North Carolina, a state in the southeastern United States, one of the original 13 colonies, located on the Atlantic Coast between Virginia and South Carolina. North Carolina is the longest and the third-largest state east of the Mississippi River, with an extreme length from east to west of 503 miles (810 km) and from north to south of 187 miles (301 km.) Some residents of the far west are nearer to the capital of six other states than to their own Raleigh.
The terrain rises from sandy ocean banks along the wide Atlantic Coastal Plain through rolling countryside to the high Blue Ridge and Great Smoky mountains in the west. The state's rivers form drainage systems that with few exceptions flow southeasterly into the Atlantic. North Carolina's generally mild climate and varied physical and historical attractions give the state its reputation as a "variety vacationland."
Virtually all of the earliest settlers except a few African slaves were English, but people of other European stock arrived in the 18th century. Blacks accounted for about a third of the population by the Civil War and make up about a quarter now. The state is home for more Indians than any other east of the Mississippi.
North Carolina leads the South in industrial output and the United States in production of tobacco, textiles, and household furniture. Only in the 1980's did the urban population surpass that of rural areas, and mush of the state retains a rural character.
