Collection is open for research; access requires at least 48 hours advance notice. Some series contain digital media. Because of the nature of certain archival formats, including digital and audio-visual materials, access will require additional advanced notice. Pending staff review and approval, access will be provided for use in the SCRC Reading Room upon request. Access may be restricted.
We perform virus scans upon ingest and upon request for access. However, not all virus software profiles will catch all threats, especially newer, not yet recognized ones. The researcher assumes all risk when opening files.
While electronic files are made available to researchers, some files may not open with current software or at all. Researchers may be required to find and use legacy software packages to read files.
Additional conditions may apply.
The Centennial Campus Records document the development of Centennial Campus from the initial 1984 land allocation through its twentieth anniversary celebration, with the bulk of the content focused on the late 1980s and early 1990s. Containing correspondence, proposals, reports, articles, brochures, clippings, electronic images, and other materials, the items discuss general design and development issues, the campus's administrative structure, the master developer (Carley Capital Group), Centennial Campus partners, the natural environment, infrastructure, facilities construction, and traffic. Materials range in date from 1974 to 2011.
Between 1984 and 1985 Governor James B. Hunt, Jr. and Governor James G. Martin transferred over 800 acres of state land to North Carolina State University. The university settled on the idea of creating Centennial Campus, a "technopolis" where university units, governmental entities, and private industry could share facilities and collaborate on projects. From 1988 to 2000 Claude E. McKinney served as coordinator of Centennial Campus and shaped its development. Since beginning its operation, the campus has attracted a variety of prominent tenants, including ABB, Red Hat, Inc., and the National Weather Service and it has become home to the College of Textiles and the College of Engineering.
Between 1984 and 1985 Governor James B. Hunt, Jr. and Governor James G. Martin transferred over 800 acres of state land to North Carolina State University. The university settled on the idea of creating Centennial Campus, a "technopolis" where university units, governmental entities, and private industry could share facilities and collaborate on projects. From 1988 to 2000 Claude E. McKinney served as coordinator of Centennial Campus and shaped its development. Since beginning its operation, the campus has attracted a variety of prominent tenants, including ABB, Red Hat, Inc., and the National Weather Service and it has become home to the College of Textiles and the College of Engineering.
On December 19, 1984, Governor James B. Hunt, Jr. transferred 355 acres of land from Dorothea Dix Hospital and the Department of Agriculture to North Carolina State University.. In February 1985, Governor James G. Martin transferred 450 additional acres. The reallocation of the land angered many who had hoped to put the land to other uses. Some individuals argued that the governor did not have the legal right to circumvent the legislative branch of the state government and authorize the reallocation, but the State Attorney General's Office upheld the legality of the transfer.
With a firm claim on the land, N.C. State University formed a committee to accept proposals for the land's development. The university, led by Chancellor Bruce Poulton, settled on the idea of creating Centennial Campus, a "technopolis" where university units, governmental entities, and private industry could share facilities and collaborate on projects. In 1985, the N.C. State University Board of Trustees formed a group to devise a Master Plan for the land. The following year, Carley Capital Group was chosen as the master developer of Centennial Campus. The primary development principles behind Centennial Campus are to gear all projects toward the educational focus of the university and its research capabilities, follow high standards of design, implement design that is respectful of the natural environment, and find a way to make the campus financially capable of maintaining itself. This financial sustainability required new legislation at the state level to allow the university to derive revenue by leasing buildings and land to government and private industry. Without this legal exception, this money would instead go to North Carolina's general fund.
In the 1990s, Larry K. Monteith followed Bruce Poulton as chancellor and attempted to accelerate the rate of development on Centennial Campus. Efforts included enhancement of marketing and public relations. The campus also got a major boost in prominence with the move of the College of Textiles to new facilities there in 1991. The next year brought the first major corporate occupation, Asea Brown Boveri's (ABB) Transmission Technology Institute, and the first government entity, the National Weather Service. The campus has continued to attract new tenants from all three sectors, including the USDA's Animal Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS) Center for Plant Health Science and Technology, the major international software company Red Hat, Inc., and the College of Engineering. The 2000s brought the Centennial Campus Magnet Middle School, residential housing, and plans for an eighteen-hole golf course.
Claude E. McKinney, coordinator of Centennial Campus from 1988 to 2000, is often credited with providing the guiding vision for the campus. He began working at N.C. State University in 1973 as Dean of the College of Design. A native of Greensboro, North Carolina, he left the University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill in 1952 after completing a bachelor's degree in painting and design and taking some graduate course work. Before arriving at N.C. State, McKinney taught in Alabama, performed design work for the Navy and U.S. government, held several positions at a New York animation firm, and became involved in urban design as a member of the Columbia, Maryland, Urban Life Center and later its director. During his time as Dean, McKinney remained involved in urban planning, fighting against high-rise construction in downtown Raleigh, supporting preservation of historic buildings, and assisting in the development of Research Triangle Park. In 1988, McKinney stepped down as dean and assumed the role of full-time Centennial Campus coordinator. He retired in 2000, and in 2001 the courtyard adjoining the Research I, II, and III Buildings was renamed Claude E. McKinney Plaza in his honor.
In 2013, after many years of planning, the James B. Hunt, Jr. Library opened on Centennial Campus. As of 2020, construction on the Fitts-Woolard Hall (for engineering) was in progress.
For additional information consult the research paper, "The History of North Carolina State University's Centennial Campus for the Twentieth Anniversary Celebration, 2004," by Paige Meszaros. It can be found in Box 23, Folder 8.
The Centennial Campus Records document the development of Centennial Campus from the initial 1984 land allocation through its twentieth anniversary celebration, with the bulk of the content focused on the late 1980s and early 1990s. Containing correspondence, proposals, reports, articles, brochures, and other materials, the items discuss general design and development issues, the campus's administrative structure the master developer (Carley Capital Group), Centennial Campus partners, the natural environment, infrastructure, facilities construction, and traffic concerns. There are also clippings from a variety of publications and electronic images of buildings and construction. The Centennial Campus Records are arranged into six series: Correspondence and Presentations, Administration, Carley Capital Group / Carley-Hines, Early Development, Design and Development, Clippings, Electronic Files, Memorabilia, and Audio-Visual.
The first series, Correspondence and Presentations, primarily contains letters and meeting descriptions generated by Claude McKinney. Major topics include infrastructure development, master planning and design, transportation/fixed guideway systems, the golf course/hotel/conference center complex, and the Triangle Universities Center for Advanced Studies, Inc. (TUCASI). This series is also made up of materials related to presentations given by McKinney and other Centennial Campus administrators. The presentations are generally broad in scope describing the origin, development, and long-term goals of the campus.
The second series, Administration, collects materials describing the Centennial Campus administrative structure and documents generated by a number of its organizing or consulting entities, including the Centennial Campus Management Team, the Chancellor's Centennial Campus Advisory Committee, and the Trustees Building and Property Committee. There are also monthly reports from the Centennial Campus Partnership Office.
The third series, Carley Capital Group / Carley-Hines, contains general information about the evolution of the group which became master developer of Centennial Campus, budgets, agreements and invoices for either their work or the firms on the design team members.
The fourth series, Early Development, is composed of Dorothea Dix property files and materials produced by Dr. Franklin Hart, an early member of the Centennial Campus Management Team. The Dorothea Dix files contain documents describing the transfer of the Dorothea Dix property to North Carolina State University and early efforts to determine how best to use the land. Dr. Hart's files overlap materials found in the Dorothea Dix files, but focus on research and development facilities issues.
The fifth series, Design and Development, contains four subseries: Alphabetical Files, Buildings and Tenants, Infrastructure and Environment, and Transportation: the Alphabetical Files broadly address issues of design and development; the Buildings and Tenants subseries is made up of files on individual Centennial Campus partners and/or the buildings they occupied on the campus; the Infrastructure and Environment subseries is made up of files that describe the natural environment of the campus and large scale projects to construct lighting, sewers, roads, and other vital components of the campus's built environment; and the Transportation subseries covers a variety of topics, but primarily contains files describing efforts to construct a monorail/fixed guideway system connecting Centennial Campus and Main Campus.
The sixth series, clippings, is arranged chronologically in three formats, original, copied, or organized into albums. The articles come from university, local, and national publications; they follow Centennial Campus from the initial transfer of the Dorothea Dix land through its subsequent growth and development.
The seventh series, electronic files, is arranged by format and alphabetically by item name. It includes images, documents, presentation materials, and web pages. The images, most often of buildings and construction, make up the largest concentration of digital objects.
The eighth series, Memorabilia, contains one item: a commemorative medal produced to celebrate Centennial Campus' 20th anniversary.
The ninth series, Audio-Visual, contains items of various formats housed together for ease of retrieval.
The tenth series contains publications highlighting Centennial Campus.
Organized into the following series:
The nature of the NC State University Libraries' Special Collections means that copyright or other information about restrictions may be difficult or even impossible to determine despite reasonable efforts. The NC State University Libraries claims only physical ownership of most Special Collections materials.
The materials from our collections are made available for use in research, teaching, and private study, pursuant to U.S. Copyright law. The user must assume full responsibility for any use of the materials, including but not limited to, infringement of copyright and publication rights of reproduced materials. Any materials used for academic research or otherwise should be fully credited with the source.
This collection may contain materials with sensitive or confidential information that is protected under federal or state right to privacy laws and regulations. Researchers are advised that the disclosure of certain information pertaining to identifiable living individuals represented in this collection without the consent of those individuals may have legal ramifications (e.g., a cause of action under common law for invasion of privacy may arise if facts concerning an individual's private life are published that would be deemed highly offensive to a reasonable person) for which North Carolina State University assumes no responsibility.
[Identification of item], North Carolina State University, Office of Finance and Administration, Centennial Campus Records, UA 003.010, Special Collections Research Center, North Carolina State University Libraries, Raleigh, NC
Transferred from the Centennial Campus Partnership Office (formerly the Centennial Campus Development Office).
Processed by Jaime L. Margalotti, October 2005
Encoded by Jaime L. Margalotti, October 2005
Digital materials processed by Jessica Rayman, 2016 June, July, and November.
Finding aid updated by Cate Putirskis, Cathy Dorin-Black, and Todd Kosmerick, 2008 - 2013
The collection is organized into eleven principal series:
This series primarily contains letters generated by Claude McKinney, the coordinator of Centennial Campus from 1988 to 2000. Beginning in 1991, McKinney produced indices of these letters, noting the date and topic. Additionally, McKinney kept detailed descriptions of meetings attended and telephone conversations, providing dates, times, locations, lists of participants, and a description of all topics discussed. These letters and meeting notes are intermingled and arranged chronologically. Frequently the letters are formal or informal communications with individuals or organizations that might be interested in locating their business on Centennial Campus. McKinney's administrative letters and meeting notes cover a wide range of topics including zoning, infrastructure development, real estate, master planning and design, transportation/fixed guideway systems, budgeting, environmental concerns, residential housing, the Centennial Campus Middle School and the proposed High Technology Academy, the golf course/hotel/conference center complex, other research parks, and North Carolina State University's struggle to install a chapter of Phi Beta Kappa. McKinney includes a large amount of correspondence generated in his role as president of the Triangle Universities Center for Advanced Studies, Inc. (TUCASI). Additionally, the early letters describe McKinney's transition from the College of Design to his new role and his continuing involvement in arts organizations like Blue Marble, a children's center for design and invention. Frequent correspondents include the Centennial Campus Management and Design Teams, Chancellor Bruce Poulton, Chancellor Larry Monteith, George Worsley, Charlie Leffler, Frank Hark, William Klarman, Tom Hines, Dick Dougherty, Charlie Moreland, and Jaine Place. This series is also made up of materials related to presentations given by McKinney and other Centennial Campus administrators. The presentations are generally broad in scope describing the origin, development, and long-term goals of the campus. A smaller number are focused on campus design and transportation projects, such as the proposed fixed guideway system. These files contain lists of scheduled presentations, background information, and some presentation texts. They are also arranged chronologically.
10 boxes and 3 folders
This series collects materials describing the Centennial Campus administrative structure and documents generated by a number of its organizing or consulting entities. The most significant of these is the Centennial Campus Management Team, which directed all aspects of campus development. In April 1989, Chancellor Bruce Poulton dissolved it and divided the expanding workload among multiple committees. The work of these more narrowly focused groups is dispersed throughout the Design and Development series (Series 5). The administration series also contains files from the Chancellor's Centennial Campus Advisory Committee, the Trustees Building and Property Committee, and Centennial Campus Partnership Office monthly reports. The files are arranged alphabetically, with their contents in chronological order.
17 folders
The Carley Capital Group (later known as Carley-Hines) began discussions with NC State University in 1985. When its Master Plan concepts were approved in April 1986, the group began working as the master developer of Centennial Campus. This series contains general information about the evolution of the group and budgets. There are copies of the agreements made between the group and NC State. The largest concentration of material is made up of invoices submitted by the group on behalf of themselves and other members of the design team, including Land Design, Inc., Arthur Erickson Architects, Kimley-Horn and Associates, Inc., McEvoy Engineering Services, Inc., and others. The files are arranged alphabetically with the invoices arranged chronologically.
5 boxes and 5 folders
The Early Development series has two major components, Dorothea Dix property files and materials produced by Dr. Franklin Hart. The Dorothea Dix files contain correspondence, reports, agreements, articles, and other documents describing the transfer of the Dorothea Dix property to North Carolina State University and early efforts to determine how best to use the land. Dr. Franklin Hart served as Vice Chancellor for Research during this time period and was an early member of the Centennial Campus Management Team. His files focus on research and development facilities issues. Although Dr. Hart's files overlap materials found in the Dorothea Dix files, they also contain some correspondence written by or specifically directed to Dr. Hart.
2 boxes and 9 folders
The Design and Development series contains four subseries: Alphabetical Files, Buildings and Tenants, Infrastructure and Environment, and Transportation. Although there is substantial overlap among the subseries, they mirror the arrangement of the files by the Centennial Campus Partnership Office. The Alphabetical Files broadly address issues of design and development, including design proposals and workshops, development guidelines, marketing, master planning, Centennial Campus history, and these contain official documents such as minutes, plans, presentations, and agreements. Several folders contain materials collected by Charles Leffler, N.C. State's Associate Vice Chancellor for Facilities. Additionally, Jaine Place, a Centennial Campus partnership development specialist, produced files for a number of development projects, including the Prospectus and Ten-Year Celebration. The files of the Naming Task Force which set up procedures for assigning names to buildings and roads on the campus are also located in this subseries. The Buildings and Tenants subseries is made up of files on individual Centennial Campus partners and/or the buildings they occupied. The files collect correspondence and other documents regarding negotiations with the partners and technical materials regarding the construction of their facilities. Several files represent groups that ultimately did not locate on Centennial Campus. There is also some information on prospective tenants. The Infrastructure and Environment subseries is made up of files that describe the natural environment of the campus and large scale projects to construct lighting, sewers, roads, and other vital components of the campus's built environment. The subseries includes correspondence, reports, proposals, agreements, and technical documents detailing specific roads, real estate, rezoning requests, environmental assessments, Lake Raleigh, a proposed golf course, and the Support Systems Committee which addressed these infrastructure developments. The Transportation subseries primarily contains files describing efforts to construct a monorail/fixed guideway system connecting Centennial Campus and Main Campus. Additional materials concern bike paths and contact with the Triangle Transit Authority regarding regional transportation concerns. The files in each subseries are arranged alphabetically, with their contents in chronological order.
33 boxes
The clippings are arranged chronologically in three formats: original, copied, or organized into albums. The albums cover Centennial Campus from 1984 to 1990, while the copied clippings run from 1997 to 2001. The clippings in their original format are the most extensive and overlap both of these groupings. The articles come from NC State, local, and national publications; they follow Centennial Campus from the initial transfer of the Dorothea Dix land through its subsequent growth and development.
6 boxes
The electronic files are arranged by format and alphabetically by item name. The files on the zip discs, CD-roms, and floppy discs include images, documents, presentation materials, and web pages. The images, most often of buildings and construction, make up the largest concentration of digital objects. The digital files are maintained both on their original media and on server space.
2 boxes
Original name of disc is "Leah"
Original name of disc is "010831_1239"
Original name of disc is "DD101402"
Original name of disc is "images"
Original name of disc is "moreconstruction"
Original name of disc is "030417_1337"
Original name of disc is "construction ima"
Original name of disc is "Etheridge"
Original name of disc is "010723_1251"
Original name of disc is "NC State UniversityCC vol.1"
Photographs on this CD are identified as property of Randy Berger Photography, and all rights therein are reserved to the photographer.
Original name of disc is "Centennial Campus"
Photographs on this CD are identified as property of Randy Berger Photography, and all rights therein are reserved to the photographer.
Original name of disc is "Centennial Campus"
Photographs on this CD are identified as property of Randy Berger Photography, and all rights therein are reserved to the photographer.
Original name of disc is "Centennial Campus"
Photographs on this CD are identified as property of Randy Berger Photography, and all rights therein are reserved to the photographer.
Memorex CD-R recordable
File count is approximate and excludes system files, deleted files, and duplicates that may have been created during processing.
Original name of disc is "Centennial Campus"
Photographs on this CD are identified as property of Randy Berger Photography, and all rights therein are reserved to the photographer.
Original name of disc is "041206_1554"
Original name of disc is "CC_PLAN"
Original name of disc is "CENPRGRP"
Original name of disc is "CC"
Original name of disc is "RENDERIN"
Original name of disc is "Webimages"
Presently, this series contains one item: a commemorative medal produced to celebrate Centennial Campus's twentieth anniversary.
1 box
This series contains VHS and BetaCam videotapes, audio cassettes, and CDs pulled from the collection and housed together. This material is only viewable once use copies are made for each item.
1 box
VHS videocassette
This series consists of materials accessioned after this collection was processed.
2 archival storage boxes and 1 oversize flat box
Includes notebooks on the proposed Centennial Center and also on Raleigh and the Research Triangle. There is also a notebook on the Sasaki Associates Centennial Center Site Location and Feasibility Study.
Collection is open for research; access requires at least 48 hours advance notice. Some series contain digital media. Because of the nature of certain archival formats, including digital and audio-visual materials, access will require additional advanced notice. Pending staff review and approval, access will be provided for use in the SCRC Reading Room upon request. Access may be restricted.
We perform virus scans upon ingest and upon request for access. However, not all virus software profiles will catch all threats, especially newer, not yet recognized ones. The researcher assumes all risk when opening files.
While electronic files are made available to researchers, some files may not open with current software or at all. Researchers may be required to find and use legacy software packages to read files.
Additional conditions may apply.
For more information contact us via mail, phone, or our web form.
Mailing address:
Special Collections Research Center
Box 7111
Raleigh, NC, 27695-7111
Phone: (919) 515-2273
[Identification of item], North Carolina State University, Office of Finance and Administration, Centennial Campus Records, UA 003.010, Special Collections Research Center, North Carolina State University Libraries, Raleigh, NC
The nature of the NC State University Libraries' Special Collections means that copyright or other information about restrictions may be difficult or even impossible to determine despite reasonable efforts. The NC State University Libraries claims only physical ownership of most Special Collections materials.
The materials from our collections are made available for use in research, teaching, and private study, pursuant to U.S. Copyright law. The user must assume full responsibility for any use of the materials, including but not limited to, infringement of copyright and publication rights of reproduced materials. Any materials used for academic research or otherwise should be fully credited with the source.
This collection may contain materials with sensitive or confidential information that is protected under federal or state right to privacy laws and regulations. Researchers are advised that the disclosure of certain information pertaining to identifiable living individuals represented in this collection without the consent of those individuals may have legal ramifications (e.g., a cause of action under common law for invasion of privacy may arise if facts concerning an individual's private life are published that would be deemed highly offensive to a reasonable person) for which North Carolina State University assumes no responsibility.