History of North Carolina
Encyclopedia
The history of North Carolina from prehistory to the present covers the experiences of the people who have lived in the territory that now comprises the U.S. state of North Carolina
.
Before 200 AD, residents were building earthwork mounds
, which were used for ceremonial and religious purposes. Succeeding peoples, including those of the ancient Mississippian culture
established by 1000 AD in the Piedmont, continued to build or add on to such mounds. In the 500–700 years preceding European contact, the Mississippian culture built large, complex cities and maintained far flung regional trading networks. Historically documented tribes in the North Carolina region included the Carolina Algonquian-speaking tribes of the coastal areas, such as the Chowanoke
, Roanoke
, Pamlico
, Machapunga
, Coree
, Cape Fear Indians
, and others, who were the first encountered by the English; Iroquoian-speaking Meherrin
, Cherokee
and Tuscarora
of the interior; and Southeastern Siouan tribes, such as the Cheraw
, Waxhaw
, Saponi
, Waccamaw
, and Catawba
.
England was the primary European nation to settle the area, starting with a charter in 1584. Sir Walter Raleigh began two small settlements in the late 1580s, but they failed—the mystery remains as to what happened to the "Lost Colony" of Roanoke Island
. By colonists from the Virginia moved into the area of Albemarle Sound
. In 1663 the king granted a charter for a new colony named Carolina in honor of his father Charles I
. He gave ownership to the Lords Proprietors
North Carolina had developed a system of representative government and local control by the early 18th century, and resented British attempts after 1765 to levy taxes without representation in parliament. The colony was a Patriot base during the American Revolution
, and its legislature issued the Halifax Resolves
, which authorized North Carolina delegates to the Second Continental Congress
to vote for independence from Britain. Loyalist elements were suppressed and there was relatively little military activity until late in the war.
During the first half of the nineteenth century, North Carolina remained a rural state, with no cities and few villages. Most whites operated small subsistence farms, but the eastern part of the state had a growing class of planters, especially after 1800 when cotton became highly profitable when using slave labor. Politically the state was highly democratic, as heated elections (among adult white men) pitted the Democratic east versus the Whiggish west. After the firing on Fort Sumter in April 1861 North Carolina seceded from the United States and joined the Confederate States of America
. More soldiers from North Carolina fought for the Confederacy during the American Civil War
, than any other state, but few major battles were fought there. During the early years of Reconstruction, strides were made at integrating the newly freed slaves into society, however these were quickly overturned and North Carolina became a firm part of the Jim Crow
South.
The Civil Rights movement of the 1950s and 1960s had many connections to North Carolina. Events such as the sit-in
protest at the F.W. Woolworth's store in Greensboro
would become a touchstone for the movement, and the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee
, a central organization in the movement, was founded at Shaw University
in Raleigh
. In 1973, Clarence Lightner
was elected as the first African-American mayor of a major southern city, also in Raleigh.
The earliest discovered human settlements in what eventually became North Carolina are found at the Hardaway Site
near the town of Badin
in the south-central part of the state. Radiocarbon dating
of the site has not been possible. However, based on other dating methods, such as rock strata and the existence of Dalton-type spear points
, the site has been dated to approximately 8000 BC.
Spearpoints of the Dalton type continued to change and evolve slowly for the next 7000 years, suggesting a continuity of culture for most of that time. During this time, settlement was scattered and likely existed solely on the hunter-gatherer
level. Towards the end of this period, there is evidence of settled agriculture
, such as plant domestication and the development of pottery.
From 1000 BC until the time of European settlement marks a time period known as the "Woodland period". Permanent villages, based on settled agriculture, existed throughout the state. By about 800 AD, fortified towns appeared throughout the Piedmont
region, suggesting the existence of organized tribal warfare. An important site of this late-Woodland period is the Town Creek Indian Mound
, an archaeologically rich location occupied by the Pee Dee culture
of the Mississippian tradition
.
The earliest exploration of North Carolina by a European expedition is likely that of Giovanni da Verrazzano in 1524. An Italian from Florence
, Verrazzano was hired by French merchants in order to procure a sea route to bring silk to the city of Lyon
. With the tacit support of King Francis I
, Verrazzano sailed west on January 1, 1524 aboard his ship La Dauphine
ahead of a flotilla that numbered three ships. The expedition made landfall at Cape Fear, and Verrazzano reported of his explorations to the King of France,
, making periodic explorations as he sought a route further west towards China. When he viewed the Albemarle
and Pamlico
Sounds opposite the Outer Banks, he believed them to be the Pacific Ocean; his reports of such helped fuel the belief that the westward route to Asia was much closer than previously believed.
Just two years later, in 1526, a group of Spanish colonists from Hispaniola
led by Lucas Vázquez de Ayllón landed at the mouth of a river they called the "Rio Jordan", which may have been the Cape Fear River
. The party consisted of 500 men and women, their slaves, and horses. One of their ships wrecked off the shore, and valuable supplies were lost; this coupled with illness and rebellion doomed the colony. Ayllon died in October, 1526 and the 150 or so survivors of that first year abandoned the colony and attempted to return to Hispaniola. Later explorers reported finding their remains along the coast; as the dead were cast off during the return trip.
Hernando de Soto first explored west-central North Carolina during his 1539-1540 expedition. His first encounter with a native settlement in North Carolina may have been at Guaquilli near modern Hickory
. In 1567 Captain Juan Pardo
led an expedition from Santa Elena at Parris Island, South Carolina
, then the capital of the Spanish colony in the Southeast, into the interior of North Carolina, largely following De Soto's earlier route. His journey was ordered to claim the area as a Spanish colony, pacify and convert the natives, as well as establish another route to protect silver mines in Mexico (the Spanish did not realize the distances involved). Pardo went toward the northwest to be able to get food supplies from natives.
Pardo and his team made a winter base at Joara
(near Morganton
, in Burke County
), which he renamed Cuenca. They built Fort San Juan and left 30 men, while Pardo traveled further, establishing five other forts. He returned by a different route to Santa Elena. After 18 months, in the spring of 1568, natives killed all the soldiers and burned the six forts, including the one at Fort San Juan. The Spanish never returned to the interior to press their colonial claim, but this marked the first European attempt at colonization of the interior. Translation in the 1980s of a journal by Pardo's scribe Bandera have confirmed the expedition and settlement. Archaeological finds at Joara indicate that it was a Mississippian culture
settlement and also indicate Spanish settlement at Fort San Juan in 1567-1568. Joara was the largest mound builder
settlement in the region. Records of Hernando de Soto attested to his meeting with them in 1540.
of 1584–1587, the famed "Lost Colony" of Sir Walter Raleigh
. The colony was established at Roanoke Island
in the Croatan Sound
on the leeward side of the Outer Banks
. The first attempt at a settlement consisted of 100 or so men led by Ralph Lane
. They built a fort, and waited for supplies from a second voyage. While waiting for supplies to return, Lane and his men antagonized the local Croatan
peoples, killing several of them in armed skirmishes. The interactions were not all negative, as the local people did teach the colonists some survival skills, such as the construction of dugout canoes.
When the relief was long in coming, the colonists began to give up hope; after a chance encounter with Sir Francis Drake
, the colonists elected to accept transport back to England with him. When the supply ships did arrive, only a few days later, they found the colony abandoned. The ship's captain, Richard Grenville
, left a small force of 15 men to hold the fort and supplies and wait for a new stock of colonists.
In 1587 a third ship arrived carrying 110 men, 17 women, and 9 children, some of whom had been part of the first group of colonists that had earlier abandoned Roanoke. This group was led by John White. Among them was a pregnant woman; she gave birth to the first English subject born in North America, Virginia Dare
. The colonists found the remains of the garrison left behind, likely killed by the Croatan who had been so antagonized by Lane's aggressiveness. White had intended to pick up the remains of the garrison, abandon Roanoke Island, and settle in the Chesapeake Bay
. White's Portuguese pilot, Simon Fernandez, refused to carry on further; rather than risk mutiny
, White agreed to resettle the former colony.
The Spanish War prevented any further contact between the colony and England until a 1590 expedition, which found no remains of any colonists, just an abandoned colony and the letters "CROATOAN" carved into a tree, and "CRO" carved into another. Despite many investigations, no one knows what happened to the colony.
almost from the beginning. The Spanish experienced trouble colonizing North Carolina because it had a dangerous coastline, a lack of ports, and few inland rivers by which to navigate. In the 1650s and 1660s, settlers (mostly British) moved south from Virginia
, in addition to runaway servants and fur trappers. They settled chiefly in the Albemarle Borderlands region.
In 1665, a second charter was issued to attempt to resolve territorial questions. In 1710, due to disputes over governance, the Carolina colony began to split into North Carolina and South Carolina
. The latter became a crown colony in 1729. Smallpox
took a heavy toll in the South. The 1738 epidemic was said to have killed one-half of the Cherokee, with other tribes of the area suffering equally. There were only about 5,000 settlers in 1700 and 11,000 in 1715. While mostly British, the settlers included a few African slaves and a colony at New Bern
composed of Swiss
and German settlers.
As early as 1689, the Carolina proprietors named a separate governor for the region of the colony that lay to the north and east of Cape Fear. By 1712, the term "North Carolina" was in common use. In 1728, the dividing line between North Carolina and Virginia was surveyed. In 1730, the population was 30,000. By 1729, the Crown bought out seven of the eight original proprietors, making North Carolina a royal colony. The proprietor who refused to sell was John Carteret, 2nd Earl Granville
, who in 1744 received rights to the vast Granville Tract
, constituting the northern half of North Carolina.
This happened just as the tide of immigration to North Carolina from Virginia and Pennsylvania began to swell. Arriving during the mid-to-late 18th century, the Scots-Irish from what is today Northern Ireland were the largest non-English immigrant group before the Revolution and English indentured servants were overwhelmingly the largest immigrant group prior to the Revolution. On the eve of the American Revolution, North Carolina was the fastest-growing British colony in North America. The small family farms of the Piedmont contrasted sharply with the plantation
economy of the coastal region, where wealthy planters grew tobacco
and rice
with slave labor.
Differences in the settlement patterns of eastern and western North Carolina, or the low country and uplands, affected the political, economic, and social life of the state from the eighteenth until the twentieth century. The Tidewater in eastern North Carolina was settled chiefly by immigrants from rural England
and the Scottish Highlands
. The upcountry of western North Carolina was settled chiefly by Scots-Irish, English
and German
Protestants, the so-called "cohee". Arriving during the mid-to-late 18th century, the Scots-Irish from Ireland were the largest immigrant group before the Revolution. During the Revolutionary War
, the English and Highland Scots of eastern North Carolina tended to remain loyal to the British Crown, because of longstanding business and personal connections with Great Britain. The English, Welsh, Scots-Irish and German settlers of western North Carolina tended to favor American independence from Britain.
Most of the English colonists arrived as indentured servant
s, hiring themselves out as teenagers for a fixed period to pay for their passage.
With no cities and very few towns or villages, the colony was intensely rural and spread out. Local taverns provided multiple services ranging from strong drink, beds for travelers, and meeting rooms for politicians and businessmen. In a world sharply divided along lines of ethnicity, gender, race, and class, the tavern keepers' rum proved a solvent that mixed together all sorts of locals, as well as travelers. The increasing variety of drinks on offer, and the emergence of private clubs meeting in the taverns, showed that genteel culture was spreading from London to the periphery of the English world. The courthouse was usually the most imposing building in the county. Jails were often an important part of the courthouse but were sometimes built separately. Tobacco warehouses were also built by some county governments.
families formed in North Carolina before the Revolution were descended from unions or marriages between free white women and enslaved or free African or African-American men. Because the mothers were free, their children were born free. As the flow of indentured laborers slackened, more slaves were imported and the state's controls on slavery hardened. The economy's growth and prosperity was based on slave labor, devoted first to the production of tobacco
. The oppressive and brutal experiences of slaves and poor whites in led to the moral acceptance among many of these people of criminal activities, such as escape from slaveowners, violent resistance, and theft of food and other goods in order to survive.
's conspicuous consumption in the construction of a new governor's mansion
at New Bern fuelled the movement's resentment. As the western districts were under-represented in the colonial legislature, it was difficult for the farmers to obtain redress by legislative
means. Ultimately, the frustrated farmers took to arms and closed the court in Hillsborough, North Carolina
. Tryon sent troops to the region and defeated the Regulators at the Battle of Alamance
in May 1771.
". The First Continental Congress
had urged their creation in 1774. By 1775 they had become counter-governments that gradually replaced royal authority and took control of local governments. They regulated the economy, politics, morality, and militia of their individual communities. After December 1776 they came under the control of a more powerful central authority, the Council of Safety.
In the spring of 1776, North Carolinians, meeting in the fourth of their Provincial Congresses
, drafted the Halifax Resolves
, a set of resolutions that empowered the state's delegates to the Second Continental Congress
to concur in a declaration of independence from Great Britain. In July, 1776, the new state became part of the new nation, the United States of America.
In 1775 the Patriots easily expelled the Royal governor and suppressed the Loyalists
. In November 1776, elected representatives gathered in Halifax to write a new state constitution
, which remained in effect until 1835. One of the most prominent Loyalists was John Legett, a rich planter in Bladen County. He organized and led one of the few loyalist brigades in the South (the North Carolina Volunteers, later known as the Royal North Carolina Regiment). After the war, Colonel Legett and some of his men moved to Nova Scotia; the British gave them free land grants in County Harbour. The great majority of Loyalists remained in North Carolina and became citizens of the new nation.
Local militia units proved important in the guerrilla war of 1780-81, and even more important were the soldiers who enlisted in George Washington's Continental Army and fought in numerous battles up and down the land.
With a weak tax base, state officials used impressment to seize food and supplies needed for the war effort, paying the farmers with promissary notes. To raise soldiers, state officials tried a draft law. Both both policies created significant discontent that undermined support for the new nation. The state's large German population, concentrated in the central counties, tried to remain neutral; the Moravians were actively pacifist because of strong religious beliefs, while Lutheran and Reformed Germans were passively neutral. All peace groups paid triple taxes in lieu of military service.
Well the British were punctual in paying their regulars and their Loyalist forces, American soldiers went month after month in threadbare uniforms with no pay and scanty supplies. Belatedly, the state tried to make amends. After 1780 soldiers received cash bounties, a slave "or the value thereof," clothing, food, and land (after 1782 they received from 640 to 1,200 acres depending on rank). Since the money supply, based on the Continental currency was subject to high inflation and loss of value, state officials valued compensation in relation to gold and silver.
between units of Patriots and Loyalists. Often the opportunity was seized to settle private grudges and feuds. A major American victory took place at King's Mountain along the North Carolina–South Carolina border. On October 7, 1780 a force of 1000 mountain men from western North Carolina (including what is today part of Tennessee
) overwhelmed a force of some 1000 Loyalist and British troops led by Major Patrick Ferguson
. The victory largely ended British efforts to recruit more Loyalists.
The road to American victory at Yorktown
led through North Carolina. As the British army moved north toward Virginia the Southern Division of the Continental Army
and local militia prepared to meet them. Following General Daniel Morgan
's victory over the British under Banastre Tarleton
at the Battle of Cowpens
on January 17, 1781, southern commander Nathanael Greene
led British Lord Charles Cornwallis across the heartland of North Carolina, and away from Cornwallis's base of supply in Charleston, South Carolina. This campaign is known as "The Race to the Dan" or "The Race for the River."
Generals Greene and Cornwallis finally met at the Battle of Guilford Courthouse in present-day Greensboro
on March 15, 1781. Although the British
troops held the field at the end of the battle, their casualties at the hands of the numerically superior American Army were crippling. Comwallis has a poor strategic plan which had failed in holding his heavily garrisoned positions in South Carolina and Georgia, and had failed to subdue North Carolina. By contrast, Greene used a more flexible adaptive approach that negated the British advantages and built an adequate logistical foundation for the American campaigns. Greene's defensive operations provided the Southern Army the opportunity to later seize the strategic offensive from Comwallis and eventually reclaim the Carolinas. The weakened Cornwallis headed to the Virginia coastline to get rescued by the Royal Navy
. There the Navy was repulsed and Cornwallis, surrounded by American and French units, surrendered to George Washington
, effectively ending the fighting.
In 1786, the population of North Carolina had increased to 350,000.
drafted in 1787 was controversial in North Carolina. Delegate meetings at Hillsboro in July 1788 initially voted to reject it for anti-federalist reasons. They were persuaded to change their minds partly by the strenuous efforts of James Iredell
and William Davies
and partly by the prospect of a Bill of Rights
. Meanwhile, residents in the wealthy northeastern part of the state, who generally supported the proposed Constitution, threatened to secede if the rest of the state did not fall into line. A second ratifying convention was held in Fayetteville in November 1789, and on November 21, North Carolina became the 12th state to ratify the U.S. Constitution.
North Carolina adopted a new state constitution in 1835. One of the major changes was the introduction of direct election of the governor, for a term of two years; prior to 1835, the legislature elected the governor for a term of one year. North Carolina's current capitol building
was completed in 1840.
in the east to Bethania
(northwest of Winston-Salem
).
On October 25, 1836 construction began on the Wilmington and Raleigh Railroad
to connect the port city of Wilmington
with the state capital of Raleigh
. In 1849 the North Carolina Railroad was created by act of the legislature to extend that railroad west to Greensboro
, High Point
, and Charlotte
. During the Civil War the Wilmington-to-Raleigh stretch of the railroad would be vital to the Confederate war effort; supplies shipped into Wilmington would be moved by rail through Raleigh to the Confederate capital of Richmond, Virginia
.
state, even by Southern standards. In 1860 only one North Carolina town, the port city of Wilmington
, had a population of more than 10,000. Raleigh
, the state capital, had barely more than 5,000 residents.
The majority of white families comprised the Plain Folk of the Old South
, or "yeoman farmers." They owned their own small farms, and occasionally had a slave or two. Most of their efforts were to build up the farm, and feed their families, with a little surplus sold on the market in order to pay taxes and buy necessities.
While slaveholding was slightly less concentrated than in some Southern states, according to the 1860 census, more than 330,000 people, or 33% of the population of 992,622 were enslaved African-Americans. They lived and worked chiefly on plantations in the eastern Tidewater
. In addition, 30,463 free people of color lived in the state. They were also concentrated in the eastern coastal plain, especially at port cities such as Wilmington and New Bern where they had access to a variety of jobs. Free African Americans were allowed to vote until 1835, when the state rescinded their suffrage.
Besides slaves, there were a number of free people of color
in the state. Most were descended from free African Americans who had migrated along with neighbors from Virginia
during the eighteenth century. After the Revolution
, Quakers
and Mennonite
s worked to persuade slaveholders to free their slaves. Some were inspired by their efforts and the language of men's rights, to arrange for manumission
of their slaves. The number of free people of color rose markedly in the first couple of decades after the Revolution.
had won the presidential election. With the attack on Fort Sumter
in April 1861, in Lincoln's call for troops to march to South Carolina, the unionist element virtually collapsed in both of the state, and North Carolina joined the Confederacy.
North Carolina was the site of few battles, but it provided at least 125,000 troops to the Confederacy— far more than any other state. Approximately 40,000 of those troops never returned home, dying of disease, battlefield wounds, and starvation. North Carolina also supplied about 15,000 Union troops. Confederate troops from all parts of North Carolina served in virtually all the major battles of the Army of Northern Virginia
, the Confederacy's most famous army. The largest battle fought in North Carolina was at Bentonville
, which was a futile attempt by Confederate General Joseph Johnston
to slow Union General William Tecumseh Sherman
's advance through the Carolinas in the spring of 1865. In April 1865 after losing the Battle of Morrisville
, Johnston surrendered to Sherman at Bennett Place
, in what is today Durham, North Carolina
. This was the next to last major Confederate Army to surrender. North Carolina's port city of Wilmington
was the last major Confederate port for blockade runners; it fell in the spring of 1865 after the nearby Second Battle of Fort Fisher
.
Elected in 1862, Governor Zebulon Baird Vance
tried to maintain state autonomy against Confederate President Jefferson Davis
.
The Union's naval blockade of Southern ports and the breakdown of the Confederate transportation system took a heavy toll on North Carolina residents, as did the runaway inflation of the war years. In the spring of 1863, there were food riots in North Carolina as town dwellers found it hard to buy food. On the other hand, blockade runners brought prosperity several port cities, until they were shut down by the Union Navy in 1864-65.
Even after secession, some North Carolinians refused to support the Confederacy. This was particularly true of non-slave-owning farmers in the state's mountains and western Piedmont region. Some of these farmers remained neutral during the war, while some covertly supported the Union
cause during the conflict. Approximately 2,000 white North Carolinians from western North Carolina enlisted in the Union Army
and fought for the North in the war, and two additional black Union regiments were raised in the coastal areas of the state that were occupied by Union forces in 1862 and 1863.
A number of white northerners migrated to North Carolina to work and invest. While feelings in the state were high against carpetbaggers, of the 133 persons at the constitutional convention, only 18 were Northern carpetbaggers and 15 were African American. North Carolina was readmitted to the Union in 1868, after ratifying a new state constitution. It included provisions to establish public education, prohibited slavery, and adopted universal suffrage. It also provided for orphanages, public charities and a penitentiary. The legislature also ratified the Fourteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.
In 1870 the Democratic Party came to power in the state. Governor William W. Holden had used civil powers and spoken out to try to combat the Ku Klux Klan's increasing violence. Conservatives accused him of being head of the Union League
, of believing in social equality between the races, and of being corrupt. When the legislature voted to impeach him, however, it charged him only with using and paying troops to put down insurrection (Ku Klux Klan activity) in the state. Holden was impeached and turned over his duties to Lieutenant Governor Tod R. Caldwell on December 20, 1870. The trial began on January 30, 1871, and lasted nearly three months. On March 22, the North Carolina Senate found Holden guilty and ordered him removed from office.
After the Ku Klux Klan Act of 1871 went into effect, the U.S. Attorney General, Amos T. Akerman
, vigorously prosecuted Klan members in North Carolina. During the late 1870s, there was increased violence in the Piedmont
area, where whites tried to suppress minority black voting in the election.
won a majority of seats in the state legislature. White Democrats worked to break up the coalition and reduce black and poor white suffrage.
In 1896 North Carolina passed a statute that made voter registration more complicated and reduced blacks on voter registration rolls. In 1898 in an election characterized by violence, fraud and intimidation of black voters, white Democrats regained power in the state legislature.
They then passed a new constitution in 1900 with a suffrage amendment. Its provisions for poll taxes, literacy tests and similar mechanisms succeeded in reducing black voter turnout completely by 1904, and disfranchising many poor whites as well. Contemporary accounts estimated that 75,000 black men lost the vote. In 1900 blacks numbered 630,207 citizens, about 33% of the state's total population.
With control of the legislature, white Democrats passed Jim Crow laws establishing segregation in public facilities and transportation. It would take African Americans more than 60 years before they would regain full power to exercise the suffrage and other full rights of citizens. Without the abiliy to vote, they lost all chance at local offices: sheriffs, justices of the peace, jurors, county commissioners and school board members, which were the active site of government at the turn of the century. Suppression of the black vote and re-establishment of white supremacy quickly overwhelmed people's memory and knowledge of the thriving black middle class in the state.
Post-Civil War racial politics encouraged efforts to divide and co-opt groups. In 1885 the state created 12 separate school districts for "Indians". The group changed their name to "Cherokee Indians of Robeson County" in 1913, "Siouan Indians of Lumber River" in 1934-1935, and were given limited recognition by the U.S. Congress as Lumbee Indians in 1956.
As the Democrats solidified their position in the legislature. They also drew racial lines in areas where they had been blurred. In 1900 the state passed laws completing the disfranchisement process and the Republicans were no longer competitive in the state.
textile industry in close-knit company towns, and timber-based furniture and building supplies in villages such as High Point and Thomasville. The introduction of manufacturing helped to diversify North Carolina's chiefly agricultural economy. In the early decades, African Americans were rejected for textile industry jobs because of segregation.
Reacting to segregation, disfranchisement and difficulties in agriculture, tens of thousands of African Americans left the state for the North for better opportunities in the Great Migration
, whose first wave was from 1910-1940. They went to Washington, Baltimore, and Philadelphia; and sometimes further north, where there was work.
The work patterns of elite white women changed radically, depending on their stage in the life cycle. Women over age 50 changed least, insisting that they needed servants and continuing their traditional managerial roles. The next generation comprising the young wives and mothers during the war depended much less on black servants, and displayed greater flexibility toward household work. The youngest generation, which matured during the war and Reconstruction, did many of their own domestic chores and sought paid jobs outside the household, especially in teaching, which allowed an escape from domestic chores and obligatory marriage.
made the first successful airplane flight at Kitty Hawk, North Carolina.
In the early 20th century, North Carolina launched both a major education initiative and a major road-building initiative to enhance the state's economy. The educational initiative was launched by Governor Charles Aycock
in 1901. Supposedly, North Carolina built one school per day while Aycock was in office. In addition, North Carolina was helped by the Julius Rosenwald Fund, which contributed matching funds for the construction of thousands of schools for African Americans in rural areas throughout the South in the 1920s and 1930s.
The state's road-building initiative began in the 1920s, after the automobile became a popular mode of transportation. During the early decades of the 20th century, several major U.S. military installations, notably Fort Bragg
, were located in North Carolina. There were many usable trains in the town.
An important state government agency was the North Carolina Woman's Committee, headed by Laura Holmes Reilly of Charlotte. Motivated by the public service ideals of the Progressive Movement, it registered women for many volunteer services, promoted increased food production and the elimination of wasteful cooking and storage practices, helped maintain social services, worked to bolster moral well-being of white and black soldiers, provided ideas on improvements of public health and public schools, encouraged black participation in its programs, and helped with the terrible Spanish flu epidemic that struck worldwide in late 1918. Of the committee was generally successful in reaching middle-class white and black women, but it was handicapped by condescension by men, limited funding, and tepid responses from women on the farms and working-class districts.
, but benefited greatly by the New Deal programs, especially the tobacco program which guaranteed a steady flow of relatively high income to farmers, and the cotton program, which raised the prices farmers received for their crops. The textile industry in the Piedmont region continued to attract cotton mills relocating from the high-wage North.
Prosperity largely returned during World War II, as the state sent hundreds of thousands of young men and a few hundred young women into the military, and supplied the armed forces with more textiles than any other state in the nation.
Political scientist V. O. Key analyzed the state political culture in depth in the late 1940s, and concluded it was exceptional in the South for its "progressive outlook and action in many phases of life", especially in the realm of industrial development, commitment to public education, and a moderate pattern segregation that was relatively free of the rigid racism found in the Deep South.
: the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
(chartered in 1789 and greatly expanded from the 1930s on), North Carolina State University
, and Duke University
(rechartered in 1924). conditions and the public elementary and high schools were not as noteworthy, however. In the 1960s Governor Terry Sanford
, a racial moderate, called for more spending on the schools, but Sanford's program featured regressive taxation that fell disproportionately on the workers. In the 1970s Governor James B. Hunt Jr., another racial moderate, championed educational reform
Reformers have stressed the central role of education in the modernization of the state and economic growth. They have also aggressively pursued economic development, attracting out-of-state, and international corporations with special tax deals and infrastructure development. Charlotte became the nation's number two banking center, after New York.
to press for voter registration. The city had an educated and politically sophisticated black middle class; by 1946 the League had succeeded in registering 7,000 black voters, an achievement in the segregated South. The work of racial desegregation
and restoration of civil rights for African Americans continued throughout the state.
Durham's Black newspaper Carolina Times, edited by Louis Austin, took the lead in promoting the "Double V" strategy during World War II among civil rights activists. the strategy was to energize blacks to fight victory abroad against the Nazis and Japs, while fighting for victory at home against white supremacy and racial oppression. Calling for a war against racism abroad and at home, activists demanded an end to racial inequality in education, politics, economics, and the armed forces.
In 1960 nearly 25% of the state was African American: 1,114,907 citizens who had been living without full rights. African-American college students began the sit-in
at the Woolworth's
lunch counter in Greensboro
on February 1, 1960, sparking a wave of copycat sit-ins across the American South. They continued the Greensboro sit-in sporadically for several months until, on July 25, African Americans were at last allowed to eat at Woolworth's. Integration of public facilities followed.
Together with continued activism in states throughout the South, African Americans' moral leadership gained passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964
and the Voting Rights Act of 1965. Throughout the state, African Americans began to participate fully in political life. In October 1973, Clarence Lightner
was elected mayor of Raleigh
, making history as the first popularly elected mayor of the city, the first African American to be elected mayor, and the first African American to be elected mayor in a white-majority city of the South.
In 1979 North Carolina ended the state eugenics
program. Since 1929 the state Eugenics Board had deemed thousands of individuals 'feeble minded' and had them forcibly sterilized. In 2011 the state legislature debated whether the estimate 2,900 living victims of North Carolina's sterilization regime would be compensated for the irreparable harm inflicted upon them by the state. The victims of the program were disproportionate minorities and the poor.
was ratified. A 1997 amendment to this constitution granted the governor veto
power over most legislation. The state became a Republican stronghold in national elections starting in 1968, although Barack Obama did carry the electoral vote in 2008.
During the last 25 years, North Carolina's population has increased as its economy has grown, especially in finance and knowledge-based industries, while agriculture has declined sharply because of mechanization, and the textile industry has steadily declined because of globalization. Most of the growth has taken place in metropolitan areas of the Piedmont, in Charlotte, Raleigh-Durham, Greensboro.
North Carolina
North Carolina is a state located in the southeastern United States. The state borders South Carolina and Georgia to the south, Tennessee to the west and Virginia to the north. North Carolina contains 100 counties. Its capital is Raleigh, and its largest city is Charlotte...
.
Before 200 AD, residents were building earthwork mounds
Earthworks (archaeology)
In archaeology, earthwork is a general term to describe artificial changes in land level. Earthworks are often known colloquially as 'lumps and bumps'. Earthworks can themselves be archaeological features or they can show features beneath the surface...
, which were used for ceremonial and religious purposes. Succeeding peoples, including those of the ancient Mississippian culture
Mississippian culture
The Mississippian culture was a mound-building Native American culture that flourished in what is now the Midwestern, Eastern, and Southeastern United States from approximately 800 CE to 1500 CE, varying regionally....
established by 1000 AD in the Piedmont, continued to build or add on to such mounds. In the 500–700 years preceding European contact, the Mississippian culture built large, complex cities and maintained far flung regional trading networks. Historically documented tribes in the North Carolina region included the Carolina Algonquian-speaking tribes of the coastal areas, such as the Chowanoke
Chowanoke
The Chowanoke, also spelled Chowanoc, was an Algonquian-language American Indian tribe. They were the largest and most powerful Algonquian tribe in present-day North Carolina, occupying most or all of the coastal banks of the Chowan River in the northeastern part of the state at time of the first...
, Roanoke
Roanoke (tribe)
The Roanoke, also spelled Roanoac, tribe were a Carolina Algonquian-speaking people whose territory comprised present-day Dare County, Roanoke Island and part of the mainland at the time of English exploration and colonization...
, Pamlico
Pamlico
The Pamlico were a Native American people of North Carolina. They spoke an Algonquian language also known as Pamlico or Carolina Algonquian.- Geography :...
, Machapunga
Machapunga
The Machapunga were a very small Native American tribe of Algonquian descent, one of a number in the territory of North Carolina, probably related to the Algonquian of the Powhatan Confederacy in present-day Virginia, who had migrated south. They have now disappeared as a separate tribe...
, Coree
Coree
The Coree were a very small Native American tribe, who once occupied a coastal area of southeastern North Carolina in the area now covered by Carteret and Craven counties...
, Cape Fear Indians
Cape Fear Indians
The Cape Fear Indians were a small tribe of Carolina Algonquian Native Americans who lived on the Cape Fear River in North Carolina ....
, and others, who were the first encountered by the English; Iroquoian-speaking Meherrin
Meherrin
The Meherrin Nation is one of eight state-recognized Nations of Native Americans in North Carolina. They reside in rural northeastern North Carolina, near the river of the same name on the Virginia-North Carolina border. They received formal state recognition in 1986. The Meherrin have an...
, Cherokee
Cherokee
The Cherokee are a Native American people historically settled in the Southeastern United States . Linguistically, they are part of the Iroquoian language family...
and Tuscarora
Tuscarora (tribe)
The Tuscarora are a Native American people of the Iroquoian-language family, with members in New York, Canada, and North Carolina...
of the interior; and Southeastern Siouan tribes, such as the Cheraw
Cheraw (tribe)
The Cheraw , were a tribe of Siouan-speaking Amerindians first encountered by Hernando De Soto in 1540. The name they called themselves is lost to history but the Cherokee called them Ani-suwa'ii and the Catawba Sara...
, Waxhaw
Waxhaws
The Waxhaws is a geographical area on the border of North and South Carolina.-Geography:The Waxhaws region is in the Piedmont region of North and South Carolina, southwest of the Uwharrie Mountains. The region encompasses an area just south of Charlotte, North Carolina, to Lancaster, South...
, Saponi
Saponi
Saponi is one of the eastern Siouan-language tribes, related to the Tutelo, Occaneechi, Monacan, Manahoac and other eastern Siouan peoples. Its ancestral homeland was in North Carolina and Virginia. The tribe was long believed extinct, as its members migrated north to merge with other tribes...
, Waccamaw
Waccamaw Siouan
Waccamaw Siouan Indians are one of eight state-recognized Native American tribal nations in North Carolina. Formerly Siouan-speaking, they are located predominantly in the southeastern North Carolina counties of Bladen and Columbus. They adopted this name in 1948. Their communities are St...
, and Catawba
Catawba (tribe)
The Catawba are a federally recognized tribe of Native Americans, known as the Catawba Indian Nation. They live in the Southeast United States, along the border between North and South Carolina near the city of Rock Hill...
.
England was the primary European nation to settle the area, starting with a charter in 1584. Sir Walter Raleigh began two small settlements in the late 1580s, but they failed—the mystery remains as to what happened to the "Lost Colony" of Roanoke Island
Roanoke Island
Roanoke Island is an island in Dare County near the coast of North Carolina, United States. It was named after the historical Roanoke Carolina Algonquian people who inhabited the area in the 16th century at the time of English exploration....
. By colonists from the Virginia moved into the area of Albemarle Sound
Albemarle Sound
Albemarle Sound is a large estuary on the coast of North Carolina in the United States located at the confluence of a group of rivers, including the Chowan and Roanoke. It is separated from the Atlantic Ocean by the Outer Banks, a long barrier peninsula upon which the town of Kitty Hawk is located,...
. In 1663 the king granted a charter for a new colony named Carolina in honor of his father Charles I
Charles I of England
Charles I was King of England, King of Scotland, and King of Ireland from 27 March 1625 until his execution in 1649. Charles engaged in a struggle for power with the Parliament of England, attempting to obtain royal revenue whilst Parliament sought to curb his Royal prerogative which Charles...
. He gave ownership to the Lords Proprietors
American Revolution
The American Revolution was the political upheaval during the last half of the 18th century in which thirteen colonies in North America joined together to break free from the British Empire, combining to become the United States of America...
, and its legislature issued the Halifax Resolves
Halifax Resolves
The Halifax Resolves is the name later given to a resolution adopted by the Fourth Provincial Congress of the Province of North Carolina on April 12, 1776, during the American Revolution...
, which authorized North Carolina delegates to the Second Continental Congress
Second Continental Congress
The Second Continental Congress was a convention of delegates from the Thirteen Colonies that started meeting on May 10, 1775, in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, soon after warfare in the American Revolutionary War had begun. It succeeded the First Continental Congress, which met briefly during 1774,...
to vote for independence from Britain. Loyalist elements were suppressed and there was relatively little military activity until late in the war.
During the first half of the nineteenth century, North Carolina remained a rural state, with no cities and few villages. Most whites operated small subsistence farms, but the eastern part of the state had a growing class of planters, especially after 1800 when cotton became highly profitable when using slave labor. Politically the state was highly democratic, as heated elections (among adult white men) pitted the Democratic east versus the Whiggish west. After the firing on Fort Sumter in April 1861 North Carolina seceded from the United States and joined the Confederate States of America
Confederate States of America
The Confederate States of America was a government set up from 1861 to 1865 by 11 Southern slave states of the United States of America that had declared their secession from the U.S...
. More soldiers from North Carolina fought for the Confederacy during the American Civil War
American Civil War
The American Civil War was a civil war fought in the United States of America. In response to the election of Abraham Lincoln as President of the United States, 11 southern slave states declared their secession from the United States and formed the Confederate States of America ; the other 25...
, than any other state, but few major battles were fought there. During the early years of Reconstruction, strides were made at integrating the newly freed slaves into society, however these were quickly overturned and North Carolina became a firm part of the Jim Crow
Jim Crow laws
The Jim Crow laws were state and local laws in the United States enacted between 1876 and 1965. They mandated de jure racial segregation in all public facilities, with a supposedly "separate but equal" status for black Americans...
South.
The Civil Rights movement of the 1950s and 1960s had many connections to North Carolina. Events such as the sit-in
Greensboro sit-ins
The Greensboro sit-ins were a series of nonviolent protests which led to the Woolworth's department store chain reversing its policy of racial segregation in the Southern United States....
protest at the F.W. Woolworth's store in Greensboro
Greensboro, North Carolina
Greensboro is a city in the U.S. state of North Carolina. It is the third-largest city by population in North Carolina and the largest city in Guilford County and the surrounding Piedmont Triad metropolitan region. According to the 2010 U.S...
would become a touchstone for the movement, and the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee
Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee
The Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee ' was one of the principal organizations of the American Civil Rights Movement in the 1960s. It emerged from a series of student meetings led by Ella Baker held at Shaw University in Raleigh, North Carolina in April 1960...
, a central organization in the movement, was founded at Shaw University
Shaw University
Shaw University, founded as Raleigh Institute, is a private liberal arts institution and historically black university in Raleigh, North Carolina, United States. Founded in 1865, it is the oldest HBCU in the Southern United States....
in Raleigh
Raleigh, North Carolina
Raleigh is the capital and the second largest city in the state of North Carolina as well as the seat of Wake County. Raleigh is known as the "City of Oaks" for its many oak trees. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the city's 2010 population was 403,892, over an area of , making Raleigh...
. In 1973, Clarence Lightner
Clarence Lightner
Clarence Everett Lightner was the first popularly elected Mayor of Raleigh, North Carolina and the first African American elected mayor of a metropolitan Southern city...
was elected as the first African-American mayor of a major southern city, also in Raleigh.
Pre-colonial history
Hardaway Site
Hardaway Site, also known as 31ST4, is an archaeological site near Badin, North Carolina. It preserves remains of prehistory, and is also important in the history of archeological methodology.It was declared a National Historic Landmark in 1990....
near the town of Badin
Badin, North Carolina
Badin is a town located in Stanly County, North Carolina. As of the 2000 census, the town had a total population of 1,154.-Geography:Badin is located at 35°24'17" North, 80°6'57" West ....
in the south-central part of the state. Radiocarbon dating
Radiocarbon dating
Radiocarbon dating is a radiometric dating method that uses the naturally occurring radioisotope carbon-14 to estimate the age of carbon-bearing materials up to about 58,000 to 62,000 years. Raw, i.e. uncalibrated, radiocarbon ages are usually reported in radiocarbon years "Before Present" ,...
of the site has not been possible. However, based on other dating methods, such as rock strata and the existence of Dalton-type spear points
Dalton Tradition
The Dalton Tradition is a Late Paleo-Indian and Early Archaic projectile point tradition. These points appeared in most of Southeast North America around 8500-7900 BC.-References:*Fagan, Brian. Ancient North America. Thames & Hudson Ltd: London. 2005...
, the site has been dated to approximately 8000 BC.
Spearpoints of the Dalton type continued to change and evolve slowly for the next 7000 years, suggesting a continuity of culture for most of that time. During this time, settlement was scattered and likely existed solely on the hunter-gatherer
Hunter-gatherer
A hunter-gatherer or forage society is one in which most or all food is obtained from wild plants and animals, in contrast to agricultural societies which rely mainly on domesticated species. Hunting and gathering was the ancestral subsistence mode of Homo, and all modern humans were...
level. Towards the end of this period, there is evidence of settled agriculture
Agriculture
Agriculture is the cultivation of animals, plants, fungi and other life forms for food, fiber, and other products used to sustain life. Agriculture was the key implement in the rise of sedentary human civilization, whereby farming of domesticated species created food surpluses that nurtured the...
, such as plant domestication and the development of pottery.
From 1000 BC until the time of European settlement marks a time period known as the "Woodland period". Permanent villages, based on settled agriculture, existed throughout the state. By about 800 AD, fortified towns appeared throughout the Piedmont
Piedmont (United States)
The Piedmont is a plateau region located in the eastern United States between the Atlantic Coastal Plain and the main Appalachian Mountains, stretching from New Jersey in the north to central Alabama in the south. The Piedmont province is a physiographic province of the larger Appalachian division...
region, suggesting the existence of organized tribal warfare. An important site of this late-Woodland period is the Town Creek Indian Mound
Town Creek Indian Mound
-External links:*, North Carolina Historic Sites...
, an archaeologically rich location occupied by the Pee Dee culture
Pee Dee (tribe)
The Pee Dee tribe are a nation of Native Americans of the southeast United States, especially the Low Country of present-day South Carolina. Several tribes are recognized by the state, although none has federal recognition. The Pee Dee River and the Pee Dee region of South Carolina were named for...
of the Mississippian tradition
Mississippian culture
The Mississippian culture was a mound-building Native American culture that flourished in what is now the Midwestern, Eastern, and Southeastern United States from approximately 800 CE to 1500 CE, varying regionally....
.
Earliest European explorations
Florence
Florence is the capital city of the Italian region of Tuscany and of the province of Florence. It is the most populous city in Tuscany, with approximately 370,000 inhabitants, expanding to over 1.5 million in the metropolitan area....
, Verrazzano was hired by French merchants in order to procure a sea route to bring silk to the city of Lyon
Lyon
Lyon , is a city in east-central France in the Rhône-Alpes region, situated between Paris and Marseille. Lyon is located at from Paris, from Marseille, from Geneva, from Turin, and from Barcelona. The residents of the city are called Lyonnais....
. With the tacit support of King Francis I
Francis I of France
Francis I was King of France from 1515 until his death. During his reign, huge cultural changes took place in France and he has been called France's original Renaissance monarch...
, Verrazzano sailed west on January 1, 1524 aboard his ship La Dauphine
La Dauphine
La Dauphine was a three-masted sailing vessel that served as the flagship of the explorer Giovanni da Verrazzano on his first voyage to the New World while seeking a shipping passage to China from Europe.-Construction:...
ahead of a flotilla that numbered three ships. The expedition made landfall at Cape Fear, and Verrazzano reported of his explorations to the King of France,
"The seashore is completely covered with fine sand [15 feet] deep, which rises in the shape of small hills about fifty paces wide... Nearby we could see a stretch of country much higher than the sandy shore, with many beautiful fields and planes[sic] full of great forests, some sparse and some dense; and the trees have so many colors, and are so beautiful and delightful that they defy description."Verrazzano continued north along the Outer Banks
Outer Banks
The Outer Banks is a 200-mile long string of narrow barrier islands off the coast of North Carolina, beginning in the southeastern corner of Virginia Beach on the east coast of the United States....
, making periodic explorations as he sought a route further west towards China. When he viewed the Albemarle
Albemarle Sound
Albemarle Sound is a large estuary on the coast of North Carolina in the United States located at the confluence of a group of rivers, including the Chowan and Roanoke. It is separated from the Atlantic Ocean by the Outer Banks, a long barrier peninsula upon which the town of Kitty Hawk is located,...
and Pamlico
Pamlico Sound
Pamlico Sound in North Carolina, is the largest lagoon along the U.S. East Coast, being long and 24 to 48 km wide. It is a body of water separated from the Atlantic Ocean by the Outer Banks, a row of low, sandy barrier islands, including Cape Hatteras. The Neuse and Pamlico rivers flow in...
Sounds opposite the Outer Banks, he believed them to be the Pacific Ocean; his reports of such helped fuel the belief that the westward route to Asia was much closer than previously believed.
Just two years later, in 1526, a group of Spanish colonists from Hispaniola
Hispaniola
Hispaniola is a major island in the Caribbean, containing the two sovereign states of the Dominican Republic and Haiti. The island is located between the islands of Cuba to the west and Puerto Rico to the east, within the hurricane belt...
led by Lucas Vázquez de Ayllón landed at the mouth of a river they called the "Rio Jordan", which may have been the Cape Fear River
Cape Fear River
The Cape Fear River is a long blackwater river in east central North Carolina in the United States. It flows into the Atlantic Ocean near Cape Fear, from which it takes its name. The overall water quality of the river is continuously measured and monitored by and conducted by the , , and the...
. The party consisted of 500 men and women, their slaves, and horses. One of their ships wrecked off the shore, and valuable supplies were lost; this coupled with illness and rebellion doomed the colony. Ayllon died in October, 1526 and the 150 or so survivors of that first year abandoned the colony and attempted to return to Hispaniola. Later explorers reported finding their remains along the coast; as the dead were cast off during the return trip.
Hickory, North Carolina
Hickory is a city in Catawba County, North Carolina. Hickory has the 162nd largest urban area in the United States. As of the 2000 census, the Metropolitan Statistical Area had a population of 341,851, making it the 4th largest metropolitan area in North Carolina. The city's population was 37,222...
. In 1567 Captain Juan Pardo
Juan Pardo (explorer)
Juan Pardo was a Spanish explorer and conquistador who was active in the later half of the sixteenth century. He led a Spanish expedition through what is now North and South Carolina and into eastern Tennessee. He established Fort San Felipe, South Carolina , and the village of Santa Elena on...
led an expedition from Santa Elena at Parris Island, South Carolina
Parris Island, South Carolina
Parris Island is a former census-designated place , currently a portion of Port Royal in Beaufort County, South Carolina, United States. The population was 4,841 at the 2000 census. As defined by the U.S. Census Bureau, Parris Island is included within the Beaufort Urban Cluster and the larger...
, then the capital of the Spanish colony in the Southeast, into the interior of North Carolina, largely following De Soto's earlier route. His journey was ordered to claim the area as a Spanish colony, pacify and convert the natives, as well as establish another route to protect silver mines in Mexico (the Spanish did not realize the distances involved). Pardo went toward the northwest to be able to get food supplies from natives.
Pardo and his team made a winter base at Joara
Joara
Joara was a large Native American settlement, a regional chiefdom of the Mississippian culture, located in what is now Burke County, North Carolina. Joara is notable as a significant archaeological and historic site. It was a place of encounter in 1540 between the Mississippian people and the...
(near Morganton
Morganton, North Carolina
Morganton is a city in Burke County, North Carolina, United States. Reader's Digest included Morganton in its list of top ten places to raise a family. The town was recently profiled in The 50 Best Small Southern Towns. The population was 17,310 at the 2000 census...
, in Burke County
Burke County, North Carolina
-Demographics:As of the census of 2000, there were 89,148 people, 34,528 households, and 24,342 families residing in the county. The population density was 176 people per square mile . There were 37,427 housing units at an average density of 74 per square mile...
), which he renamed Cuenca. They built Fort San Juan and left 30 men, while Pardo traveled further, establishing five other forts. He returned by a different route to Santa Elena. After 18 months, in the spring of 1568, natives killed all the soldiers and burned the six forts, including the one at Fort San Juan. The Spanish never returned to the interior to press their colonial claim, but this marked the first European attempt at colonization of the interior. Translation in the 1980s of a journal by Pardo's scribe Bandera have confirmed the expedition and settlement. Archaeological finds at Joara indicate that it was a Mississippian culture
Mississippian culture
The Mississippian culture was a mound-building Native American culture that flourished in what is now the Midwestern, Eastern, and Southeastern United States from approximately 800 CE to 1500 CE, varying regionally....
settlement and also indicate Spanish settlement at Fort San Juan in 1567-1568. Joara was the largest mound builder
Mound builder
Mound builder may refer to:* Mound builder , Native American people who built mounds* Moundbuilders , school mascot* Megapode, also known as incubator birds or mound-builders...
settlement in the region. Records of Hernando de Soto attested to his meeting with them in 1540.
Roanoke
The earliest English attempt at colonization in North America was Roanoke ColonyRoanoke Colony
The Roanoke Colony on Roanoke Island in Dare County, present-day North Carolina, United States was a late 16th-century attempt to establish a permanent English settlement in what later became the Virginia Colony. The enterprise was financed and organized by Sir Walter Raleigh and carried out by...
of 1584–1587, the famed "Lost Colony" of Sir Walter Raleigh
Walter Raleigh
Sir Walter Raleigh was an English aristocrat, writer, poet, soldier, courtier, spy, and explorer. He is also well known for popularising tobacco in England....
. The colony was established at Roanoke Island
Roanoke Island
Roanoke Island is an island in Dare County near the coast of North Carolina, United States. It was named after the historical Roanoke Carolina Algonquian people who inhabited the area in the 16th century at the time of English exploration....
in the Croatan Sound
Croatan Sound
Croatan Sound is an inlet in Dare County, North Carolina. It connects Pamlico Sound with Albemarle Sound, and is bordered to the east by Roanoke Island; Roanoke Sound is on the other side of the island. Its name comes from the Croatan Indians who once inhabited the area.The Croatan Sound is crossed...
on the leeward side of the Outer Banks
Outer Banks
The Outer Banks is a 200-mile long string of narrow barrier islands off the coast of North Carolina, beginning in the southeastern corner of Virginia Beach on the east coast of the United States....
. The first attempt at a settlement consisted of 100 or so men led by Ralph Lane
Ralph Lane
Sir Ralph Lane was an English explorer of the Elizabethan era. He was part of the unsuccessful attempt in 1585 to colonize Roanoke Island, North Carolina. He also served the Crown in Ireland and was knighted by the Queen in 1593....
. They built a fort, and waited for supplies from a second voyage. While waiting for supplies to return, Lane and his men antagonized the local Croatan
Croatan
The Croatan were a small Native American group living in the coastal areas of what is now North Carolina. They may have been a branch of the larger Roanoke people or allied with them....
peoples, killing several of them in armed skirmishes. The interactions were not all negative, as the local people did teach the colonists some survival skills, such as the construction of dugout canoes.
When the relief was long in coming, the colonists began to give up hope; after a chance encounter with Sir Francis Drake
Francis Drake
Sir Francis Drake, Vice Admiral was an English sea captain, privateer, navigator, slaver, and politician of the Elizabethan era. Elizabeth I of England awarded Drake a knighthood in 1581. He was second-in-command of the English fleet against the Spanish Armada in 1588. He also carried out the...
, the colonists elected to accept transport back to England with him. When the supply ships did arrive, only a few days later, they found the colony abandoned. The ship's captain, Richard Grenville
Richard Grenville
Sir Richard Grenville was an English sailor, sea captain and explorer. He took part in the early English attempts to settle the New World, and also participated in the fight against the Spanish Armada...
, left a small force of 15 men to hold the fort and supplies and wait for a new stock of colonists.
In 1587 a third ship arrived carrying 110 men, 17 women, and 9 children, some of whom had been part of the first group of colonists that had earlier abandoned Roanoke. This group was led by John White. Among them was a pregnant woman; she gave birth to the first English subject born in North America, Virginia Dare
Virginia Dare
Virginia Dare was the first child born in the Americas to English parents, Eleanor and Ananias Dare. She was born into the short-lived Roanoke Colony in what is now North Carolina, USA. What became of Virginia and the other colonists remains a mystery...
. The colonists found the remains of the garrison left behind, likely killed by the Croatan who had been so antagonized by Lane's aggressiveness. White had intended to pick up the remains of the garrison, abandon Roanoke Island, and settle in the Chesapeake Bay
Chesapeake Bay
The Chesapeake Bay is the largest estuary in the United States. It lies off the Atlantic Ocean, surrounded by Maryland and Virginia. The Chesapeake Bay's drainage basin covers in the District of Columbia and parts of six states: New York, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, and West...
. White's Portuguese pilot, Simon Fernandez, refused to carry on further; rather than risk mutiny
Mutiny
Mutiny is a conspiracy among members of a group of similarly situated individuals to openly oppose, change or overthrow an authority to which they are subject...
, White agreed to resettle the former colony.
The Spanish War prevented any further contact between the colony and England until a 1590 expedition, which found no remains of any colonists, just an abandoned colony and the letters "CROATOAN" carved into a tree, and "CRO" carved into another. Despite many investigations, no one knows what happened to the colony.
Development of North Carolina Colony
The Province of North Carolina developed distinctly from South CarolinaProvince of South Carolina
The South Carolina Colony, or Province of South Carolina, was originally part of the Province of Carolina, which was chartered in 1663. The colony later became the U.S. state of South Carolina....
almost from the beginning. The Spanish experienced trouble colonizing North Carolina because it had a dangerous coastline, a lack of ports, and few inland rivers by which to navigate. In the 1650s and 1660s, settlers (mostly British) moved south from Virginia
History of Virginia
The history of Virginia began with settlement of the geographic region now known as the Commonwealth of Virginia in the United States thousands of years ago by Native Americans. Permanent European settlement began with the establishment of Jamestown in 1607, by English colonists. As tobacco emerged...
, in addition to runaway servants and fur trappers. They settled chiefly in the Albemarle Borderlands region.
In 1665, a second charter was issued to attempt to resolve territorial questions. In 1710, due to disputes over governance, the Carolina colony began to split into North Carolina and South Carolina
South Carolina
South Carolina is a state in the Deep South of the United States that borders Georgia to the south, North Carolina to the north, and the Atlantic Ocean to the east. Originally part of the Province of Carolina, the Province of South Carolina was one of the 13 colonies that declared independence...
. The latter became a crown colony in 1729. Smallpox
Smallpox
Smallpox was an infectious disease unique to humans, caused by either of two virus variants, Variola major and Variola minor. The disease is also known by the Latin names Variola or Variola vera, which is a derivative of the Latin varius, meaning "spotted", or varus, meaning "pimple"...
took a heavy toll in the South. The 1738 epidemic was said to have killed one-half of the Cherokee, with other tribes of the area suffering equally. There were only about 5,000 settlers in 1700 and 11,000 in 1715. While mostly British, the settlers included a few African slaves and a colony at New Bern
New Bern, North Carolina
New Bern is a city in Craven County, North Carolina with a population of 29,524 as of the 2010 census.. It is located at the confluence of the Trent and the Neuse rivers...
composed of Swiss
Switzerland
Switzerland name of one of the Swiss cantons. ; ; ; or ), in its full name the Swiss Confederation , is a federal republic consisting of 26 cantons, with Bern as the seat of the federal authorities. The country is situated in Western Europe,Or Central Europe depending on the definition....
and German settlers.
As early as 1689, the Carolina proprietors named a separate governor for the region of the colony that lay to the north and east of Cape Fear. By 1712, the term "North Carolina" was in common use. In 1728, the dividing line between North Carolina and Virginia was surveyed. In 1730, the population was 30,000. By 1729, the Crown bought out seven of the eight original proprietors, making North Carolina a royal colony. The proprietor who refused to sell was John Carteret, 2nd Earl Granville
John Carteret, 2nd Earl Granville
John Carteret, 2nd Earl Granville, 7th Seigneur of Sark, KG, PC , commonly known by his earlier title as Lord Carteret, was a British statesman and Lord President of the Council from 1751 to 1763.-Family:...
, who in 1744 received rights to the vast Granville Tract
Granville District
The Granville District was a 60-mile wide strip of land in the North Carolina colony adjoining the boundary with Virginia, lying between north latitudes 35° 34' and 36° 30'....
, constituting the northern half of North Carolina.
Immigration from north
The colony grew rapidly from a population of 100,000 in 1752 to 200,000 in 1765. By 1760, enslaved Africans constituted one quarter of the population and were concentrated along the coast.This happened just as the tide of immigration to North Carolina from Virginia and Pennsylvania began to swell. Arriving during the mid-to-late 18th century, the Scots-Irish from what is today Northern Ireland were the largest non-English immigrant group before the Revolution and English indentured servants were overwhelmingly the largest immigrant group prior to the Revolution. On the eve of the American Revolution, North Carolina was the fastest-growing British colony in North America. The small family farms of the Piedmont contrasted sharply with the plantation
Plantation
A plantation is a long artificially established forest, farm or estate, where crops are grown for sale, often in distant markets rather than for local on-site consumption...
economy of the coastal region, where wealthy planters grew tobacco
Tobacco
Tobacco is an agricultural product processed from the leaves of plants in the genus Nicotiana. It can be consumed, used as a pesticide and, in the form of nicotine tartrate, used in some medicines...
and rice
Rice
Rice is the seed of the monocot plants Oryza sativa or Oryza glaberrima . As a cereal grain, it is the most important staple food for a large part of the world's human population, especially in East Asia, Southeast Asia, South Asia, the Middle East, and the West Indies...
with slave labor.
Differences in the settlement patterns of eastern and western North Carolina, or the low country and uplands, affected the political, economic, and social life of the state from the eighteenth until the twentieth century. The Tidewater in eastern North Carolina was settled chiefly by immigrants from rural England
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...
and the Scottish Highlands
Scottish Highlands
The Highlands is an historic region of Scotland. The area is sometimes referred to as the "Scottish Highlands". It was culturally distinguishable from the Lowlands from the later Middle Ages into the modern period, when Lowland Scots replaced Scottish Gaelic throughout most of the Lowlands...
. The upcountry of western North Carolina was settled chiefly by Scots-Irish, English
English people
The English are a nation and ethnic group native to England, who speak English. The English identity is of early mediaeval origin, when they were known in Old English as the Anglecynn. England is now a country of the United Kingdom, and the majority of English people in England are British Citizens...
and German
Germans
The Germans are a Germanic ethnic group native to Central Europe. The English term Germans has referred to the German-speaking population of the Holy Roman Empire since the Late Middle Ages....
Protestants, the so-called "cohee". Arriving during the mid-to-late 18th century, the Scots-Irish from Ireland were the largest immigrant group before the Revolution. During the Revolutionary War
American Revolutionary War
The American Revolutionary War , the American War of Independence, or simply the Revolutionary War, began as a war between the Kingdom of Great Britain and thirteen British colonies in North America, and ended in a global war between several European great powers.The war was the result of the...
, the English and Highland Scots of eastern North Carolina tended to remain loyal to the British Crown, because of longstanding business and personal connections with Great Britain. The English, Welsh, Scots-Irish and German settlers of western North Carolina tended to favor American independence from Britain.
Most of the English colonists arrived as indentured servant
Indentured servant
Indentured servitude refers to the historical practice of contracting to work for a fixed period of time, typically three to seven years, in exchange for transportation, food, clothing, lodging and other necessities during the term of indenture. Usually the father made the arrangements and signed...
s, hiring themselves out as teenagers for a fixed period to pay for their passage.
With no cities and very few towns or villages, the colony was intensely rural and spread out. Local taverns provided multiple services ranging from strong drink, beds for travelers, and meeting rooms for politicians and businessmen. In a world sharply divided along lines of ethnicity, gender, race, and class, the tavern keepers' rum proved a solvent that mixed together all sorts of locals, as well as travelers. The increasing variety of drinks on offer, and the emergence of private clubs meeting in the taverns, showed that genteel culture was spreading from London to the periphery of the English world. The courthouse was usually the most imposing building in the county. Jails were often an important part of the courthouse but were sometimes built separately. Tobacco warehouses were also built by some county governments.
Slaves
In the early years the line between indentured servants and African slaves was vague. Some Africans were allowed to earn their freedom before slavery became a lifelong status. Most of the free coloredFree people of color
A free person of color in the context of the history of slavery in the Americas, is a person of full or partial African descent who was not enslaved...
families formed in North Carolina before the Revolution were descended from unions or marriages between free white women and enslaved or free African or African-American men. Because the mothers were free, their children were born free. As the flow of indentured laborers slackened, more slaves were imported and the state's controls on slavery hardened. The economy's growth and prosperity was based on slave labor, devoted first to the production of tobacco
Tobacco
Tobacco is an agricultural product processed from the leaves of plants in the genus Nicotiana. It can be consumed, used as a pesticide and, in the form of nicotine tartrate, used in some medicines...
. The oppressive and brutal experiences of slaves and poor whites in led to the moral acceptance among many of these people of criminal activities, such as escape from slaveowners, violent resistance, and theft of food and other goods in order to survive.
Politics
In the late 1760s, tensions between Piedmont farmers and coastal planters welled up in the Regulator movement. With specie scarce, many inland farmers found themselves unable to pay their taxes and resented the consequent seizure of their property. Local sheriffs sometimes kept taxes for their own gain and sometimes charged twice for the same tax. Governor William TryonWilliam Tryon
William Tryon was a British soldier and colonial administrator who served as governor of the Province of North Carolina and the Province of New York .-Early life and career:...
's conspicuous consumption in the construction of a new governor's mansion
Tryon Palace
Tryon Palace is a modern reconstruction of the historical colonial royal governors' palace of the Province of North Carolina. It was constructed in the 1950s across the original mansion site located in the city of New Bern, North Carolina. Today it is a State Historic Site. The Palace gardens are...
at New Bern fuelled the movement's resentment. As the western districts were under-represented in the colonial legislature, it was difficult for the farmers to obtain redress by legislative
Legislature
A legislature is a kind of deliberative assembly with the power to pass, amend, and repeal laws. The law created by a legislature is called legislation or statutory law. In addition to enacting laws, legislatures usually have exclusive authority to raise or lower taxes and adopt the budget and...
means. Ultimately, the frustrated farmers took to arms and closed the court in Hillsborough, North Carolina
Hillsborough, North Carolina
Hillsborough is a town in Orange County, North Carolina, United States. The population was 5,653 at the 2008 census. It is the county seat of Orange County....
. Tryon sent troops to the region and defeated the Regulators at the Battle of Alamance
Battle of Alamance
The Battle of Alamance was the final battle of the War of the Regulation, a rebellion in colonial North Carolina over issues of taxation and local control. In the past, historians considered the battle to be the opening salvo of the American Revolution and locals agreed with this assessment...
in May 1771.
American Revolution
The demand for independence came from local grassroots organizations called "Committees of SafetyCommittee of Safety (American Revolution)
Many Committees of Safety were established throughout Colonial America at the start of the American Revolution. These committees started to appear in the 1760s as means to discuss the concerns of the time, and often consisted of every male adult in the community...
". The First Continental Congress
Continental Congress
The Continental Congress was a convention of delegates called together from the Thirteen Colonies that became the governing body of the United States during the American Revolution....
had urged their creation in 1774. By 1775 they had become counter-governments that gradually replaced royal authority and took control of local governments. They regulated the economy, politics, morality, and militia of their individual communities. After December 1776 they came under the control of a more powerful central authority, the Council of Safety.
In the spring of 1776, North Carolinians, meeting in the fourth of their Provincial Congresses
North Carolina Provincial Congress
The North Carolina Provincial Congresses were extra-legal unicameral legislative bodies formed in 1774 through 1776 by the people of the Province of North Carolina, independent of the British colonial government.-First Provincial Congress:...
, drafted the Halifax Resolves
Halifax Resolves
The Halifax Resolves is the name later given to a resolution adopted by the Fourth Provincial Congress of the Province of North Carolina on April 12, 1776, during the American Revolution...
, a set of resolutions that empowered the state's delegates to the Second Continental Congress
Second Continental Congress
The Second Continental Congress was a convention of delegates from the Thirteen Colonies that started meeting on May 10, 1775, in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, soon after warfare in the American Revolutionary War had begun. It succeeded the First Continental Congress, which met briefly during 1774,...
to concur in a declaration of independence from Great Britain. In July, 1776, the new state became part of the new nation, the United States of America.
In 1775 the Patriots easily expelled the Royal governor and suppressed the Loyalists
Loyalist (American Revolution)
Loyalists were American colonists who remained loyal to the Kingdom of Great Britain during the American Revolutionary War. At the time they were often called Tories, Royalists, or King's Men. They were opposed by the Patriots, those who supported the revolution...
. In November 1776, elected representatives gathered in Halifax to write a new state constitution
North Carolina Constitution
The Constitution of the State of North Carolina governs the structure and function of the state government of North Carolina, United States; it is the highest legal document for the state and subjugates North Carolina law...
, which remained in effect until 1835. One of the most prominent Loyalists was John Legett, a rich planter in Bladen County. He organized and led one of the few loyalist brigades in the South (the North Carolina Volunteers, later known as the Royal North Carolina Regiment). After the war, Colonel Legett and some of his men moved to Nova Scotia; the British gave them free land grants in County Harbour. The great majority of Loyalists remained in North Carolina and became citizens of the new nation.
Local militia units proved important in the guerrilla war of 1780-81, and even more important were the soldiers who enlisted in George Washington's Continental Army and fought in numerous battles up and down the land.
With a weak tax base, state officials used impressment to seize food and supplies needed for the war effort, paying the farmers with promissary notes. To raise soldiers, state officials tried a draft law. Both both policies created significant discontent that undermined support for the new nation. The state's large German population, concentrated in the central counties, tried to remain neutral; the Moravians were actively pacifist because of strong religious beliefs, while Lutheran and Reformed Germans were passively neutral. All peace groups paid triple taxes in lieu of military service.
Well the British were punctual in paying their regulars and their Loyalist forces, American soldiers went month after month in threadbare uniforms with no pay and scanty supplies. Belatedly, the state tried to make amends. After 1780 soldiers received cash bounties, a slave "or the value thereof," clothing, food, and land (after 1782 they received from 640 to 1,200 acres depending on rank). Since the money supply, based on the Continental currency was subject to high inflation and loss of value, state officials valued compensation in relation to gold and silver.
Military campaigns of 1780-81
After 1780 the British made a major effort to rouse and arm the Loyalists—who they supposed were a very large group. The result was fierce guerrilla warfareGuerrilla warfare
Guerrilla warfare is a form of irregular warfare and refers to conflicts in which a small group of combatants including, but not limited to, armed civilians use military tactics, such as ambushes, sabotage, raids, the element of surprise, and extraordinary mobility to harass a larger and...
between units of Patriots and Loyalists. Often the opportunity was seized to settle private grudges and feuds. A major American victory took place at King's Mountain along the North Carolina–South Carolina border. On October 7, 1780 a force of 1000 mountain men from western North Carolina (including what is today part of Tennessee
Tennessee
Tennessee is a U.S. state located in the Southeastern United States. It has a population of 6,346,105, making it the nation's 17th-largest state by population, and covers , making it the 36th-largest by total land area...
) overwhelmed a force of some 1000 Loyalist and British troops led by Major Patrick Ferguson
Patrick Ferguson
Major Patrick Ferguson was a Scottish officer in the British Army, early advocate of light infantry and designer of the Ferguson rifle. He is best known for his service in the 1780 military campaign of Charles Cornwallis, in which he aggressively recruited Loyalists and harshly treated Patriot...
. The victory largely ended British efforts to recruit more Loyalists.
Yorktown, Virginia
Yorktown is a census-designated place in York County, Virginia, United States. The population was 220 in the 2000 census. It is the county seat of York County, one of the eight original shires formed in colonial Virginia in 1634....
led through North Carolina. As the British army moved north toward Virginia the Southern Division of the Continental Army
Continental Army
The Continental Army was formed after the outbreak of the American Revolutionary War by the colonies that became the United States of America. Established by a resolution of the Continental Congress on June 14, 1775, it was created to coordinate the military efforts of the Thirteen Colonies in...
and local militia prepared to meet them. Following General Daniel Morgan
Daniel Morgan
Daniel Morgan was an American pioneer, soldier, and United States Representative from Virginia. One of the most gifted battlefield tacticians of the American Revolutionary War, he later commanded troops during the suppression of the Whiskey Rebellion.-Early years:Most authorities believe that...
's victory over the British under Banastre Tarleton
Banastre Tarleton
General Sir Banastre Tarleton, 1st Baronet, GCB was a British soldier and politician.He is today probably best remembered for his military service during the American War of Independence. He became the focal point of a propaganda campaign claiming that he had fired upon surrendering Continental...
at the Battle of Cowpens
Battle of Cowpens
The Battle of Cowpens was a decisive victory by Patriot Revolutionary forces under Brigadier General Daniel Morgan, in the Southern campaign of the American Revolutionary War...
on January 17, 1781, southern commander Nathanael Greene
Nathanael Greene
Nathanael Greene was a major general of the Continental Army in the American Revolutionary War. When the war began, Greene was a militia private, the lowest rank possible; he emerged from the war with a reputation as George Washington's most gifted and dependable officer. Many places in the United...
led British Lord Charles Cornwallis across the heartland of North Carolina, and away from Cornwallis's base of supply in Charleston, South Carolina. This campaign is known as "The Race to the Dan" or "The Race for the River."
Generals Greene and Cornwallis finally met at the Battle of Guilford Courthouse in present-day Greensboro
Greensboro, North Carolina
Greensboro is a city in the U.S. state of North Carolina. It is the third-largest city by population in North Carolina and the largest city in Guilford County and the surrounding Piedmont Triad metropolitan region. According to the 2010 U.S...
on March 15, 1781. Although the British
Kingdom of Great Britain
The former Kingdom of Great Britain, sometimes described as the 'United Kingdom of Great Britain', That the Two Kingdoms of Scotland and England, shall upon the 1st May next ensuing the date hereof, and forever after, be United into One Kingdom by the Name of GREAT BRITAIN. was a sovereign...
troops held the field at the end of the battle, their casualties at the hands of the numerically superior American Army were crippling. Comwallis has a poor strategic plan which had failed in holding his heavily garrisoned positions in South Carolina and Georgia, and had failed to subdue North Carolina. By contrast, Greene used a more flexible adaptive approach that negated the British advantages and built an adequate logistical foundation for the American campaigns. Greene's defensive operations provided the Southern Army the opportunity to later seize the strategic offensive from Comwallis and eventually reclaim the Carolinas. The weakened Cornwallis headed to the Virginia coastline to get rescued by the Royal Navy
Royal Navy
The Royal Navy is the naval warfare service branch of the British Armed Forces. Founded in the 16th century, it is the oldest service branch and is known as the Senior Service...
. There the Navy was repulsed and Cornwallis, surrounded by American and French units, surrendered to George Washington
George Washington
George Washington was the dominant military and political leader of the new United States of America from 1775 to 1799. He led the American victory over Great Britain in the American Revolutionary War as commander-in-chief of the Continental Army from 1775 to 1783, and presided over the writing of...
, effectively ending the fighting.
In 1786, the population of North Carolina had increased to 350,000.
Early Republic
The United States ConstitutionUnited States Constitution
The Constitution of the United States is the supreme law of the United States of America. It is the framework for the organization of the United States government and for the relationship of the federal government with the states, citizens, and all people within the United States.The first three...
drafted in 1787 was controversial in North Carolina. Delegate meetings at Hillsboro in July 1788 initially voted to reject it for anti-federalist reasons. They were persuaded to change their minds partly by the strenuous efforts of James Iredell
James Iredell
James Iredell was one of the first Justices of the Supreme Court of the United States. He was appointed by President George Washington and served from 1790 until his death in 1799...
and William Davies
William Davies
-Politicians:*William Davies , Georgia-based politician and lawyer*William Davies , British Member of Parliament for Pembrokeshire, 1880–1892*William T...
and partly by the prospect of a Bill of Rights
Bill of rights
A bill of rights is a list of the most important rights of the citizens of a country. The purpose of these bills is to protect those rights against infringement. The term "bill of rights" originates from England, where it referred to the Bill of Rights 1689. Bills of rights may be entrenched or...
. Meanwhile, residents in the wealthy northeastern part of the state, who generally supported the proposed Constitution, threatened to secede if the rest of the state did not fall into line. A second ratifying convention was held in Fayetteville in November 1789, and on November 21, North Carolina became the 12th state to ratify the U.S. Constitution.
North Carolina adopted a new state constitution in 1835. One of the major changes was the introduction of direct election of the governor, for a term of two years; prior to 1835, the legislature elected the governor for a term of one year. North Carolina's current capitol building
North Carolina State Capitol
The North Carolina State Capitol is the main house of government of the U.S. state of North Carolina. Housing the offices of the Governor of North Carolina, it is located in the state capital of Raleigh on Union Square at One East Edenton Street. The cornerstone of the Greek Revival building was...
was completed in 1840.
Transportation
In mid-century, the state's rural and commercial areas were connected by the construction of a 129–mile (208 km) wooden plank road, known as a "farmer's railroad", from FayettevilleFayetteville, North Carolina
Fayetteville is a city located in Cumberland County, North Carolina, United States. It is the county seat of Cumberland County, and is best known as the home of Fort Bragg, a U.S. Army post located northwest of the city....
in the east to Bethania
Bethania, North Carolina
Bethania is the oldest municipality in Forsyth County, North Carolina, United States, and was most recently incorporated in 1995, upon the reactivation of the original 1838/1839 town charter...
(northwest of Winston-Salem
Winston-Salem, North Carolina
Winston-Salem is a city in the U.S. state of North Carolina, with a 2010 population of 229,617. Winston-Salem is the county seat and largest city of Forsyth County and the fourth-largest city in the state. Winston-Salem is the second largest municipality in the Piedmont Triad region and is home to...
).
On October 25, 1836 construction began on the Wilmington and Raleigh Railroad
Wilmington and Raleigh Railroad
Chartered in 1834, the Wilmington and Raleigh Railroad began operations in 1840 between Wilmington, North Carolina and Weldon, NC. With 161.5 miles of track, it is said to have been the longest railroad in the world at the time of its completion....
to connect the port city of Wilmington
Wilmington, North Carolina
Wilmington is a port city in and is the county seat of New Hanover County, North Carolina, United States. The population is 106,476 according to the 2010 Census, making it the eighth most populous city in the state of North Carolina...
with the state capital of Raleigh
Raleigh, North Carolina
Raleigh is the capital and the second largest city in the state of North Carolina as well as the seat of Wake County. Raleigh is known as the "City of Oaks" for its many oak trees. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the city's 2010 population was 403,892, over an area of , making Raleigh...
. In 1849 the North Carolina Railroad was created by act of the legislature to extend that railroad west to Greensboro
Greensboro, North Carolina
Greensboro is a city in the U.S. state of North Carolina. It is the third-largest city by population in North Carolina and the largest city in Guilford County and the surrounding Piedmont Triad metropolitan region. According to the 2010 U.S...
, High Point
High Point, North Carolina
High Point is a city located in the Piedmont Triad region of North Carolina. As of 2010 the city had a total population of 104,371, according to the US Census Bureau. High Point is currently the eighth-largest municipality in North Carolina....
, and Charlotte
Charlotte, North Carolina
Charlotte is the largest city in the U.S. state of North Carolina and the seat of Mecklenburg County. In 2010, Charlotte's population according to the US Census Bureau was 731,424, making it the 17th largest city in the United States based on population. The Charlotte metropolitan area had a 2009...
. During the Civil War the Wilmington-to-Raleigh stretch of the railroad would be vital to the Confederate war effort; supplies shipped into Wilmington would be moved by rail through Raleigh to the Confederate capital of Richmond, Virginia
Richmond, Virginia
Richmond is the capital of the Commonwealth of Virginia, in the United States. It is an independent city and not part of any county. Richmond is the center of the Richmond Metropolitan Statistical Area and the Greater Richmond area...
.
Rural life
During the antebellum period, North Carolina was an overwhelmingly ruralRural
Rural areas or the country or countryside are areas that are not urbanized, though when large areas are described, country towns and smaller cities will be included. They have a low population density, and typically much of the land is devoted to agriculture...
state, even by Southern standards. In 1860 only one North Carolina town, the port city of Wilmington
Wilmington, North Carolina
Wilmington is a port city in and is the county seat of New Hanover County, North Carolina, United States. The population is 106,476 according to the 2010 Census, making it the eighth most populous city in the state of North Carolina...
, had a population of more than 10,000. Raleigh
Raleigh, North Carolina
Raleigh is the capital and the second largest city in the state of North Carolina as well as the seat of Wake County. Raleigh is known as the "City of Oaks" for its many oak trees. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the city's 2010 population was 403,892, over an area of , making Raleigh...
, the state capital, had barely more than 5,000 residents.
The majority of white families comprised the Plain Folk of the Old South
Plain Folk of the Old South
The Plain Folk of the Old South refers to the middling class of white farmers in the Southern United States before the Civil War, located between the rich planters and the poor whites. At the time they were often called "yeomen". They owned land and had no slaves or only a few. Most of them were...
, or "yeoman farmers." They owned their own small farms, and occasionally had a slave or two. Most of their efforts were to build up the farm, and feed their families, with a little surplus sold on the market in order to pay taxes and buy necessities.
Plantations, slavery and free blacks
Most of North Carolina's slave owners and large plantations were located in the eastern portion of the state. Although North Carolina's plantation system was smaller and less cohesive than those of Virginia, Georgia or South Carolina, there were significant numbers of planters concentrated in the counties around the port cities of Wilmington and Edenton, as well as suburban planters around the cities of Raleigh, Charlotte and Durham. Planters owning large estates wielded significant political and socio-economic power in antebellum North Carolina, placing their interests above those of the generally non-slave holding "yeoman" farmers of Western North Carolina.While slaveholding was slightly less concentrated than in some Southern states, according to the 1860 census, more than 330,000 people, or 33% of the population of 992,622 were enslaved African-Americans. They lived and worked chiefly on plantations in the eastern Tidewater
Tidewater (geographic term)
Tidewater is a geographic area of southeast Virginia and northeastern North Carolina that is considered a part of the Coastal Plain. Portions of Maryland facing the Chesapeake Bay are also given this designation. The area gains its name because of the effect the area has from the changing tides of...
. In addition, 30,463 free people of color lived in the state. They were also concentrated in the eastern coastal plain, especially at port cities such as Wilmington and New Bern where they had access to a variety of jobs. Free African Americans were allowed to vote until 1835, when the state rescinded their suffrage.
Besides slaves, there were a number of free people of color
Free people of color
A free person of color in the context of the history of slavery in the Americas, is a person of full or partial African descent who was not enslaved...
in the state. Most were descended from free African Americans who had migrated along with neighbors from Virginia
Virginia
The Commonwealth of Virginia , is a U.S. state on the Atlantic Coast of the Southern United States. Virginia is nicknamed the "Old Dominion" and sometimes the "Mother of Presidents" after the eight U.S. presidents born there...
during the eighteenth century. After the Revolution
American Revolutionary War
The American Revolutionary War , the American War of Independence, or simply the Revolutionary War, began as a war between the Kingdom of Great Britain and thirteen British colonies in North America, and ended in a global war between several European great powers.The war was the result of the...
, Quakers
Religious Society of Friends
The Religious Society of Friends, or Friends Church, is a Christian movement which stresses the doctrine of the priesthood of all believers. Members are known as Friends, or popularly as Quakers. It is made of independent organisations, which have split from one another due to doctrinal differences...
and Mennonite
Mennonite
The Mennonites are a group of Christian Anabaptist denominations named after the Frisian Menno Simons , who, through his writings, articulated and thereby formalized the teachings of earlier Swiss founders...
s worked to persuade slaveholders to free their slaves. Some were inspired by their efforts and the language of men's rights, to arrange for manumission
Manumission
Manumission is the act of a slave owner freeing his or her slaves. In the United States before the passage of the Thirteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution, which abolished most slavery, this often happened upon the death of the owner, under conditions in his will.-Motivations:The...
of their slaves. The number of free people of color rose markedly in the first couple of decades after the Revolution.
Civil War
In 1860, North Carolina was a slave state, in which about one-third of the population of 992,622 were enslaved African Americans. This was a smaller proportion than many Southern states. In addition, the state had just over 30,000 Free Negroes. there were relatively few large plantations or old aristocratic families. North Carolina was reluctant to secede from the Union when it became clear that Republican Abraham LincolnAbraham Lincoln
Abraham Lincoln was the 16th President of the United States, serving from March 1861 until his assassination in April 1865. He successfully led his country through a great constitutional, military and moral crisis – the American Civil War – preserving the Union, while ending slavery, and...
had won the presidential election. With the attack on Fort Sumter
Fort Sumter
Fort Sumter is a Third System masonry coastal fortification located in Charleston Harbor, South Carolina. The fort is best known as the site upon which the shots initiating the American Civil War were fired, at the Battle of Fort Sumter.- Construction :...
in April 1861, in Lincoln's call for troops to march to South Carolina, the unionist element virtually collapsed in both of the state, and North Carolina joined the Confederacy.
North Carolina was the site of few battles, but it provided at least 125,000 troops to the Confederacy— far more than any other state. Approximately 40,000 of those troops never returned home, dying of disease, battlefield wounds, and starvation. North Carolina also supplied about 15,000 Union troops. Confederate troops from all parts of North Carolina served in virtually all the major battles of the Army of Northern Virginia
Army of Northern Virginia
The Army of Northern Virginia was the primary military force of the Confederate States of America in the Eastern Theater of the American Civil War, as well as the primary command structure of the Department of Northern Virginia. It was most often arrayed against the Union Army of the Potomac...
, the Confederacy's most famous army. The largest battle fought in North Carolina was at Bentonville
Battle of Bentonville
At 3 p.m., Confederate infantry from the Army of Tennessee launched an attack and drove the Union left flank back in confusion, nearly capturing Carlin in the process and overrunning the XIV Corps field hospital. Confederates under Maj. Gen. D.H. Hill filled the vacuum left by the retreating...
, which was a futile attempt by Confederate General Joseph Johnston
Joseph E. Johnston
Joseph Eggleston Johnston was a career U.S. Army officer, serving with distinction in the Mexican-American War and Seminole Wars, and was also one of the most senior general officers in the Confederate States Army during the American Civil War...
to slow Union General William Tecumseh Sherman
William Tecumseh Sherman
William Tecumseh Sherman was an American soldier, businessman, educator and author. He served as a General in the Union Army during the American Civil War , for which he received recognition for his outstanding command of military strategy as well as criticism for the harshness of the "scorched...
's advance through the Carolinas in the spring of 1865. In April 1865 after losing the Battle of Morrisville
Battle of Morrisville
The Battle at Morrisville Station was fought April 13–15 1865 in Morrisville, North Carolina during the Carolinas Campaign of the American Civil War. It was the last cavalry battle of the War and occurred between the armies of Major General William T. Sherman and General Joseph E. Johnston...
, Johnston surrendered to Sherman at Bennett Place
Bennett Place
Bennett Place, sometimes known as Bennett Farm, in Durham, North Carolina was the site of the largest surrender of Confederate soldiers ending the American Civil War, on April 26, 1865.-History:...
, in what is today Durham, North Carolina
Durham, North Carolina
Durham is a city in the U.S. state of North Carolina. It is the county seat of Durham County and also extends into Wake County. It is the fifth-largest city in the state, and the 85th-largest in the United States by population, with 228,330 residents as of the 2010 United States census...
. This was the next to last major Confederate Army to surrender. North Carolina's port city of Wilmington
Wilmington, North Carolina
Wilmington is a port city in and is the county seat of New Hanover County, North Carolina, United States. The population is 106,476 according to the 2010 Census, making it the eighth most populous city in the state of North Carolina...
was the last major Confederate port for blockade runners; it fell in the spring of 1865 after the nearby Second Battle of Fort Fisher
Second Battle of Fort Fisher
The Second Battle of Fort Fisher was a joint assault by Union Army and naval forces against Fort Fisher, outside Wilmington, North Carolina, near the end of the American Civil War...
.
Elected in 1862, Governor Zebulon Baird Vance
Zebulon Baird Vance
Zebulon Baird Vance was a Confederate military officer in the American Civil War, the 37th and 43rd Governor of North Carolina, and U.S. Senator...
tried to maintain state autonomy against Confederate President Jefferson Davis
Jefferson Davis
Jefferson Finis Davis , also known as Jeff Davis, was an American statesman and leader of the Confederacy during the American Civil War, serving as President for its entire history. He was born in Kentucky to Samuel and Jane Davis...
.
The Union's naval blockade of Southern ports and the breakdown of the Confederate transportation system took a heavy toll on North Carolina residents, as did the runaway inflation of the war years. In the spring of 1863, there were food riots in North Carolina as town dwellers found it hard to buy food. On the other hand, blockade runners brought prosperity several port cities, until they were shut down by the Union Navy in 1864-65.
Union (American Civil War)
During the American Civil War, the Union was a name used to refer to the federal government of the United States, which was supported by the twenty free states and five border slave states. It was opposed by 11 southern slave states that had declared a secession to join together to form the...
cause during the conflict. Approximately 2,000 white North Carolinians from western North Carolina enlisted in the Union Army
Union Army
The Union Army was the land force that fought for the Union during the American Civil War. It was also known as the Federal Army, the U.S. Army, the Northern Army and the National Army...
and fought for the North in the war, and two additional black Union regiments were raised in the coastal areas of the state that were occupied by Union forces in 1862 and 1863.
Reconstruction
During Reconstruction, African American leaders came both from those free before the war, from men who had escaped to the North and decided to return, and from migrants from the North who wanted to help in the postwar years. Many of these had escaped from slavery and got some education before they came back to the state. In general, however, illiteracy was a problem shared by most African Americans and about one-third of the whites in the state.A number of white northerners migrated to North Carolina to work and invest. While feelings in the state were high against carpetbaggers, of the 133 persons at the constitutional convention, only 18 were Northern carpetbaggers and 15 were African American. North Carolina was readmitted to the Union in 1868, after ratifying a new state constitution. It included provisions to establish public education, prohibited slavery, and adopted universal suffrage. It also provided for orphanages, public charities and a penitentiary. The legislature also ratified the Fourteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.
In 1870 the Democratic Party came to power in the state. Governor William W. Holden had used civil powers and spoken out to try to combat the Ku Klux Klan's increasing violence. Conservatives accused him of being head of the Union League
Union League
A Union League is one of a number of organizations established starting in 1862, during the American Civil War to promote loyalty to the Union and the policies of Abraham Lincoln. They were also known as Loyal Leagues. They comprised upper middle class men who supported efforts such as the United...
, of believing in social equality between the races, and of being corrupt. When the legislature voted to impeach him, however, it charged him only with using and paying troops to put down insurrection (Ku Klux Klan activity) in the state. Holden was impeached and turned over his duties to Lieutenant Governor Tod R. Caldwell on December 20, 1870. The trial began on January 30, 1871, and lasted nearly three months. On March 22, the North Carolina Senate found Holden guilty and ordered him removed from office.
After the Ku Klux Klan Act of 1871 went into effect, the U.S. Attorney General, Amos T. Akerman
Amos T. Akerman
Amos Tappan Akerman served as United States Attorney General under President Ulysses S. Grant from 1870 to 1871. Akerman was born on February 23, 1821 in Portsmouth, New Hampshire as the ninth of Benjamin Akerman’s twelve children...
, vigorously prosecuted Klan members in North Carolina. During the late 1870s, there was increased violence in the Piedmont
Piedmont (United States)
The Piedmont is a plateau region located in the eastern United States between the Atlantic Coastal Plain and the main Appalachian Mountains, stretching from New Jersey in the north to central Alabama in the south. The Piedmont province is a physiographic province of the larger Appalachian division...
area, where whites tried to suppress minority black voting in the election.
Disfranchisement
As in other Southern states, after white Democrats regained power, they worked to re-establish white supremacy. Nonetheless, in the 1880s, black officeholders were at a peak in local offices, elected from black-majority districts. In 1894 after years of agricultural problems, an interracial coalition of Republicans and PopulistsPopulist Party (United States)
The People's Party, also known as the "Populists", was a short-lived political party in the United States established in 1891. It was most important in 1892-96, then rapidly faded away...
won a majority of seats in the state legislature. White Democrats worked to break up the coalition and reduce black and poor white suffrage.
In 1896 North Carolina passed a statute that made voter registration more complicated and reduced blacks on voter registration rolls. In 1898 in an election characterized by violence, fraud and intimidation of black voters, white Democrats regained power in the state legislature.
They then passed a new constitution in 1900 with a suffrage amendment. Its provisions for poll taxes, literacy tests and similar mechanisms succeeded in reducing black voter turnout completely by 1904, and disfranchising many poor whites as well. Contemporary accounts estimated that 75,000 black men lost the vote. In 1900 blacks numbered 630,207 citizens, about 33% of the state's total population.
With control of the legislature, white Democrats passed Jim Crow laws establishing segregation in public facilities and transportation. It would take African Americans more than 60 years before they would regain full power to exercise the suffrage and other full rights of citizens. Without the abiliy to vote, they lost all chance at local offices: sheriffs, justices of the peace, jurors, county commissioners and school board members, which were the active site of government at the turn of the century. Suppression of the black vote and re-establishment of white supremacy quickly overwhelmed people's memory and knowledge of the thriving black middle class in the state.
Post-Civil War racial politics encouraged efforts to divide and co-opt groups. In 1885 the state created 12 separate school districts for "Indians". The group changed their name to "Cherokee Indians of Robeson County" in 1913, "Siouan Indians of Lumber River" in 1934-1935, and were given limited recognition by the U.S. Congress as Lumbee Indians in 1956.
As the Democrats solidified their position in the legislature. They also drew racial lines in areas where they had been blurred. In 1900 the state passed laws completing the disfranchisement process and the Republicans were no longer competitive in the state.
Post-war economy and society
During the late 19th century, North Carolina's Piedmont region developed an industrial economy that included the cottonCotton
Cotton is a soft, fluffy staple fiber that grows in a boll, or protective capsule, around the seeds of cotton plants of the genus Gossypium. The fiber is almost pure cellulose. The botanical purpose of cotton fiber is to aid in seed dispersal....
textile industry in close-knit company towns, and timber-based furniture and building supplies in villages such as High Point and Thomasville. The introduction of manufacturing helped to diversify North Carolina's chiefly agricultural economy. In the early decades, African Americans were rejected for textile industry jobs because of segregation.
Reacting to segregation, disfranchisement and difficulties in agriculture, tens of thousands of African Americans left the state for the North for better opportunities in the Great Migration
Great Migration (African American)
The Great Migration was the movement of 6 million blacks out of the Southern United States to the Northeast, Midwest, and West from 1910 to 1970. Some historians differentiate between a Great Migration , numbering about 1.6 million migrants, and a Second Great Migration , in which 5 million or more...
, whose first wave was from 1910-1940. They went to Washington, Baltimore, and Philadelphia; and sometimes further north, where there was work.
The work patterns of elite white women changed radically, depending on their stage in the life cycle. Women over age 50 changed least, insisting that they needed servants and continuing their traditional managerial roles. The next generation comprising the young wives and mothers during the war depended much less on black servants, and displayed greater flexibility toward household work. The youngest generation, which matured during the war and Reconstruction, did many of their own domestic chores and sought paid jobs outside the household, especially in teaching, which allowed an escape from domestic chores and obligatory marriage.
20th century
On December 17, 1903, the Wright brothersWright brothers
The Wright brothers, Orville and Wilbur , were two Americans credited with inventing and building the world's first successful airplane and making the first controlled, powered and sustained heavier-than-air human flight, on December 17, 1903...
made the first successful airplane flight at Kitty Hawk, North Carolina.
In the early 20th century, North Carolina launched both a major education initiative and a major road-building initiative to enhance the state's economy. The educational initiative was launched by Governor Charles Aycock
Charles Brantley Aycock
Charles Brantley Aycock was the 50th Governor of the U.S. state of North Carolina from 1901 to 1905. During his tenure as governor, he was an advocate for the improvement of the state's public school systems, and following his term in office, he traveled the country promoting educational...
in 1901. Supposedly, North Carolina built one school per day while Aycock was in office. In addition, North Carolina was helped by the Julius Rosenwald Fund, which contributed matching funds for the construction of thousands of schools for African Americans in rural areas throughout the South in the 1920s and 1930s.
World War I
In 1917-1919 the state's Democrats were in powerful positions in Congress, holding two of 23 major committee chairmanships in the Senate and four of 18 in the House, as well as the post of House majority leader. President Woodrow Wilson, a fellow Democrat from the South, remained highly popular during the war and was generally supported by the delegation. During the war, the decrepit ship building industry was suddenly revived with large-scale federal contracts. Nine new shipyards opened to build ships under contracts from the Emergency Fleet Corporation. For steamships were actually made out of concrete, but most were made of wood or steel. Thousands of workers rushed to high-paying jobs, as the managers found a shortage of highly skilled mechanics, as well as a housing shortage. Although unions were weak, labor unrest and managerial inexperience caused the delays. the shipyards closed at the end of the war.The state's road-building initiative began in the 1920s, after the automobile became a popular mode of transportation. During the early decades of the 20th century, several major U.S. military installations, notably Fort Bragg
Fort Bragg, North Carolina
Fort Bragg is a major United States Army installation, in Cumberland and Hoke counties, North Carolina, U.S., mostly in Fayetteville but also partly in the town of Spring Lake. It was also a census-designated place in the 2010 census and had a population of 39,457. The fort is named for Confederate...
, were located in North Carolina. There were many usable trains in the town.
An important state government agency was the North Carolina Woman's Committee, headed by Laura Holmes Reilly of Charlotte. Motivated by the public service ideals of the Progressive Movement, it registered women for many volunteer services, promoted increased food production and the elimination of wasteful cooking and storage practices, helped maintain social services, worked to bolster moral well-being of white and black soldiers, provided ideas on improvements of public health and public schools, encouraged black participation in its programs, and helped with the terrible Spanish flu epidemic that struck worldwide in late 1918. Of the committee was generally successful in reaching middle-class white and black women, but it was handicapped by condescension by men, limited funding, and tepid responses from women on the farms and working-class districts.
Great Depression and World War II
The state's farmers were badly hurt in the early years of the United StatesGreat Depression in the United States
The Great Depression began with the Wall Street Crash of October, 1929 and rapidly spread worldwide. The market crash marked the beginning of a decade of high unemployment, poverty, low profits, deflation, plunging farm incomes, and lost opportunities for economic growth and personal advancement...
, but benefited greatly by the New Deal programs, especially the tobacco program which guaranteed a steady flow of relatively high income to farmers, and the cotton program, which raised the prices farmers received for their crops. The textile industry in the Piedmont region continued to attract cotton mills relocating from the high-wage North.
Prosperity largely returned during World War II, as the state sent hundreds of thousands of young men and a few hundred young women into the military, and supplied the armed forces with more textiles than any other state in the nation.
Political scientist V. O. Key analyzed the state political culture in depth in the late 1940s, and concluded it was exceptional in the South for its "progressive outlook and action in many phases of life", especially in the realm of industrial development, commitment to public education, and a moderate pattern segregation that was relatively free of the rigid racism found in the Deep South.
Education and the economy
North Carolina invested heavily in its system of higher education. also became known for its excellent universities. Three major institutions compose the state's Research TriangleThe Triangle (North Carolina)
The Research Triangle, also known as Raleigh-Durham and commonly referred to as simply "The Triangle", is a region in the Piedmont of North Carolina in the United States, anchored by North Carolina State University, Duke University, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and cities of...
: the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill is a public research university located in Chapel Hill, North Carolina, United States...
(chartered in 1789 and greatly expanded from the 1930s on), North Carolina State University
North Carolina State University
North Carolina State University at Raleigh is a public, coeducational, extensive research university located in Raleigh, North Carolina, United States. Commonly known as NC State, the university is part of the University of North Carolina system and is a land, sea, and space grant institution...
, and Duke University
Duke University
Duke University is a private research university located in Durham, North Carolina, United States. Founded by Methodists and Quakers in the present day town of Trinity in 1838, the school moved to Durham in 1892. In 1924, tobacco industrialist James B...
(rechartered in 1924). conditions and the public elementary and high schools were not as noteworthy, however. In the 1960s Governor Terry Sanford
Terry Sanford
James Terry Sanford was a United States politician and educator from North Carolina. A member of the Democratic Party, Sanford was the 65th Governor of North Carolina , a two-time U.S. Presidential candidate in the 1970s and a U.S. Senator...
, a racial moderate, called for more spending on the schools, but Sanford's program featured regressive taxation that fell disproportionately on the workers. In the 1970s Governor James B. Hunt Jr., another racial moderate, championed educational reform
Reformers have stressed the central role of education in the modernization of the state and economic growth. They have also aggressively pursued economic development, attracting out-of-state, and international corporations with special tax deals and infrastructure development. Charlotte became the nation's number two banking center, after New York.
Race relations
In 1931 the Negro Voters League was formed in RaleighRaleigh, North Carolina
Raleigh is the capital and the second largest city in the state of North Carolina as well as the seat of Wake County. Raleigh is known as the "City of Oaks" for its many oak trees. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the city's 2010 population was 403,892, over an area of , making Raleigh...
to press for voter registration. The city had an educated and politically sophisticated black middle class; by 1946 the League had succeeded in registering 7,000 black voters, an achievement in the segregated South. The work of racial desegregation
Desegregation
Desegregation is the process of ending the separation of two groups usually referring to races. This is most commonly used in reference to the United States. Desegregation was long a focus of the American Civil Rights Movement, both before and after the United States Supreme Court's decision in...
and restoration of civil rights for African Americans continued throughout the state.
Durham's Black newspaper Carolina Times, edited by Louis Austin, took the lead in promoting the "Double V" strategy during World War II among civil rights activists. the strategy was to energize blacks to fight victory abroad against the Nazis and Japs, while fighting for victory at home against white supremacy and racial oppression. Calling for a war against racism abroad and at home, activists demanded an end to racial inequality in education, politics, economics, and the armed forces.
In 1960 nearly 25% of the state was African American: 1,114,907 citizens who had been living without full rights. African-American college students began the sit-in
Greensboro sit-ins
The Greensboro sit-ins were a series of nonviolent protests which led to the Woolworth's department store chain reversing its policy of racial segregation in the Southern United States....
at the Woolworth's
F. W. Woolworth Company
The F. W. Woolworth Company was a retail company that was one of the original American five-and-dime stores. The first successful Woolworth store was opened on July 18, 1879 by Frank Winfield Woolworth in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, as "Woolworth's Great Five Cent Store"...
lunch counter in Greensboro
Greensboro, North Carolina
Greensboro is a city in the U.S. state of North Carolina. It is the third-largest city by population in North Carolina and the largest city in Guilford County and the surrounding Piedmont Triad metropolitan region. According to the 2010 U.S...
on February 1, 1960, sparking a wave of copycat sit-ins across the American South. They continued the Greensboro sit-in sporadically for several months until, on July 25, African Americans were at last allowed to eat at Woolworth's. Integration of public facilities followed.
Together with continued activism in states throughout the South, African Americans' moral leadership gained passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964
Civil Rights Act of 1964
The Civil Rights Act of 1964 was a landmark piece of legislation in the United States that outlawed major forms of discrimination against African Americans and women, including racial segregation...
and the Voting Rights Act of 1965. Throughout the state, African Americans began to participate fully in political life. In October 1973, Clarence Lightner
Clarence Lightner
Clarence Everett Lightner was the first popularly elected Mayor of Raleigh, North Carolina and the first African American elected mayor of a metropolitan Southern city...
was elected mayor of Raleigh
Raleigh, North Carolina
Raleigh is the capital and the second largest city in the state of North Carolina as well as the seat of Wake County. Raleigh is known as the "City of Oaks" for its many oak trees. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the city's 2010 population was 403,892, over an area of , making Raleigh...
, making history as the first popularly elected mayor of the city, the first African American to be elected mayor, and the first African American to be elected mayor in a white-majority city of the South.
In 1979 North Carolina ended the state eugenics
Eugenics
Eugenics is the "applied science or the bio-social movement which advocates the use of practices aimed at improving the genetic composition of a population", usually referring to human populations. The origins of the concept of eugenics began with certain interpretations of Mendelian inheritance,...
program. Since 1929 the state Eugenics Board had deemed thousands of individuals 'feeble minded' and had them forcibly sterilized. In 2011 the state legislature debated whether the estimate 2,900 living victims of North Carolina's sterilization regime would be compensated for the irreparable harm inflicted upon them by the state. The victims of the program were disproportionate minorities and the poor.
Recent changes
In 1971, North Carolina's third state constitutionNorth Carolina Constitution
The Constitution of the State of North Carolina governs the structure and function of the state government of North Carolina, United States; it is the highest legal document for the state and subjugates North Carolina law...
was ratified. A 1997 amendment to this constitution granted the governor veto
Veto
A veto, Latin for "I forbid", is the power of an officer of the state to unilaterally stop an official action, especially enactment of a piece of legislation...
power over most legislation. The state became a Republican stronghold in national elections starting in 1968, although Barack Obama did carry the electoral vote in 2008.
During the last 25 years, North Carolina's population has increased as its economy has grown, especially in finance and knowledge-based industries, while agriculture has declined sharply because of mechanization, and the textile industry has steadily declined because of globalization. Most of the growth has taken place in metropolitan areas of the Piedmont, in Charlotte, Raleigh-Durham, Greensboro.
See also
- History of the East Coast of the United States
- History of the Southern United StatesHistory of the Southern United StatesThe history of the Southern United States reaches back hundreds of years and includes the Mississippian people, well known for their mound building. European history in the region began in the very earliest days of the exploration and colonization of North America...
- History of the United StatesHistory of the United StatesThe history of the United States traditionally starts with the Declaration of Independence in the year 1776, although its territory was inhabited by Native Americans since prehistoric times and then by European colonists who followed the voyages of Christopher Columbus starting in 1492. The...
- List of National Historic Landmarks in North Carolina
- National Register of Historic Places listings in North Carolina
Surveys
- Clay, James, and Douglas Orr, eds., North Carolina Atlas: Portrait of a Changing Southern State 1971
- Crow; Jeffrey J. and Larry E. Tise; Writing North Carolina History (1979) online
- Fleer; Jack D. North Carolina Government & Politics (1994) online political science textbook
- Hawks; Francis L. History of North Carolina 2 vol 1857
- Kersey, Marianne M., and Ran Coble, eds., North Carolina Focus: An Anthology on State Government, Politics, and Policy, 2d ed., (Raleigh: North Carolina Center for Public Policy Research, 1989).
- Lefler; Hugh Talmage. A Guide to the Study and Reading of North Carolina History (1963) online
- Lefler, Hugh Talmage, and Albert Ray Newsome, North Carolina: The History of a Southern State (1954, 1963, 1973), standard textbook
- Link, William A. North Carolina: Change and Tradition in a Southern State (2009), 481pp history by leading scholar
- Luebke, Paul. Tar Heel Politics: Myths and Realities (1990).
- Powell William S. Dictionary of North Carolina Biography. Vol. 1, A-C; vol. 2, D-G; vol. 3, H-K. 1979-88.
- Powell, William S. Encyclopedia of North Carolina. 2006. ISBN 978-0807830710.
- Powell, William S. North Carolina Fiction, 1734-1957: An Annotated Bibliography 1958
- Powell, William S. North Carolina through Four Centuries (1989), standard textbook
- Ready, Milton. The Tar Heel State: A History of North Carolina (2005) excerpt and text search
- WPA Federal Writers' Project. North Carolina: A Guide to the Old North State. 1939. famous Works Progress AdministrationWorks Progress AdministrationThe Works Progress Administration was the largest and most ambitious New Deal agency, employing millions of unskilled workers to carry out public works projects, including the construction of public buildings and roads, and operated large arts, drama, media, and literacy projects...
guide to every town
Localities
- Boyd William Kenneth. The Story of Durham. 1925.
- Lally, Kelly A. Historic Architecture of Wake County, North Carolina. Raleigh: Wake County Government, 1994. ISBN 0-9639198-0-6.
- Payne, Roger L. Place Names of the Outer Banks. Washington, North Carolina: Thomas A. Williams, 1985. ISBN0-932707-01-4.
- Morland John Kenneth. Millways of Kent. UNC 1958.
- Powell, William S. The First State University. 3rd ed. Chapel Hill: 1992.
- Powell, William S. North Carolina Gazetteer. Chapel Hill: 1968. Available as an electronic book with ISBN 0807867039 from NetLibrary.
- Vickers, James. Chapel Hill: An Illustrated History. Chapel Hill: Barclay, 1985. ISBN 0-9614429-0-5.
Special topics
- Bishir, Catherine. North Carolina Architecture. Chapel Hill: UNC, 1990.
- North Carolina China Council [a regional affiliate of the China Council of the Asia Society.] North Carolina's "China Connection", 1840-1949: A Record. N.P.: North Carolina China Council, 1981. No ISBN. Catalog of a photographic exhibit shown at the North Carolina Museum of History and elsewhere, 1980-1981.
- Riggs, Stanley R. ed. The Battle for North Carolina's Coast: Evolutionary History, Present Crisis, and Vision for the Future (University of North Carolina Press; 2011) 142 pages
Environment and geography
- Sawyer, Roy T. America's Wetland: An Environmental and Cultural History of Tidewater Virginia and North Carolina (University of Virginia Press; 2010) 248 pages; traces the human impact on the ecosystem of the Tidewater region.
Pre 1920
- Anderson, Eric. Race and Politics in North Carolina, 1872-1901 (1981).
- Beatty Bess. "Lowells of the South: Northern Influence on the Nineteenth-Century North Carolina Textile Industry, 1830-1890". Journal of Southern History 53 (Feb 1987): 37-62. online at JSTOR
- Billings Dwight. Planters and the Making of a "New South": Class, Politics, and Development in North Carolina, 1865-1900. 1979.
- Bolton; Charles C. Poor Whites of the Antebellum South: Tenants and Laborers in Central North Carolina and Northeast Mississippi 1994 online edition
- Bradley, Mark L. Bluecoats and Tar Heels: Soldiers and Civilians in Reconstruction North Carolina (2010) 370 pp. ISBN 978-0-8131-2507-7
- Cathey, Cornelius O. Agricultural Developments in North Carolina, 1783-1860. 1956.
- Clayton, Thomas H. Close to the Land. The Way We Lived in North Carolina, 1820-1870. 1983.
- Ekirch, A. Roger "Poor Carolina": Politics and Society in Colonial North Carolina, 1729-1776 (1981)
- Escott Paul D., and Jeffrey J. Crow. "The Social Order and Violent Disorder: An Analysis of North Carolina in the Revolution and the Civil War". Journal of Southern History 52 (August 1986): 373-402.
- Escott Paul D., ed. North Carolinians in the Era of the Civil War and Reconstruction (U. of North Carolina Press, 2008) 307pp; essays by scholars on specialized topics
- Escott; Paul D. Many Excellent People: Power and Privilege in North Carolina, 1850-1900 (1985) online
- Fenn, Elizabeth A. and Peter H. Wood. Natives and Newcomers: The Way We Lived in North Carolina Before 1770 (1983)
- Gilpatrick; Delbert Harold. Jeffersonian Democracy in North Carolina, 1789-1816 (1931) online edition
- Gilmore; Glenda Elizabeth. Gender and Jim Crow: Women and the Politics of White Supremacy in North Carolina, 1896-1920 (1996) online edition
- Griffin Richard W. "Reconstruction of the North Carolina Textile Industry, 1865-1885". North Carolina Historical Review 41 (January 1964): 34-53.
- Harris, William C. "William Woods Holden: in Search of Vindication." North Carolina Historical Review 1982 59(4): 354-372. ISSN 0029-2494 Governor during Reconstruction
- Harris, William C. William Woods Holden, Firebrand of North Carolina Politics. (1987). 332 pp.
- Johnson, Charles A. "The Camp Meeting in Ante-Bellum North Carolina". North Carolina Historical Review 10 (April 1933): 95-110.
- Johnson, Guion Griffis. Antebellum North Carolina: A Social History. 1937
- Kars, Marjoleine. Breaking Loose Together: The Regulator Rebellion in Pre-Revolutionary North Carolina (2002) online edition
- Kruman Marc W. Parties and Politics in North Carolina, 1836-1865. (1983).
- Leloudis, James L. Schooling the New South: Pedagogy, Self, and Society in North Carolina, 1880-1920 1996 online edition
- McDonald, Forrest, and Grady McWhiney. "The South from Self-Sufficiency to Peonage: An Interpretation". American Historical Review 85 (December 1980): 1095-1118. in JSTOR
- McDonald Forrest, and Grady McWhiney. "The Antebellum Southern Herdsmen: A Reinterpretation". Journal of Southern History 41 (May 1975): 147-66. in JSTOR
- Morrill, James R. The Practice and Politics of Fiat Finance: North Carolina in the Confederation, 1783-1789. 1969 online edition
- Newcomer, Mabel, Economic and Social History of Chowan County, North Carolina, 1880-1915 (1917) online edition
- Nathans Sydney. The Quest for Progress: The Way We Lived in North Carolina, 1870-1920. 1983.
- O'Brien Gail Williams. The Legal Fraternity and the Making of a New South Community, 1848-1882. (1986).
- Opper Peter Kent. "North Carolina Quakers: Reluctant Slaveholders". North Carolina Historical Review 52 (January 1975): 37-58.
- Perdue Theda. Native Carolinians: The Indians of North Carolina. Division of Archives and History, North Carolina Department of Cultural Resources, 1985.
- Ramsey Robert W. Carolina Cradle. Settlement of the Northwest Carolina Frontier, 1747-1762. 1964.
- Risjord, Norman. Chesapeake Politics 1781-1800 (1978)
- Joseph Carlyle Sitterson. The Secession Movement in North Carolina (1939) 285 pages
- Tolley, Kim, “Joseph Gales and Education Reform in North Carolina, 1799–1841,” North Carolina Historical Review, 86 (Jan. 2009), 1–31.
- Louise Irby Trenholme; The Ratification of the Federal Constitution in North Carolina (1932) online edition
- Watson Harry L. An Independent People: The Way We Lived in North Carolina, 1770-1820. 1983.
Since 1920
- Abrams; Douglas Carl; Conservative Constraints: North Carolina and the New Deal (1992) online edition
- Badger; Anthony J. Prosperity Road: The New Deal, Tobacco, and North Carolina (1980) online edition
- Bell John L., Jr. Hard Times: Beginnings of the Great Depression in North Carolina, 1929-1933. North Carolina Division of Archives and History, 1982.
- Christensen, Rob. The Paradox of Tar Heel Politics: The Personalities, Elections, and Events That Shaped Modern North Carolina (2008) excerpt and text search
- Clancy, Paul R. Just a Country Lawyer: A Biography of Senator Sam Ervin. (1974). Senator who helped to bring down Richard Nixon, but opposed the Civil Rights movement
- Cooper, Christopher A., and H. Gibbs Knotts, eds. The New Politics of North Carolina (U. of North Carolina Press, 2008) ISBN 978-0-8078-5876-9
- Gatewood; Willard B. Preachers, Pedagogues & Politicians: The Evolution Controversy in North Carolina, 1920-1927 1966 online edition
- Gilmore; Glenda Elizabeth. Gender and Jim Crow: Women and the Politics of White Supremacy in North Carolina, 1896-1920 (1996)
- Grundy; Pamela. Learning to Win: Sports, Education, and Social Change in Twentieth-Century North Carolina 2001 online edition
- Hagood, Margaret Jarman. Mothers of the South: Portraiture of the White Tenant Farm Woman 1939
- Key, V. O. Southern Politics in State and Nation (1951)
- Odum, Howard W. Folk, Region, and Society: Selected Papers of Howard W. Odum, (1964).
- Parramore Thomas C. Express Lanes and Country Roads: The Way We Lived in North Carolina, 1920-1970. (1983).
- Pope, Liston. Millhands and Preachers. (1942). A history of the 1929 Loray Mill strike in Gastonia, N.C., especially the role of the church.
- Puryear, Elmer L. Democratic Party Dissension in North Carolina, 1928-1936 (1962).
- Seymour, Robert E. "Whites Only". Valley Forge, Pa.: Judson, 1991. An account of the Civil Rights movement in North Carolina, and churches' involvement in it (on both sides) in particular, by a white Baptist pastor who was a supporter of the movement. ISBN 0-8170-1178-1.
- Taylor, Elizabeth A. "The Women's Suffrage Movement in North Carolina", North Carolina Historical Review, (January 1961): 45-62, and ibid. (April 1961): 173-89;
- Tilley Nannie May. The Bright Tobacco Industry, 1860-1929. (1948).
- Tilley Nannie May. The R. J. Reynolds Tobacco Company. (1985).
- Tullos, Allen. Habits of Industry: White Culture and the Transformation of the Carolina Piedmont. (1989). online edition, based on interviews
- Weare; Walter B. Black Business in the New South: A Social History of the North Carolina Mutual Life Insurance Company (1993) online edition
- Wood; Phillip J. Southern Capitalism: The Political Economy of North Carolina, 1880-1980 1986 online edition
Primary sources
- Lindley S. Butler and Alan D. Watson, eds., The North Carolina Experience: An Interpretive and Documentary History 1984, essays by historians and selected related primary sources.
- John L. Cheney, Jr., ed., North Carolina Government, 1585-1979: A Narrative and Statistical History (Raleigh: Department of the Secretary of State, 1981)
- Jack Claiborne and William Price, eds. Discovering North Carolina: A Tar Heel Reader (1991).
- Hugh Lefler, North Carolina History Told by Contemporaries (numerous editions since 1934)
- H. G. Jones, North Carolina Illustrated, 1524-1984 (1984)
- Alexander S. Salley, ed. Narratives of Early Carolina, 1650-1708 (1911) online edition
- Woodmason Charles. The Carolina Backcountry on the Eve of the Revolution. 1953.
- Yearns, W. Buck and John G. Barret; North Carolina Civil War Documentary (1980)
Primary sources: governors and political leaders
- Luther H. Hodges; Businessman in the Statehouse: Six Years as Governor of North Carolina 1962 online edition
- Memoirs of W. W. Holden (1911) complete text
- Holden, William Woods. The Papers of William Woods Holden. Vol. 1: 1841-1868. Horace Raper and Thornton W. Mitchell, ed. Raleigh, Division of Archives and History, Dept. of Cultural Resources, 2000. 457 pp.
- North Carolina Manual, published biennially by the Department of the Secretary of State since 1941.