USA North Carolina - The People : USA  

USA North Carolina - The People - Travel guide

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USA North Carolina - The People

The People

In colonial days the English constituted the largest group of settlers. Scots-Irish, Highland Scots, Germans, and Welsh also arrived in the 18th century, many from the colony of Pennsylvania. Sometimes certain dialects and accents can be detected in the speech of more isolated rural North Carolinians, especially on the Outer Banks, where descendants of early English settlers remained spatially isolated for many decades.

North Carolina had about 100,000 black inhabitants in 1790, and by the time of the American Civil War (1861-1865) blacks accounted for one-third of the population. In 2000 blacks accounted for 21.6 percent of the state's population. Whites comprised the largest share of the population, representing 72.1 percent of the people. Asians were 1.4 percent, Native Americans 1.2 percent, and those of mixed heritage or not reporting ethnicity were 3.6 percent. Native Hawaiians and other Pacific Islanders numbered 3,983. Hispanics, who may be of any race, were 4.7 percent of the people.

The 2000 census put North Carolina's population at 8,049,313. The State Capital is Raleigh, other major cities or towns include Charlotte, Fayetteville, Greensboro, Winston-Salem, Wilmington.