This Remote Part of the World: Regional Formation in Lower Cape Fear, North Carolina, 1725-1775

Between 1700 and 1775 no colony in British America experienced more impressive growth than North Carolina, and no region within the colony developed as rapidly as the Lower Cape Fear. Totally uninhabited by Europeans in 1700, this isolated corner of North Carolina’s southern coast is particularly noteworthy for its relatively late colonization and its rapid rise to economic prominence. First settled in 1725, the region grew to be the most prosperous in North Carolina by 1775. In his study of this eighteenth-century settlement, Bradford J. Wood explores frontier development in a region surrounded by more-established communities. Challenging many commonly held beliefs, he presents the Lower Cape Fear as a prime example for understanding North Carolina - and the entirety of colonial America - as a patchwork of regional cultures. Employing social history tools used in studies of New England and Chesapeake but seldom applied to colonies further south, Wood examines probate, legal, real estate, and tax records to recreate the lives of 5,000 Cape Fear residents during the era 1725 to 1775. Rarely have such methods of intensive archival research, collective biography, and computer-driven s