Currituck County: Much more than a getaway destination

Currituck County is arguably much better known than all of the other Albemarle counties. But it is not identified for its 17^th century settlers or its roots of American Quakerism like other close by counties.

Instead, Currituck County includes a extend of the Outer Banking companies, a area of sand and surf visited by around 1 million folks every single 12 months. But Currituck County’s record is far more than beach front households and recreation. It is a county of agriculture, political management, and stories of intriguing persons who lived on both sides of Currituck Seem.

The ideal way to comprehend the historical past of this distinctive county is by its two geographic halves. The western 50 % of Currituck County, stretching from North River to Currituck Seem and the Virginia border, was settled all over 1650 as section of the Virginian migration to the Albemarle region. In accordance to David Leroy Corbitt, Currituck started out out as a person of the first precincts of Albemarle County in advance of becoming a county of its personal in 1739.

A single of the earliest settlers was Thomas Jarvis, who originally lived in Perquimans County in the vicinity of leaders such as George Durant and Nathaniel Batts. Jarvis at some point served on the governor’s council and as deputy governor of North Carolina. Ahead of his loss of life in 1694, Jarvis moved to his plantation on Whites Island in Currituck County, now regarded as Church Island east of Coinjock. 

The Jarvis spouse and children finished up staying one particular of the most influential in the county’s history. Samuel Jarvis was a longtime political leader in the county who fought in the Revolution according to David Stick. Thomas Jordan Jarvis served as governor of North Carolina and helped to uncovered what later on grew to become East Carolina College.

Agriculture has dominated the historical past and economic climate of Currituck County’s western 50 percent. Early wheat and tobacco society was supplemented by logging and shingle production from the trees in the county’s swamps. These pursuits, like nearly all agricultural processes in japanese North Carolina at this time, utilised slaves. According to the Hergesheimer map of 1860, Currituck’s population was 35% enslaved, which was the lowest whole in the Albemarle but larger than 45 other North Carolina counties.

In transportation, Currituck County benefitted from just one of North Carolina’s couple antebellum canals. The Albemarle and Chesapeake Canal, finished in 1857 as observed in Alexander Crosby Brown’s book, linked the Albemarle Sound with Norfolk by way of a channel minimize as a result of Currituck County at the city of Coinjock. There was also a port in Currituck County for a time, but it was often of negligible sizing and ceased to operate when Currituck Inlet closed up in the 18^th century.

Like Camden County to the west, there are no integrated towns in Currituck County. The most significant communities in the western 50 percent are Moyock, Grandy, and Coinjock. Currituck is a small neighborhood on Currituck Seem that has the historic jail and the 19^th century courthouse, a sizable brick composition described by Ruth Minimal-Stokes as having noteworthy neoclassical information.

1 of North Carolina’s handful of remaining Rosenwald educational facilities, which are schools designed for African People in america in the early 20th century, is currently becoming restored nearby. Currituck also contains a ferry to Knotts Island, a historic island in Currituck Audio that is made up of a wildlife refuge and a winery.

The jap half of Currituck County has a much various history dominated by tourism and the shifting mother nature of the Outer Banks. Acknowledged as Currituck Financial institutions, this segment employed to be an island till Currituck Inlet at the northern edge closed up in the 19^th century. Until the formation of Dare County in 1870, Currituck County’s jap area at first stretched down to the spot of existing-working day Kitty Hawk the existing border, a line north of Duck, employed to be the now-stuffed Caffey’s Inlet. 

The very first European to go to the place may well have been Giovanni De Verazzano, who explored sections of the Outer Banking companies in 1524. Early settlers have been number of and significantly between. William Byrd talked about two of them in a tale relayed by David Adhere in his “History of the Outer Banking companies.” The people described by Byrd were hermits who lived in a hut, “subsisted chiefly upon Oysters,” and wore no clothing other than for their beards and hair.

In the mid-19th century, Currituck Banks commenced to appeal to wealthy people. Inspired by stories of massive flocks of geese, the first capturing club opened in the area in 1874. It was adopted in 1922 by the Whalehead Club, an ornate lodge occupying 35 acres of what was then undisturbed marsh.

1 of North Carolina’s famed lighthouses, the Currituck Seaside Light, was crafted in 1875 in the community of Corolla. It is tied for the second-tallest lighthouse in North Carolina with the Bodie Island Gentle and can be climbed various months out of the 12 months.

By the 1920s, jap Currituck County began to open up to vacationers from throughout the country. Tourism was facilitated by the Excellent Roads Movement and a number of necessary bridges, most notably the Baum Bridge in 1928 and the Wright Memorial Bridge in 1930. Website visitors relished the white sand shorelines, searching grounds, and the wild horses in Corolla.

Sooner or later, Carova Seashore became a secluded vacationer destination. It is noteworthy for staying only accessible by boat or by driving on the seaside. As Kip Tabb wrote in a 2017 short article on progress at the beach, “Although traffic has been raising, the deficiency of infrastructure and paved roads has retained visitation modest by comparison to other components of the Outer Banking companies.”

The variations between jap and western Currituck County are stark. Eastern Currituck County’s populace swells in the summertime months to about 50,000 men and women, additional than double the year-spherical populace of the overall county. Holidaymakers are minimal in the western half though comprising just about the full economy of the jap 50 percent.

The vacationers and holidaymakers on Currituck Banking institutions contain some of the wealthiest and most strong folks in the planet. Former Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia owned a dwelling in Corolla, and Bill Gates was rumored in 2021 to have as soon as rented one. In distinction, western Currituck County, which is the property of the greater part of Currituck’s 1,377 African Americans, is rural, isolated and mainly totally free from movie star sightings.

These disparate circumstances amongst the two halves will only continue on to improve. The western 50 percent will probable be bolstered by the mid-Currituck bridge and the advancement of Elizabeth Town and Hampton Streets. This portion of Currituck County could turn out to be either a cease on the way to the Outer Banks or a distant bed room community for Chesapeake and Suffolk, Virginia.

The japanese half, on the other hand, will proceed to appeal to visitors but is slash off from Virginia by Bogus Cape Condition Park, which does not allow vehicular accessibility from North Carolina. These differing paths and experiences give Currituck County its character and make it just one of the most remarkable counties in all of North Carolina.