Hampton Durant Williams

Hampton Durant Williams. Image Source: Sam Byrd, The Duplin Story: An Historical Play with Music, 1950, p. 37. ECU Digital Collections PS3503.Y5 D8 1950.

Hampton Durant “Hamp” Williams served on the ECTC board from 1927 to 1933, a transitional period during which East Carolina moved from an era of campus growth to one of consolidation and gender diversification. The major development was the appearance of increasing numbers of young men either enrolling as freshmen or transferring from other schools to complete their education at ECTC. While the student body remained overwhelmingly female — in 1933, of the 914 students, 94 were male — by the final year of Williams’ time as a trustee, the men on campus, then known as coeds, were able to organize football, basketball, and baseball squads and competed in intercollegiate competition.

By profession, Williams was an attorney with significant farming and real estate interests in Kenansville and elsewhere in Duplin County. He was also a prominent member of the Democratic Party in Duplin County, chairing its executive committee in the early 1900s. And as with many so-called progressives who played instrumental roles in the founding and growth of East Carolina, he was an admirer of Gov. Charles B. Aycock (1859–1912) and Senator Furnifold M. Simmons (1854–1940) and their efforts to ensure white dominance in government. In that respect, his progressivism never transcended the bigotry of his era.

Additionally, Williams served in various public capacities: as mayor of Kenansville and for two terms in the state legislature representing Duplin County. Respected in the business community, Williams also served as president of the Bank of Magnolia in Duplin County in the 1930s.

Williams was also active, in the early twentieth century, in the North Carolina Good Roads Association, serving as an outspoken advocate of the construction and maintenance of a state system of highways connecting all county seats and principal towns. Williams made a resolution to this effect at a meeting of the Good Roads Association in the summer of 1917, well before the N.C. state legislature saw the wisdom of a system of state roads. In the interval, Williams served his county by helping it to start a county road system.

Williams’ generously served his home county in 1950 when the Duplin County Historical Society, celebrating Duplin County’s 200th anniversary, staged a historical drama, The Duplin Story. To provide an appealing venue, an amphitheater was built on land donated, for the duration of the performance, by Williams, resulting in the naming of the spacious facility the Hampton D. Williams Amphitheatre. And, in the early 1950s, when a new 50-bed hospital was being planned for Duplin County, Williams’ home site north of the Kenansville Courthouse was the announced site. Williams’ record of service as a public advocate for the good roads and as a patron of local historical culture no doubt recommended his appointment as a trustee at ECTC.

Sources

• Berry, H. M. “A Segment of North Carolina History: Telling the Story of the Development of Road Building, the State System of Highways and the Part Played by the North Carolina Good Roads Association.” Charlotte Observer. May 1, 1923. Pp. 19, 23.
• “Duplin County Democratic Convention Met Here Monday and Nominated a Splendid Ticket.” Eastern Carolina News. July 27, 1910. P. 2.
• “‘Duplin Story’ Set for Opening on Thursday.” News and Observer. September 5, 1950. P. 1.
• “Duplin Story to be Retold: Drama Produced on 200th Anniversary of County is Slated in September.” News and Observer. July 23, 1950. P. 51.
• “Duplin Tells Its Story Again This Year: Drama Gives Life History of N.C. Area.” News and Observer. August 27, 1950. P. 45.
• “Enrollment for Fall Term Second Largest.” Teco Echo. October 18, 1933. P. 1. https://digital.lib.ecu.edu/38008
• Journal of the House of Representatives of the General Assembly of the State of North Carolina, Extra Session, 1908. Raleigh: E. M. Uzzell State Printers and Binders, 1908.
• “Senator F. M. Simmons Opens Campaign in Duplin County.” Eastern Carolina News. October 5, 1910. P. 2.
• “Sketch of Proposed 50-Bed Hospital to be Built at Kenansville.” News and Observer. November 9, 1952. P. 6.
• “Speaking by Democratic County Candidates and Other Democratic Speakers.” Eastern Carolina News (Kenansville). September 16, 1908. P. 3.
• The Duplin Story: An Historical Play with Music. J. Y. Joyner N. C. Reference # PS3503.Y5 D8 1950. East Carolina University. Greenville, N. C. https://digital.lib.ecu.edu/17060
• Williams, H. D. “Argues Against Bonds for Ports: H. D. Williams Cites Twenty Points Against Proposed Terminal Measure.” News and Observer. November 2, 1924. P. 33.

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