Encyclopedia of North Carolina Now Available Online

Encyclopedia of North Carolina edited by William S. PowellThe University of North Carolina Press’s comprehensive Encyclopedia of North Carolina is now available online through NCpedia. The history of telephone service in North Carolina, the mystery of the Brown Mountain Lights, the range of growth of the Venus flytrap and thousands of other facts are now at your fingertips for free.

NCpedia, the online encyclopedia about North Carolina, is managed by the Digital Information Management Program at the State Library of North Carolina’s Government & Heritage Library, in the N.C. Department of Cultural Resources, and is hosted by NC LIVE, North Carolina’s statewide online library service. It is available at http://ncpedia.org and is optimized for mobile devices. A partnership between the State Library of North Carolina and the University of North Carolina Press was launched in February of 2012. State Library staff completed the process of integrating more than 1,900 articles from the Encyclopedia into NCpedia on Dec. 7, 2012, with the entry for “Zoning.”

Venus fly trap, photo (c) 2013 by Tom Earnhardt
Venus fly trap, photo (c) 2013 by Tom Earnhardt

“Researchers of all ages benefit from having the Encyclopedia of North Carolina available through NCpedia,” says State Librarian Cal Shepard.  “There has been a need for a reputable online resource about the vast array of topics covered by the Encyclopedia.  We are happy to partner with UNC Press to meet this need.”

The Encyclopedia of North Carolina was edited by William S. Powell, professor emeritus of history at UNC-Chapel Hill, and published by UNC Press in 2006.  Founded in 1922, UNC Press is the oldest university press in the South and one of the oldest in the United States.

NCpedia continues to grow as biographical essays from the UNC Press six-volume  Dictionary of North Carolina Biography now are being added. The expansion of NCpedia is funded through a Library Services and Technology Act grant from the federal Institute of Museum and Library Services.

If you are on Twitter be sure to follow @NCpedia and watch for tweets tagged with #EncyOfNC.