supply of trained scientists, engineers, managers, and technicians to the region's workforce.

In addition to this academic and research capacity, the region possesses an established network and infrastructure to support a diverse range of companies. Ranging from the Council of Entrepreneurial Development to the North Carolina Biotechnology Center to the RTI International, a host of organizations and networks exist to complement and catalyze activities around a number of cluster industries. These institutions and companies work together with Park companies and the universities, reflecting a spirit of cooperation and learning within the scientific and technological community. Since it was established, the Park has witnessed a steady and stable increase in the number of companies and employees. Currently, there are 136 research and development facilities in RTP. More than 37,600 people work in RTP with combined annual salaries of over $2.7 billion. The average salary in the Park is $56,000 annually, nearly 45 percent larger than the regional and national average.

The urban areas of Raleigh and Durham have grown tremendously since 1950.

More than a location and an engine for the economic growth, RTP has been a center of innovation. It is home to winners of the Nobel and the Pulitzer prizes, as well as recipients of the U.S. Presidential Award and National Foundation Awards. Just as important, it is the workplace of technical, chemical, and biomedical scientists and patent holders whose discoveries have impacted the lives of all citizens in this country and around the world. Some of the most profound discoveries of the 20th century have been influenced by scientists and researchers working in RTP, including the invention of the Universal Product Code, 3D ultrasound technology, and Astroturf. Among the most significant of RTP accomplishments was the discovery of Taxol, hailed by the National Cancer Institute as the most important new anti-cancer drug of the past 15 years, and AZT, a drug used to fight HIV-AIDS.

The Park is managed by the Research Triangle Foundation of North Carolina, a non-profit organization founded in 1959. The Foundation is responsible for the overall management of the Park as well as ensuring that the regulations developed by the Park's founders to protect the natural environment and aesthetics of RTP are preserved. Under the development regulations governing the Park, a certain percentage of the total area is devoted to green space. In addition, companies in RTP must obey stringent setbacks and land coverage regulations to maintain the natural environment of the Park and its surroundings.

Forming RTP

The idea for RTP stemmed from the need to reverse a number of negative economic trends facing the North Carolina economy. In the mid-1950s, North Carolina's per capita income was one of the lowest in the nation. In 1952, per capita income in North Carolina was $1,049, compared to $1,121 for the eleven state Southeast region, and $1,639 for the continental United States. In addition the state's economy was dominated by low-wage manufacturing industries such as furniture, textiles, forestry, and small-scale agriculture. The state was facing a serious "brain drain" as graduates in the state were leaving in search of better jobs, and those attending college outside the state were not returning.

Given the expected consequences, leadership within the state sought to reverse these trends. Upon the urging of some private sector leaders such as Robert Hanes, the president of Wachovia Bank and Trust Company, and Romeo Guest, a Greensboro building contractor, and with the help and support of North Carolina State Chancellor Carey Bostian, Governor Luther Hodges commissioned a concept report on the idea of the establishment of a research park to diversify the state's economic base. By the end of 1956, the University of North Carolina and Duke University joined the effort and the Research Triangle Development Council was formed. The vision was to attract research companies from around the nation to locate in a parcel of land surrounded by the state's research universities. The resulting "Research Triangle Park" would be a place where companies could take advantage of the region's intellectual assets in individual campus settings that provided a ready physical infrastructure.

It was decided that the Research Triangle project idea was a valid concept and should be undertaken as a private effort with engagement of the three flagship universities rather than a state/government sponsored effort. In particular, the Park would be set up to "encourage and promote the establishment of industrial research laboratories and other facilities in North Carolina primarily in, but not limited to, the geographical area or triangle formed by the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, North Carolina State College of Agriculture and Engineering of the University of North Carolina at Raleigh, and Duke University at Durham." The Park would also "promote the use of research facilities" at the universities and "cooperation between the three institutions and industrial research agencies." The end goal was to "increase opportunities of the citizens of this state for employment and to increase the per capita income of the citizens of the state."

Early obstacles

While support for the establishment of RTP was growing, the project had several obstacles to overcome. The first was the image of the South in mid-20th century America. In part due to problems of segregation, the region did not have the most progressive reputation. North Carolina...and the U.S. South in general... was not known for innovation or entrepreneurial activity. In addition, companies at that time tended to maintain their research facilities near their manufacturing sites which were predominantly located in the northeast and mid-western parts of the country. The Triangle region did not posses any manufacturing facilities for the types of "new-line" industries the Park was targeting. Finally, the committee needed to raise the funds to acquire, promote and develop the parcel of land that was to become RTP.

Historical growth

RTP grew slowly at first, but employment grow rapidly in the 1980s and 1990s.

The first five years of the Park's existence were relatively slow. While Chemstrand, a company jointly owned by Monsanto Corporation and America Viscose, announced its decision to come to the Park in 1960, it was not until 1965 that growth in the Park took off. In 1965, IBM announced that it would locate a 400 acre, 600,00 square foot research facility in the Park. Also that year, the U.S. Department of Health, Education, and Welfare decided to locate its new $70 million National Environmental Health Science Center at the Park. With the location of a substantial government presence and private sector company, the Park gained credibility as a place for research and development.

Due in part to the existence and extension of road, water, and sewer infrastructure in Durham County, the early growth of the Park was in its Northern section. In addition, major highway improvements, including the building of North Carolina route 147 to connect Duke University and downtown Durham to the Park (1973), the construction of Interstate 40 from the Park to Chapel Hill (1985), and improvements to the region's Raleigh-Durham International Airport helped to improve the Park's competitive position.

In the following 40 years, growth in the park has averaged six new companies and an addition of roughly 1,800 employees per year. The original parcel of land that made up RTP in 1959 consisted of 4,400 acres. Through the years, the Foundation acquired more land, surpassing 5,500 acres by 1979 and totaling 6,971 acres presently. In the same period, the Park's developed space has increased from only 200,000 square feet in 1960 to more than 20 million square feet in 2005. Mirroring the information communications technology boom in the late 1990s, the Park reached a peak employment level of 45,000 in 2001. Although the number of employees declined slightly in the ensuing recession, the number of companies in RTP has increased steadily. Large companies continue to make up the majority of the Park's employment numbers. The guiding assumption behind the initial recruitment strategy for the Park was to attract larger, more established companies that would build a culture in which smaller, start-up industries could thrive. The theory has proven accurate, as a number of smaller, spin-off companies have emerged.

Beginning with the first planning session in 1956, North Carolina's leadership took deliberate and rather ambitious steps to make a positive change in the state's economy. In the fifty years that have elapsed, the vision and commitment of that group has been carried forward and has resulted in the development of a unique parcel of land that is home to one of the greatest critical masses of knowledge workers and intellectual activity. With RTP as its driver, the Triangle region has emerged as one of the top five high technology regions worldwide.

Credit text

Adapted from Rick L. Weddle, et al, "Research Triangle Park: Evolution and Renaissance." from RTP.