Some place names included in The North Carolina Gazetteer contain terms that are considered offensive.
Copyright Notice: This content is from the North Carolina Gazetteer, edited by William S. Powell and Michael Hill. Copyright © 2010 by the University of North Carolina Press. Used by permission of the publisher. For personal use and not for further distribution. Please submit permission requests for other use directly to the publisher.
"The North Carolina Gazetteer is a geographical dictionary in which an attempt has been made to list all of the geographic features of the state in one alphabet. It is current, and it is historical as well. Many features and places that no longer exist are included; many towns and counties for which plans were made but which never materialized are also included. Some names appearing on old maps may have been imaginary, but many of them also appear in this gazetteer.
Each entry is located according to the county in which it is found. I have not felt obliged to keep entries uniform. The altitude of a place, the date of incorporation of a city or town, may appear in the beginning of one entry and at the end of another. Some entries may appear more complete than others. I have included whatever information I could find. If there is no comment on the origin or meaning of a name, it is because the information was not available. In some cases, however, resort to an unabridged dictionary may suggest the meaning of many names."
--From The North Carolina Gazetteer, 1st edition, preface by William S. Powell
| Place | Description |
|---|---|
| Old Sparta |
town in S Edgecombe County on Tar River. Inc. as Sparta, 1876, and reincorporated as Old Sparta, 1903. No longer active in municipal affairs. Post office est. 1829; probably came to be called Old Sparta after Sparta, county seat of Alleghany County, est. 1859, began to thrive. |
| Old Stanhope |
See Spring Hope. |
| Old Station Gap |
central Madison County between Brush Creek and Walnut Creek. |
| Old Topsail Creek |
rises in S Pender County and flows S into Topsail Sound. |
| Old Topsail Inlet |
S Pender County, through which waters of Topsail Sound enter the Atlantic Ocean. It lies between New Topsail Inlet on the N and Rich Inlet on the s. |
| Old Town |
community in central Forsyth County. Settled 1753 by first Moravians to arrive at the Wachovia tract from Pennsylvania. First named Bethabara, or House of Passage, since it was intended to be a temporary settlement. After 1766, when Salem was begun, Bethabara declined. The post office, est. 1832, ceased to be called Bethabara in 1835 and was changed to Old Town. |
| Old Town Creek |
See Town Creek. |
| Old Town Township |
W central Forsyth County. |
| Old Trap |
community in S Camden County, was probably settled as early as the 1650s. In the eighteenth century, it was the center of much maritime activity, and a grog shop there supplied the local trade with West India rum. Tradition says that men carrying grain to a local windmill tarried long at the grog shop—it "trapped" them. By the end of the Revolution, the name The Trap was being used, and after 1800 Old Trap came into use. |
| Old Tree Swamp |
rises in W Hertford County and flows SE into Potecasi Creek. |
