John Moses Avery (1876-1931), namesake of the John Avery Boys and Girls Club, began his career as a school principal but switched in 1905 to be a salesman for North Carolina Mutual Life Insurance. He rose to become a vice president and director of the company but remained a strong advocate for formal education.

Partnered with J.R. Green in 1867 and partnered with James R. Day in 1869 upon Green's death, Blackwell brought in J. S. Carr as a third partner in 1871.

Julian Shakespeare Carr joined the Blackwell-Day partnership in 1871. He was involved in the Durham Board of Education and Learning and at one point, he owned the Tobacco Plant newspaper.

Namesake of the I.L. Buck Dean Freeway (N.C. 147), Iley Lamond Buck Dean (1913-1991) was a Durham city council member 1961-65 and a member of the state Board of Transportation. In those offices, he was instrumental in promoting construction of the expressway through downtown.

Youngest son of Washington and Artelia Roney Duke, James Buchanan, "Buck" Duke (1856-1925) took up tobacco manufacture with his father and siblings and became the driving force behind the family firm's growth and creation of the American Tobacco Co. He left Durham in 1884 and resided for the rest of his life in New York City and at a New Jersey estate. In 1924 he established the Duke Endowment to benefit colleges, ministers, orphanages and other charitable causes in the Carolinas.

Washington Duke's older brother, William James Duke (1803-1883) was a lay Methodist evangelist and a highly successful farmer in what is now the Herndon Road area of Durham.

Brodie Leonidas Duke (1846-1919) was the son of Washington Duke and his first wife, Mary Caroline Clinton. He was a partner in the family tobacco firm and a dealer in and developer of real estate.

Benjamin Newton Duke (1855-1929) was the second son of the tobacco company founder, Washington Duke. He was active in all of the family businesses and principal in the Dukes' philanthropies.

Said to be the prettiest girl in Alamance County, Artelia Roney Duke (1829-1858) was second wife of Washington Duke and mother of Mary Carolina, Benjamin Newton and James Buchanan Duke.

Founder of the W. Duke, Sons & Co. tobacco company, Washington Duke (1820-1905) began manufacturing smoking tobacco on his farm after his service with the Confederate Navy in the Civil War. A widower, Duke moved his family and the business off the farm (now Duke Homestead State Historic Site) and into Durham in 1874.

Namesake of Dunstan Avenue, Calvin Dunstan (also spelled "Dunston") owned land on Pine (later South Roxboro) Street c. 1911.

Namesake of the city, Bartlett Leonidas Durham (1824-1859) was a physician, merchant and politician who granted the North Carolina Railroad four acres of land for a track easement and depot that stimulated the formation of a town in the 1850s.

Howard A. Easley (1902-1989) was a professor of education at Duke and served on the Durham County Board of Commissioners from 1966 until 1982.

She was the wife of Reverend E. D. Markham.

Williamson Whitehead Fuller (1858-1934), son of Durham attorney Thomas Fuller, assisted his father in leading the legislative maneuvers to create Durham County in 1881. He later moved to New York City as general counsel to the American Tobacco Co. and other Duke family business interests.

According to the Blount Map of Durham's Station c. 1867, Fred C. Geer (1823-1919) owned a farm north of town, on the west side of the Roxboro Road and south of "Eleby" Creek.

Jesse Geer (1799-c.1880), like his relative Fred C. Geer, owned a farm north of Durham's Station that appears on the Blount Map of the area c. 1867. The Geers are the namesake of Geer Street, which runs through their former acreage.

J.R. Green's brother, Caleb ran a drugstore, was in government, opened a printing company in 1870, and started Durham's first newspaper (The Tobacco Plant). Along with W.K. Parrish, Green introduced a bill into the state House of Representatives to create Durham County, which saw success in 1881.

John Ruffin Green (1840-1869) manufactured Genuine Durham Smoking Tobacco and used a bull as his trademark: origin of the "Bull Durham" brand. After Green's death, his partner William T. Blackwell took over the company and the bull trademark.

Namesake of Gregson Street, Amos Gregson (1839-1926) was the first minister of the congregation that later became Duke Memorial United Methodist Church.

Rencher Nicholas Harris (1900-1965) was the first African American elected to the Durham City Council, winning a seat in 1953. A real-estate appraiser by occupation, Harris also became the first African American on the city school board, appointed in 1958.

William Daniel Hill (1890-1945), went to work for North Carolina Mutual Life Insurance in 1917. He was in projects to aid Durham's African American youngsters. The W.D. Hill Recreation Center on Fayetteville Street is named in his honor.

John Sprunt Hill (1869-1961), the son-in-law of George W. Watts, founded the Durham Bank and Trust Co. and Home Savings Bank, later Central Carolina Bank. During the Depression, he constructed the 18-story Hill Building at Main and Corcoran as his bank's headquarters. He and his wife, Annie, also donated land for many of Durham's parks.

George Watts Hill Sr. (1901-1993) was a banker and philanthropist, chairman of Central Carolina Bank and Home Security Life Insurance and namesake of the Hill Pavilion for the Arts at Durham Central Park.

He was a seaman recruit in the US Navy (WWI). c.1917

Thomas Decatur Jones (1852-1889) was in the tobacco business, buying into an auction house in 1880 and building a monumental brick warehouse at Morgan and Great Jones streets in 1885.

She was the wife of Thomas D. Jones.

William Jesse Kennedy Jr. (1889-1985), better known as "W.J.," succeeded C.C. Spaulding as North Carolina Mutual's president in 1952 and led the company until retiring in 1959.

Mary Elizabeth Duke Lyon (1853-1893) was the first child and only daughter of Washington and Artelia Roney Duke. With her father and brothers, she worked in the family tobacco business. As a result of Mary's death from pneumonia, in 1899, her family paid for a new building for the Southern Conservatory of Music, at Duke and Main streets, as a memorial to Mary.

Mangum Elementary School shares its name with a family long established in what is now northern Durham County. The Bahama community shares part of the name as well, being formed from those of three area families: Ball, Harris and Mangum.

John M. Manning (1857-1933), a physician and county health official, served as Durham Mayor 1921-1931. During his administration, the city built the Durham Auditorium (Carolina Theatre) and relocated its offices to the former Central High School on Morris Street.

Edian Markham (c. 1824-1910) came to Durham as an evangelist in 1868 and established a congregation that became St. Joseph's African Methodist Episcopal Church.

An entrepreneur and Methodist lay preacher, John Archibald McMannen (1812-1875) bought land south of Durhams Station in 1855 but failed in an attempt to develop an envisioned town there. McMannen Street (later South Mangum), which led to his home, was named for him, as was McMannen United Methodist Church on Neal Road.

John Merrick (1859-1919) was an African American entrepreneur in early Durham. Starting as a youthful bricklayer, he took up barbering and opened a chain of shops before going into insurance and co-founding the N.C. Mutual and Provident Association (later N.C. Mutual Life Insurance) with Aaron M. Moore in 1898.

Aaron McDuffie Moore (1863-1923) was an African American physician and businessman in Durham. He was a co-founder of the North Carolina Mutual Life Insurance Co. and Lincoln Hospital, and started a Sunday school library at White Rock Baptist Church that developed into the Stanford L. Warren public library.

Eugene Morehead (1845-1889) opened Durham's first bank in 1878, and had business interests in railroads, electric power and a fertilizer company. A strong proponent of public education, Morehead was on the city's first school commission.

Samuel Tate Morgan (1857-1919), son of a Flat River planter Samuel Davidson Morgan, established the Durham Fertilizer Co. in 1881, later merging it with other firms to create the mammoth Virginia-Carolina Chemical Co.

Robert F. Morris (1813-1872) was a merchant and tavern-keeper in Hillsborough who bought land near Durhams Station in 1857 and went into the towns first tobacco-manufacturing business with his son, Thomas, and Wesley Wright in 1858 or 1860.

Edward James Parrish (1846-1920) served as Durham's first tobacco auctioneer in 1871. He and went on to open his own auction house on what is now Parrish Street. After financial reverses in the 1893 crash, he went to Japan asan agent of James B. Duke's American Tobacco Co.

William Gaston Vickers (1828-1924) was a large landowner southwest of the Durham's Station village, a teacher and the county School Superintendent 1890-94.

The possible namesake for Pope Street, which later became "Liggett" and still later part of Washington Street, is John W. Pope, a Durham County commissioner 1902-3 and Durham alderman 1911-13.

William N. Pratt (d. 1867) owned land, a cotton gin, store and tavern on the Hillsborough-Raleigh road and Durham might have been named Prattsburg in his honor.

William Haynes Proctor (1857-1921) was a member of a family that owned large tracts south and west of Durhams Station. In 1901 he sold land to the Durham Traction Co. that went into the companys Lakewood Park amusement park

A landowner circa 1890.

Atlas Monroe Rigsbee (1840[41?]-1903) was a farmer, saloon owner, merchant and charter member of Durham's Board of Aldermen, 1869-71. Rigsbee Avenue is named for him.

Jack Roosevelt Robinson (1919-1972), better known as "Jackie," became the first African American player in major-league baseball as a Brooklyn Dodger in 1947. National League Rookie of the Year, Robinson had a lifetime batting average of .311 and entered baseball's Hall of Fame in 1962.

James Edward Shepard (1875-1947) founded the National Religious Training School and Chatauqua (now North Carolina Central University) in 1910 and remained the school's president until his death. Shepard Middle School bears his name.

A patriarch of Durham's African American population, C.C. (Charles Clinton) Spaulding (1874-1952) was a leader of the N.C. Mutual Life Insurance Co., becoming its general manager in 1900 and president in 1923.

Sarah Durham Stagg (1827-1903) was a sister of town namesake Bartlett Leonidas Durham. Her son, James Edward Stagg, and daughter-in-law, Mary Washington Lyon, donated the Duke Memorial United Methodist Church carillion in honor of Sarah Stagg and Mary Elizabeth Duke Lyon.

James Edward Stagg (1850-1916) was secretary to Benjamin N. Duke and married his neice, Mary Washington Lyon. The Staggs donated the carillon to Duke Memorial Methodist Church in memory of their mothers. Their home, Greystone, is a National Register property at Vickers and Morehead Avenues in Morehead Hill.

William Gaston Vickers (1828-1924) was a large landowner southwest of the Durhams Station village. He sold much of the land that homeowners developed as Morehead Hill, and that later became the Forest Hills neighborhood.

In 1872, Alexander Walker (1825-1904), for whom the Walker Warehouse on the former Cigarette Street is named, became founding president of the Durham Tobacco Board of Trade - an organization to coordinate and promote the town's new tobacco market.

Stanford Leigh Warren (1860-1940) was a prominent African American physician, a co-founder of Lincoln Hospital and of Mechanics and Farmers Bank.

A partner in the W. Duke Sons & Co. tobacco business, George Washington Watts (1851-1921) was also involved in banking, textiles and philanthropy. In 1895, he established Durham's first hospital, which bore his name until it was replaced by Durham Regional Hospital in the 1970s.

James A. Whitted (d. 1892) was principal of Durham's first public school for African American children, established in 1887. Whitted School was named for him.

James Young Whitted (1836-1926) was a Hillsborough tobacco manufacturer and friend of Bull Durham founder John Ruffin Green. According to local lore, Whitted suggested that Green adopt a bull as symbol for his tobacco brand.

Richard Harvey Wright (1851-1929) owned a number of Durham businesses, including the Wright Machinery Co., maker of tobacco-packaging machinery, and the electric utility Durham Traction Co, which also ran an electric streetcar line and developed Lakewood Park to attract riders.