The Kellenberger Room Houses the Local History and Genealogy Collection of the New Bern-Craven County Public Library
The room is named in memory of May Gordon Latham Kellenberger. Mrs. Kellenberger was instrumental in the restoration of Tryon Palace, and upon her death, she left a large trust fund to finance local history projects in New Bern and Craven County. It was with funds from the Kellenberger Foundation that this room was built and furnished in a remodeling project completed in 1992. Materials in the collection consist of books, microfilm, photographs, vertical files, oral histories, and online databases. Books Genealogy books concentrate on Eastern North Carolina and Tidewater Virginia, though there are some materials on other areas. In addition, the library contains hundreds of books about individual families and on the records of specific counties. Microfilm Microfilmed genealogical materials include census records and county records. County records include such items as court minutes, deeds, wills, and estate papers. The counties we concentrate our microfilm collecting around are Beaufort, Carteret, Craven, Jones, Lenoir, Onslow, Pamlico, and Pitt. Photographs and Vertical Files The Vertical Files contain clippings from newspapers and magazines, as well as uncatalogued pamphlets and booklets. Most of the materials deal with New Bern and Craven County. There are also a few genealogical files of family names associated with New Bern and Craven County. A listing of the vertical files (updated July 2017) available in the Kellenberger Room is available as a PDF file. Oral Histories The library also houses oral interviews conducted by the James City Historical Society that cover African-American life in Craven County; interviews conducted by Duke University in the Behind the Veil Project; and interviews conducted during the African American Voices Between Two Rivers Oral History Project. Online Databases NC LIVE also allows access to Historic North Carolina Digital Newspaper Collection, a collection of 3.5 million pages of digitized content from over 1,000 NC county newspapers. The library also subscribes to Ancestry Library Edition (in-house use only) and the Newspaper Archive. |
On September 3, 1913, a hurricane hits the area, destroying the Neuse River Bridge
(at the foot of Johnson Street)