Religion

A small village, rich in North Carolina history, Snow Camp has long been a crossroads and an outsider to the Old North State. Settled in 1749 by the oldest Quaker meeting still in the region, the community has been involved in the nation's history since its origin. The Regulators Movement formed over unfair taxation by the North Carolina colony and helped inspire more famous protests in Boston. Freedom's Hill Wesleyan Church arose in Snow Camp to resist the dominant pro-slavery culture of both the state and the Methodist Church in 1847. The Underground Railroad held faith in Snow Camp, having four stations in the small area alone. Join author and resident J. Timothy Allen as he chronicles Snow Camp's compelling past, present and future.

In the 1750s, Quakers from Pennsylvania and Virginia settled in the North Carolina Piedmont, eventually organizing Spring Friends Meeting in 1763. The Friends still gather by the spring and wait for the light to descend upon them 250 years later. Spring Meeting nursed the injured and dying in the American Revolution, said goodbye to members migrating to farmlands in the Northwest, stood against slavery in the antebellum years, helped reconstruct the South in the late 1800s, and held their pacifist beliefs throughout the 20th century. A record-setting World Series pitcher, leading educators, missionaries, and major figures in North Carolina Quaker leadership fill its rolls. Persevering through the ebb and flow of revivals and apathy, Spring Meeting has left its mark in history. Today the spring flows, the front door remains unlocked, and members still gather on First Sundays.

Tarheel Quakers and the Fight Against Slavery

Quakers settled the Carolina Colony in the 1650s, bringing their slaves and servants with them. Industrious coastal Quakers soon rose to prominence on the backs of their enslaved men and women, and Piedmont Quaker lives were enriched by the people they enslaved as well. Sparked by the observations of John Woolman, Carolina Quakers took up the battle against slavery in the 1700s, beginning with themselves. Legal conflicts, the Free Negro program, colonization, the North Carolina Manumission Society and the Underground Railroad were the results. Combining North Carolina slave narratives, runaway slave ads, digital archives, local histories and internet blogs, Tim Allen re-creates the inspiring story of Tarheel Quakers who fought each other and the state to abolish enslavement in antebellum North Carolina.