North Carolina: A Historical Timeline

PRE-EUROPEAN SETTLEMENT
Prior to 1500	The first Native Americans cross into North America from Siberia 12,000 to 10,000 years ago. The first permanent settlements appear around 1000 BCE
	Approximately 30 Native American tribes are scattered across the area now known as North Carolina. The Iroquois inhabit the mountains in the western part of the state, the Sioux live in the central piedmont area, and the Algonquin live in the southern tidewater area.
1500–1729 EARLY EUROPEAN EXPLORATION AND SETTLEMENT
1524	(March 19) Sailing on behalf of France, Italian explorer Giovanni de Verrazano sights land around the area of the Carolinas.
1540	Spanish explorer Hernando de Soto explores the southwestern part of the region in search of gold.
1567	North Carolina to claim the area for the Spanish and convert the Native Americans to Christianity. By 1568 Native Americans have killed all the soldiers and burned their six forts; the Spanish never return to the interior to assert their land claim.
1584	(March 25) Sir Walter Raleigh finances and organizes the Roanoke Colony, the first English colony in the New World, on Roanoke Island in what is now North Carolina. For the next three years, various groups of English colonists attempt to permanently settle the area.
1587	(August 18) Virginia Dare is born to Ellinor and Ananias Dare on Roanoke Island. She is first English person born in the New World.
1590	John White, the leader of a second group of settlers, returns from a trip to England for supplies and finds the Roanoke settlement deserted. He finds the word Croatoan (one of the local Native American tribes) carved into a tree. No trace of the settlers is ever found, and the fate of the "Lost Colony" remains a mystery to this day.
1663	(March 24) King Charles II of England awards land known as the Carolinas to eight members of the nobility who assisted with his restoration to the throne.
1705	Bath, the first town in North Carolina, is founded.
1709	(September) The first major group of Swiss and German colonists reaches the Carolinas. Religious refugees lured by promises of rich farmland and silver mines, the colonists found the town of New Bern.
1711	The Tuscarora War between Native Americans and European settlers begins. The Tuscarora fight a number of military expeditions, trying to end the wave of white settlers crowding them out of their land and enslaving Native American children. The war erupts with a massacre of settlers in North Carolina and ends in 1713 when the governor of North Carolina offers payment to other Native Americans for Tuscarora scalps and captured Tuscarora, who will be used as slaves.
1718	Edward Teach, the notorious pirate Blackbeard, is killed during a bloody battle off the North Carolina coast with a British Navy force sent from Virginia. He subsequently beheaded.
1729–1774 NORTH CAROLINA COLONY
1729	(July 25) North Carolina becomes a royal colony.
1761	In western North Carolina, English soldiers raze Kituwha, the heart of the Cherokee nation.
1767–70	Tryon Palace is built in New Bern and becomes North Carolina’s colonial capital building.
1774	Penelope Barker leads the women of Edenton to take on the British monarchy by putting down their teacups in what is known as the Edenton Tea Party. This is one of the earliest organized women’s political actions in the U.S.
1775–1800 REVOLUTIONARY NORTH CAROLINA
1775	(May 20) North Carolina becomes the first colony to declare its independence from Britain.
1776	(February 27) The Whigs defeat the Tories in the Battle of Moore's Creek Bridge, the first battle of the American Revolution fought in North Carolina. The North Carolina Patriots defeat the Scottish Loyalists, spurring enthusiasm for the Revolution. (April 12) North Carolina is the first state to vote for independence.
1789	(November 12) North Carolina ratifies the U.S. Constitution, becoming the 12th state in the Union. (December 11) The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill is chartered, becoming the first public university in the U.S. (December 22) North Carolina is the third state to ratify the Bill of Rights.
1794	Raleigh becomes the new state capital.
1799	The first gold nugget is found in the U.S. at Reed Gold Mine in Cabarrus County.
1800–1859 POST-REVOLUTIONARY NORTH CAROLINA
1800–50	North Carolina becomes known as the "Rip Van Winkle" state after the Washington Irving character after it garners the reputation of making so little progress that it appears to be asleep.
1804	Residents of North Carolina and Georgia fight in a boundary dispute over 12 miles of land, which becomes known as the "Walton War." A year later, Georgia cedes the land to North Carolina.
1830s	The U.S. government forces Native American Cherokees from their homes, exiling them to west of the Mississippi River in what becomes known as the "Trail of Tears." Many Cherokee hide in the mountains of North Carolina.
1831	(June 21) Workmen attempting to fireproof the roof of the state capital building in Raleigh actually set the building on fire, destroying it in the process. Debate regarding moving the capital to Fayetteville arises, but the idea is never realized.
1860–1900 THE CIVIL WAR AND RECONSTRUCTION ERAS
1861	(May 20) While North Carolina never formally secedes from the Union, it votes to "undo" the act that had brought it into the Union. Between 1861 and 1865, approximately 40,000 North Carolinians are killed in the Civil War. (August 27) The Battle of Fort Hatteras and Clark. Union troops make an amphibious landing at Cape Hatteras on the North Carolina Outer Banks and lay siege on two Confederate forts. It is the first notable victory for Union troops as well as the first combined operation of both the U.S. Army and Navy.
1863	(March 18) The Salisbury "bread riot." About 50 women riot in Salisbury to protest the lack of flour and salt in the South and the resulting merchant profiteering. When merchants refuse to bring prices down, the women break down doors with hatchets and threaten shopkeepers. They end up making off with three barrels of flour, molasses, salt, and $20.
1865	(January 16) General William Tecumseh Sherman leads Union troops on a march through the Carolinas, proceeding northward across the Lumber River into North Carolina. Since Sherman viewed North Carolina as a "reluctant" Confederate state, he does little damage to civilian infrastructure. (March 19-21) The Battle of Bentonville is the bloodiest battle fought in North Carolina. The Confederates are defeated by Union troops. (April 26) A large number of Confederates surrender at Bennett Place outside of Durham. (May 6) The last Confederate troops in North Carolina surrender. Freed slaves found the town of Princeville along the Tar River.
1866	In Robeson County, Tuscarora Native American Henry Berry Lowrie leads a revolt for Native American civil rights and tribal self-determination. He becomes a folk hero to many Native Americans but mysteriously disappears six years later.
1868	(July 4) North Carolina is readmitted into the Union.
1869	The North Carolina Legislature passes an anti-Ku Klux Klan law.
1870	Governor William Holden declares martial law in two North Carolina counties in an attempt to suppress the Ku Klux Klan’s activities. He also suspends habeas corpus for accused Klan leaders.
1871	As a result of his anti-Klan campaign, Holden becomes the first governor in the U.S. to be removed from office by impeachment.
1878	A Cherokee reservation forms in Western North Carolina to provide for the Native Americans living in that region.
1881	(August 27) A hurricane hits Florida and the Carolinas, killing 700.
1895	(February 21) The North Carolina Legislature adjourns for the day to mark the death of African-American abolitionist and suffragist Frederick Douglass.
1897	North Carolina is one of the first states to propose a bill giving women the right to vote. The vote is sent to a committee on insane asylums and is never passed.
1898	In New Bern, pharmacist Caleb Bradham produces "Brad’s drink," a mixture of syrup and soda water, as a digestive aid and energy booster. It becomes a hit and is renamed Pepsi-Cola. (November 10) A race riot in Wilmington begins when African-Americans attempt to vote in the city elections.
1900–1930 EARLY 20TH CENTURY
1903	The Wright brothers make their first successful powered flight at Kill Devil Hill near Kitty Hawk. The event gets little press attention since the brothers are afraid rival aviators will steal their ideas. North Carolina becomes the first state requiring registration for nurses.
1906	(August 7) A mob defies a court order and lynches three African-American sharecroppers suspected of the murder of the Lyerly family in Salisbury.
1910	Due to segregation, disenfranchisement, and difficulties in agriculture, Tens of thousands of African-Americans begin leaving North Carolina for Maryland and Pennsylvania in the Great Migration.
1918	Fort Bragg is established as an artillery training ground. It becomes a permanent Army post in 1922.
1920–30	Tobacco becomes an important crop in North Carolina. The state is now the leading producer of tobacco in the country.
1930–1950 THE GREAT DEPRESSION AND WORLD WAR II
1937	Vernon Rudolph launches doughnut shop Krispy Creme in Winston-Salem. The company is franchised in 1982 and the first shop opens outside the Southeast in Indianapolis in 1995. Today franchises are found all over the world.
1941–45	The U.S. enters World War II. North Carolina supplies more textiles to the U.S. armed forces than any other state.
1943	North Carolina is one of the first U.S. states to establish a state symphony, the North Carolina Symphony. Pembroke State College for Native Americans (now UNC-Pembroke) becomes the nation’s first public four-year college for Native Americans.
1948	American architect Buckminster Fuller builds his first geodesic dome in Asheville. Fuller popularized the geodesic dome, which becomes prevalent in mid-20th century design.
1950–PRESENT MODERN NORTH CAROLINA
1952	The FBI arrests 10 members of the Ku Klux Klan in North Carolina.
1954	Hurricane Hazel is one of the most destructive hurricanes in the state’s history, killing 95 people near the border of North and South Carolina. Because of the damaging effects and high death toll, the name will never be used again for a hurricane in the North Atlantic.
1959	Research Triangle Park opens between Raleigh-Durham and Chapel Hill, beginning an era of high-tech growth in North Carolina.
1960	(February 1) The "sit-in" is born when four African-American college students stage one at a dime store in Greensboro after they are refused service at a lunch counter. Within days, sit-ins occur across the state. Governor Terry Sanford establishes the North Carolina Fund to help end poverty in the state; it becomes a model for anti-poverty programs across the U.S.
1969	tThe Afro-American Society students of Duke University lead an African-American student takeover of the Allen Building in order to spark University action on the concerns of black students. The takeover leads to the establishment of an Afro-American studies program, an African-American cultural center, and an increased number of African-American students and faculty.
1971	(May 6) North Carolina becomes the 47th state to ratify the 19th Amendment granting women the right to vote. The amendment was actually put into effect in 1920.
1975	Animal fossils from around 620 Million BCE are found in North Carolina. They are the oldest animal fossils found in the U.S. to date.
1979	(November 3) "The Greensboro Massacre." Five people are killed from gunfire after a caravan of Klansmen and Nazis infiltrates an anti-Ku Klux Klan demonstration in Greensboro.
1989	A jury in Charlotte convicts disgraced former televangelist Jim Bakker on 24 counts of fraud and conspiracy.
1996	Governor James B. Hunt is re-elected to a record fourth term. The Eastern Band of the Cherokee Nation acquires a few hundred acres of ancestral lands bordering the Tuckasegee River. The land includes the Kituwha Mound where, according to legend, God gave the Cherokee their laws and the first fire.
2011	President Barack Obama announces the end of the Iraq War in a speech at Fort Bragg in North Carolina.