Musician and UNC Alum Tift Merritt, a True North Carolina Gem, Still Has Plenty of Material to Mine

Posted Sep 26, 2025
Although born in Texas, Tift Merritt was raised in Raleigh and is a North Carolina girl through and through. She waitressed in Wilmington for a stint after high school before enrolling at UNC in the late ‘90s, where she immersed herself in the creative writing department, studying under Doris Betts and intending to become a fiction writer. (Indy Week)

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