Students Seeking Historical Truth, the first student organization that formed around issues relating to the University’s history with racial injustice, identified a number of buildings on the campus named in honor slave-owners and white supremacists, including Murphey Hall, named to honor Archibald DeBow Murphey, an early graduate of the University “who owned several slaves.” In the early morning hours of Wednesday, October 6th, 1999, members of the organization decorated Saunders Hall, Murphey Hall, and Steele Building, hanging a white sheet over Murphey Hall, which read “Hitler Hall.”
Students Seeking Historical Truth, the first student organization that formed around issues relating to the University’s history with racial injustice, identified a number of buildings on the campus named in honor slave-owners and white supremacists, including Murphey Hall, named to honor Archibald DeBow Murphey, an early graduate of the University “who owned several slaves.” In the early morning hours of Wednesday, October 6th, 1999, members of the organization decorated Saunders Hall, Murphey Hall, and Steele Building, hanging a white sheet over Murphey Hall, which read “Hitler Hall.”
Organization: Students Seeking Historical Truth
Space Use: Academic
Spatial Organizing Approach: Contestation
Date Created: 1924
Campus Space: Saunders Hall
Citation: Saunders Hall Anti-Klan decoration, presentation, and speak-out, October 1999 in the John Kenyon Chapman Papers #5441, Southern Historical Collection, The Wilson Library, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.