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.
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.
Some place names included in The North Carolina Gazetteer contain terms that are considered offensive.
"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 |
|---|---|
| Wendell (win-DELL) |
town in E Wake County. Settled 1895. Inc. 1903. Named for Oliver Wendell Holmes (1809-94), American writer and father of the U.S. Supreme Court justice of the same name. Produces tobacco, apparel, and furniture. |
| Wenona |
community in S Washington County on the N shoulder of Dogwood Ridge on East Dismal Swamp. Est. after A. E. Rice purchased 160 acres of land there and built a house in 1912. Other settlers then purchased land from Roper Lumber Company and settled; by 1914, a school was built. A post office was est. there in 1913; closed 1955. Settlers came there from Pennsylvania, West Virginia, Illinois, and Ohio. |
| Wentworth |
county seat, central Rockingham County. Courthouse authorized to be est. 1787; first court held there 1799. Post office operated there, 1794-1827, as Rockingham Courthouse. Named for Charles Watson-Wentworth, Duke of Rockingham and prime minister of England when the Stamp Act was repealed; on March 9 and 17, 1778, Watson-Wentworth spoke on behalf of immediate recognition of the independence of the American colonies. Rockingham Community College, est. 1966, is there. Inc. 1998. Alt. approx. 900. |
| Wentworth Township |
central Rockingham County. |
| Wesley |
community in SE Surry County served by post office, 1894-1905. |
| Wesley Chapel |
community in W central Union County. Inc. 1998. |
| Wesley Creek |
rises in S Buncombe County and flows SE into Bent Creek. |
| Wesley Martin Branch |
rises in E Cherokee County and flows NW into Valley River. |
| Wesner Bald |
on Haywood-Jackson county line. Alt. 5,600. Named for David Wesner of Cabarrus County, who obtained a grant for 100 acres in the vicinity in 1808. Wesner froze to death while hunting deer about 1812 on the mountain that now bears his name. |
| Wesser |
community in SW Swain County near Nantahala Gorge. Alt. 1,714. Named for the nearby Wesser Creek. |
