The Stair with No Bottom

A Criminal Corner

Forest Theater

Piece of London

Computer Museum

Bottomless Stairs   >

Old East

McCorkle Place

Chapel Hill Walking

Good Walls

Approach Chapel Hill from the south along Manning Drive, and you cannot fail to view, towering over the treetops, the Chapel Hill water tank, rising 150 feet and containing 1 million gallons. Wending around the main column of the water tower is a spiral staircase connected at the top to the main water tank. Meanwhile, the bottom of the staircase steps out into empty air.

Prior to the current water tower being built in the 1950s, the town's old water tank was located at Wilson Court and, no matter the security precautions taken, marked by the artistic talents of various fraternities in town. After construction of the Manning Drive water tank, engineers had any access ladders going up to the tank for a height of 35 feet above the ground taken off, with a special lock and steel gate sealing off the central column stairs. The next morning, however, painted in 8-feet high black letters around the water tank was "KILROY WAS HERE." [31].