It’s time to go all in with Apex by celebrating the Town’s 150th year since it was incorporated by the NC General Assembly on February 28, 1873. One-hundred and fifty years – as Mayor Jacques Gilbert said in the sesquicentennial kickoff video on the homepage of the Apex 150 website, “We won’t get this opportunity again. You’ve got to be a part of it.”
Town of Apex staff and community members began working behind-the-scenes in the summer of 2021 to make the sesquicentennial year one to remember. They’ve planned a yearlong celebration, with a focus on unification and common understanding. There are more than 150 activities planned throughout the year (ending in February 2024), along with special programs where you can learn about Apex history and share community stories reflecting on what makes Apex home.
Around 10 Town of Apex staff members served on the core planning committee for the yearlong celebration. They were selected based on roles within the organization and their relationship to the Apex community. They worked together with subcommittees made up of over 40 community members focusing on Apex history and special events. The committee members volunteered to serve and wanted to contribute their time and talents to this effort.
Together, committee members and staff developed a wide variety of activities to celebrate and honor Apex’s past, present, and potential. Efforts behind the celebration year had one main goal – to create ways for each community member to go all in with Apex and feel proud to call Apex home. The group also wanted to engage anyone that interacts with Apex so everyone can “celebrate 150 years of history, learning, growing and becoming the community our residents, businesses, and visitors desire.”
Visit www.apex150.com to get all of the details and to watch a 2-½-minute video featuring some of the Town’s elected officials. The website features multiple sections, representing aspects of Apex’s “past, present and potential.”
The Past section of the Apex150 website opens with a quote from Carl P. “Toby” Holleman, Jr. and Warren Holleman’s book titled “Pluck, Perseverance, and Paint”: “It had taken only eight years from the end of a devastating Civil War for this undistinguished village, situated beside an unpretentious log pond, to become incorporated by the North Carolina General Assembly. And things only got better after that! Through the remaining decades of the nineteenth century and the first few decades of the twentieth, Apex emerged as a prosperous farm-to-market hub that gave every indication of fulfilling the promise of superlative achievement inherent in its bold new name. Indeed, by 1911 the Town of Apex had acquired a well-deserved reputation throughout the capital county as a can-do community of indomitable entrepreneurs. These people had gumption. These people had pluck!”
The Holleman brothers’ book is available for purchase online at https://apexhistory.org/.
On the Past webpage for Apex150, the history and growth of Apex is explored (did you know that the town was once called “Log Pond”?). There you can learn how the town started and how it got its name and motto (“the peak of good living” – hint: it’s train-related). You can also discover the importance of the railroad coming to town and explore significant events (such as the Great Fire of 1911) on a history timeline, which includes many old photographs and other interesting documents. “Apex was once a small community on the outskirts of the capital. Now, Apex is a place of its own.” It’s also now a place with a population of over 74,000!
The Present section of the Apex150 website is where you can find the long list of “Ways to Celebrate’’ activities that have been organized as part of this yearlong celebration. These activities include annual events, community tours, exhibits on Apex’s history, ways to give back to the community, and ways to be a good neighbor. Examples shown online include special programs like festivals, recreational tournaments, art exhibits, farmers market days, cultural tours, and much more. Be sure to check it out!
Save the date for the big event of the year, “Party in the Peak,” which will take place on Saturday, September 23 from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. on the Apex Town Hall campus. Information on this event is included in the Present section of the Apex150 website. This event will include live music and entertainment, old-fashioned games, kids activities, arts and crafts, food vendors, and more.
The information in the Present section of the website also includes details on the “Passport to the Peak” which community members can use to attend or complete activities, and receive passport stickers, to earn up to 6 prize items (i.e., town swag)! The passport is a small booklet that can be downloaded from online and printed out, or picked up at one of the following locations: (1) Apex Town Hall, (2) John M. Brown Community Center, (3) Apex Senior Center, (4) Halle Cultural Arts Center, and (5) The Apex Depot, during normal business hours.
The Passport swag items include: (1) for 10 activities: Peak of Good Living pint glass, (2) for 20 activities: Peak of Good Living shoelaces, (3) for 30 activities: Peak of Good Living ball cap, (4) for 40 activities: Peak of Good Living beach towel, (5) for 50 activities: Print of downtown Apex painting, and (6) for 60 activities: a Commemorative Sesquicentennial coin.
The Passport can be completed by participating in the “Ways to Celebrate” activities. When you participate in one of these activities, you will receive a “visa sticker” to add to your Passport. Look for the “visa checkpoint” signs at in-person activities and events. Alternatively, you can snap a photograph or add something to the “memory collection” section of your Passport to show that you were at an activity, and pick up visa stickers at another in-person 150th activity. The Town will also have scheduled check-in times throughout the celebratory year. Specific dates for these will be emailed out to those who sign up for the Passport activity.
As mentioned above, the back section of the Passport includes a “memory collection” space. This is the perfect way for participants to tell their own 150th story through fun and important moments captured during the celebration year. Participants can fill the section with pictures, receipts, random items, and more to help remember how they celebrated the sesquicentennial!
The Potential section is the third major part of the Apex150 website. It focuses on continued improvements and long-range plans for the town. Many informational documents are included on this page, such as the town’s Strategic Plan, Vision Zero, Advance Apex, Affordable Housing Plan, Downtown Plan, and Bike Apex.
As it states on the Potential webpage: “You don’t get to be America’s best place to live by chance or accident. It takes great commitment and vision to create an environment that’s so beloved by those who are fortunate enough to call Apex home. Though the town continues to receive accolades, that doesn’t stop us from continuing to improve upon providing the best services, amenities, and environment for all of our residents, businesses, and visitors…Apex is always looking forward. We’re dedicated to growing alongside our community, with opportunities for public feedback every step of the way.”
Back in 1975, a public contest was held which yielded “The Peak of Good Living” as the Town of Apex’s slogan. The phrase was a nod to the town’s good quality of life, as well as the play on the town’s namesake for being the highest point along a 30-mile section of the Chatham Railroad. At that time, the town’s population stood at around 2,200. While the population size has grown quite a bit since then, the sense of community in town remains strong and this yearlong celebration hopes to bring people together even more.
As part of the sesquicentennial, a new logo was developed for the celebration year. The 150th logo was designed to represent the town in its 150th year with three lines portraying the town’s past, present, and potential. Every town and individual has a story, one that shows pieces of history, knows who and what it is today, and aspires to be something even greater in the future. The three lines of the 150th logo are a visual reminder of that story for Apex and each community member.
As already stated, the Apex 150th celebration aims to be a year of unification, common understanding, and to provide a challenge to community members to go all in with Apex! It is the hope of the planning committees and town officials that Apex’s 150th celebration will leave everyone who interacts with the celebration year feeling proud to call Apex home and satisfied with the diverse amenities that the town has to offer.