50 Fun Facts About Raleigh

Sir Walter Raleigh, the city's namesake, sponsored which failed English settlement in North Carolina?

The 'lost colony' vanished from Roanoke Island after 1587; its sponsor never set foot in North America himself.

The purpose-built North Carolina capital was incorporated on December 31 of which year?

The site had been chosen in 1788 because its inland location was safe from coastal attack; no town existed there before the surveyors arrived.

Thanks to its tree-lined streets, Raleigh is known by what nickname?

The name is celebrated every New Year's Eve, when a giant copper acorn is dropped downtown at midnight.

Wake County, of which the city is the seat, was named in honor of whom?

Margaret Wake Tryon lent her maiden name to the county in 1771, two decades before the capital city was laid out inside it.

Which planter, the 'Father of Raleigh', sold the land on which the capital was built?

The site commission had leaned toward John Hinton's land across the river until an evening of food and spirits at Lane's house swung the vote his way.

The 1792 street grid, with a central square and one in each corner, was modeled on which older city's plan?

Thomas Holme drew that plan for William Penn in 1682; in the copy, the State Capitol occupies the central square.

The State Capitol occupies the central plot of the original 1792 grid, which is known as what?

Burke Square, one of the four corner squares, had been earmarked for a governor's residence and now holds the Executive Mansion.

Which future U.S. president was born at Casso's Inn in the city in 1808?

The 17th president was born into poverty and never attended a day of school; his birthplace cabin now sits in Mordecai Historic Park.

The Raleigh-born 17th president was bound as an apprentice at age ten in what trade?

He ran away from James Selby's shop after about five years, and Selby posted a ten-dollar reward for the return of the runaway apprentice.

The 1831 fire that destroyed the first State House also consumed a Washington statue by which sculptor?

A replica of the marble now stands in the Capitol rotunda; the original had shown Washington in Roman dress.

The current State Capitol by Town and Davis is built in which architectural style?

The gneiss for its walls was hauled in on the state's first railroad, and the building remains almost unchanged since it opened.

Which governor slipped out of the city in April 1865 to avoid capture as Union troops approached?

He left behind a letter authorizing Mayor William Harrison to surrender, hoping to spare the capital the fate of Columbia and Atlanta.

On April 13, 1865, the mayor surrendered the city to which Union cavalry general?

His troopers took down the Confederate flagpole on the Capitol and ran the Stars and Stripes up over the dome.

Which civil rights organization emerged from an April 1960 student meeting at Shaw University?

The meeting was organized by Ella Baker; Shaw itself is the oldest HBCU to have begun classes in the South, dating to 1865.

In which year was North Carolina State University founded as a land-grant college?

It opened as the North Carolina College of Agriculture and Mechanic Arts and today is the largest university in the Carolinas.

Before an anonymous 1921 letter suggested 'Wolfpack', NC State's teams had gone by which of these names?

They had also been the Aggies and the Techs; the wolves Mr. and Mrs. Wuf did not appear on the sidelines until the 1960s.

NC State's 115-foot Memorial Belltower was built as a monument to alumni killed in which conflict?

Completed in 1937, the granite tower is lit red after athletic victories and appears on the chancellor's seal.

Which player led NC State to its first NCAA title in 1974 and is the only Wolfpack player with a retired jersey?

His No. 44 hangs alone; that team lost only once in two seasons and beat Marquette 76–64 in the final.

Who dunked Whittenburg's last-second air ball to beat Houston in the 1983 NCAA final?

Houston's Phi Slama Jama, with Clyde Drexler and Hakeem Olajuwon, had been expected to win easily over Jim Valvano's Cardiac Pack.

In the Krispy Kreme Challenge, how many doughnuts must runners eat between the two legs?

The whole thing must be finished within an hour; it started in 2004 as a dare among a dozen friends at the Belltower.

The Carolina Hurricanes moved to North Carolina in 1997 from which city?

The old goal horn from the Hartford Civic Center still sounds at their arena; the franchise began life in 1971 as the WHA's New England Whalers.

In which North Carolina city did the Hurricanes play their first two seasons?

The only rink in the Triangle with an ice plant was 5,100-seat Dorton Arena, so the team spent two years playing 90 minutes from home.

The Hurricanes won their first Stanley Cup in 2006 by beating which team in seven games?

It was North Carolina's first major professional sports championship; Game 7 drew 18,978 to the arena in Raleigh.

Which broadcaster's 2019 jab at the Hurricanes' "Storm Surge" gave the team its "Bunch of Jerks" slogan?

The team printed the insult on T-shirts, and the season ended in their first conference final in a decade.

The Hurricanes' second Stanley Cup, in 2026, came in a six-game Final against which team?

They had swept both of the first two playoff rounds, the first team to do so since best-of-seven series were introduced in 1987.

The 'Terror of the South' exhibit in North Carolina is built around the most complete skeleton of which dinosaur?

The specimen, nicknamed 'Acro', shares a hall with a life-size model of the giant sauropod Astrodon.

The NC Museum of Art's 2010 West Building was designed by which architecture firm?

The museum's collection began with a $1 million legislative appropriation in 1947, the first time any U.S. state had earmarked public money to buy art.

Along with Raleigh and Durham, which town completes the Research Triangle?

The three points are anchored by NC State, Duke and UNC; the 'Triangle' name dates only from the creation of the research park in the 1950s.

Research Triangle Park, the largest research park in the United States, covers roughly how many acres?

Established in 1959 in a pine forest between the three cities, it hosts more than 300 companies, including a 774,000-square-foot IBM complex.

Which Raleigh-based open-source company did IBM buy for $34 billion in a deal closed in 2019?

It had moved its headquarters from Durham to NC State's Centennial Campus in 2002 before taking over a downtown tower in 2013.

Which Raleigh TV station received the first experimental US high-definition broadcast license in 1996?

It went on to air the world's first all-HD newscast in October 2000; Jesse Helms had been its nightly editorialist before entering the Senate.

What nickname did the Sir Walter Hotel earn as the unofficial headquarters of state politics?

By 1925 more than 80 percent of the legislature lived there, and Senator Sam Ervin called it 'the most politically saturated inn in America'.

What did the 1949 shopping center, the first built between Washington and Atlanta, rename itself in 2021?

In the 1970s its former Cold War bomb shelter became 'The Village Subway', a music venue that booked Muddy Waters and an early R.E.M.

Jim Valvano and Jesse Helms are both buried in which historic burial ground near the Capitol?

Founded in 1869, its 102 acres include a Confederate section and Wake County's first Hebrew cemetery, both on land given by Henry Mordecai.

Founded in 1887 beside NC State, what is the oldest public park in North Carolina?

Its 1911 carousel, moved from the old Bloomsbury amusement park, is still turning; the founder refused to have the park named after him.

The 308-acre Dix Park, a mile southwest of downtown, occupies the grounds of what institution?

The city bought the land from the state for $52 million in 2015; a three-acre cemetery there holds about 900 patients' graves.

Falls Lake, the reservoir that supplies the city's drinking water, was created by damming which river?

The dam was finished in 1981 and drowned the Falls of the Neuse, the whitewater that gave the lake its name.

The city sits on the boundary between the Piedmont and the coastal plain, known as what?

It marks the point where waterfalls begin appearing in rivers heading inland, which is why the eastern half of the city flattens out.

Which 1996 hurricane caused severe damage across the city, mostly from falling trees?

The same year the Olympic flame passed through town on its way to Atlanta, and the Whalers announced their move to the city.

The North Carolina State Fair, held in the city every October, was first staged in what year?

It skipped the Civil War years and set its attendance record of 1,091,887 in 2010; it now runs without any state funding.

Dorton Arena, opened on the fairgrounds in 1952, was the first structure in the world to use what?

Its architect, Matthew Nowicki, died in a plane crash before construction began; the saddle-shaped design inspired Tokyo's Yoyogi gymnasium.

After hosting the IBMA's World of Bluegrass from 2013 to 2024, Raleigh lost the event to which Tennessee city?

The festival had come to Raleigh from Nashville, which had hosted it from 2005 through 2012.

Which downtown restaurant did Ashley Christensen open in 2007, kicking off the city's food-scene revival?

It took its name from one of the building's original tenants, one of the first restaurants in downtown Raleigh.

Which Raleigh-born singer finished second on the 2003 season of American Idol?

He sang in the Raleigh Boychoir as a child and later performed the national anthem at the 2011 NHL All-Star Game in his home town.

When General Sherman reached the city in April 1865, where did he set up his headquarters?

The city was spared the destruction inflicted elsewhere; the old Palace was later replaced by the Queen Anne-style Executive Mansion on Blount Street.

Which rookie goaltender won the Conn Smythe Trophy as playoff MVP of the Hurricanes' 2006 Cup run?

He was only the fourth rookie ever to take the award, and later became the franchise's all-time leader in goalie wins.

Which town was North Carolina's seat of government from 1789 to 1794 while Raleigh was built?

New Bern had been the colonial capital, but a British siege during the Revolution ended its usefulness for the job.

The General Assembly left the Capitol in 1963 for a new Legislative Building designed by which architect?

The building and its furnishings cost $5.5 million, which the state worked out to $1.24 for every citizen of North Carolina.

'Willo' the Thescelosaurus became famous for supposedly preserving which fossilized organ?

Later CT scans showed the lump was most likely a concretion of sand, but the specimen from Montana kept its fame.

Estey Hall at Shaw University (1873) was the first US building built for the higher education of whom?

It was named for Deacon Jacob Estey of Brattleboro, Vermont, whose organ-making family gave $8,000 toward the construction.