[Ads-l] Major Antedating of "Tarheel"

[Shapiro, Fred]

U.S. states generally have standardized nicknames applied to the state and its inhabitants.  The two most celebrated such nicknames are "Hoosier" (Indiana) and "Tarheel" (North Carolina).  Both of these are now proudly used by the respective state, its university, and its athletic teams.  Both were often used, early in their history, as pejorative insults.  The North Carolina moniker derives from the state's prominence as a producer of tar from pine trees.

The earliest documented usage of "Tarheel" or "Tar Heel" in specific reference to North Carolina has been in a February 6, 1863 entry in the diary of Confederate soldier William B. A. Lowrance.  In addition, Bonnie Taylor-Blake has found "Tar heel" in an October 21, 1846 article by A. L. Bayley in a New York City periodical, "The Emancipator."  However, Taylor-Blake noted that Bayley seems to have employed the term to refer broadly to poor Southern whites rather than only to North Carolinians.

I have now discovered an earlier occurrence of "tar-heel," specifically referring to North Carolinians, dated exactly five years before the Lawrence diary entry.  The source, surprisingly, is from California.  In the San Andreas Independent newspaper, February 6, 1858, page 3, column 1, there is an item titled "Carrying the War Into Africa" (accessible on the wonderful Newspapers.com database).  The item describes a heated argument between two African Americans, one of whom called the other a "Down-easter."  The second combatant is said to have responded as follows:

"Dont yah call dis er'n a Down-easter," said Scip, "yah mis'ble dirt-eatin Norf C'lina tar-heel."

The fact that the state nickname "tar-heel" had disseminated as far as California by 1858 suggests that it may be significantly older than previously thought.

Fred Shapiro
Editor, New Yale Book of Quotations (Yale University Press)

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