North Carolina Maps
This entry was originally written by Johni Cerny and Gareth L. Mark for Red Book: American State, County, and Town Sources.
Excellent maps, atlases, and gazetteers for North Carolina are readily available. The best gazetteer available for North Carolina is William Stevens Powell, The North Carolina Gazetteer: A Dictionary of Tar Heel Places (Chapel Hill, N.C.: University of North Carolina Press, 1968). The Gazetteer includes historical definitions, derivations of place-names, and exact locations. It is cross-indexed well and gives references for the first use of place-names. An important historical publication is Richard Edwards, ed., Statistical Gazetteer of the States of Virginia and North Carolina (Richmond, Va.: Published for the Proprietor, 1856).
There are several excellent atlases and map guides available for North Carolina. James W. Clay, Douglas M. Orr, Jr., and Alfred W. Stuart, eds., North Carolina Atlas: Portrait of a Changing Southern State. (1975; reprint. Chapel Hill, N.C.: University of North Carolina Press, 2000) is perhaps the best atlas available. Fifteen North Carolina maps are included in William P. Cummings, North Carolina in Maps (3d printing, Raleigh, N.C.: State Department of Archives and History, 1992). See also Garland P. Stout, Historical Research Maps: North Carolina Counties, 5 vols. (Greensboro, N.C.: Garland P. Stout, 1973).
The North Carolina Office of Archives and History has revised David Leroy Corbitt, The Formation of the North Carolina Counties, 1663'1943 (1950; reprint with supplementary data and corrections, Raleigh, N.C.: State Department of Archives and History, 1969). This guide is essential for determining the historical boundaries of North Carolina's counties.
