Cape Fear Unearthed

The Spanish Influenza of 1918 killed more than 50 million people worldwide and brought daily life to a standstill, especially in Wilmington, where it first showed up in North Carolina.

With Women’s History Month in full swing, the Cape Fear Unearthed local history podcast is turning its attention to the lives of women who helped define and redefine progress in Southeastern North Carolina.

Highland Charge: Scots in the Cape Fear

This special bonus episode tells the story of how the Fort Anderson flag made it from the Cape Fear to Washington, D.C. and into the company of both President Abraham Lincoln and his eventual assassin John Wilkes Booth.

Fort Anderson is often overshadowed by Fort Fisher in Civil War history, but it was ultimately the final stand of the Confederacy in the fight to keep Wilmington out of Union hands.

Wrightsville Beach was awoken from a dream on Jan. 28, 1934 when a fire ripped through its north end and destroyed more than 100 structures, thrusting the town into a new era of uncertainty and progress.

Fort Fisher was built to protect Wilmington from Union control and it would become one of the most important fortifications and lifelines for the Confederacy in the Civil War.

A look at the lost history of the Cape Fear Indians, the tribe of native people who lived in the Cape Fear region for thousands of years.

Thalian Hall in Wilmington its fair share of ghost stories in its 160 years of history, including the tale of three actors who still take in shows from the balcony.

Major General William H. C. Whiting’s legacy is eternally tied to Fort Fisher during the Civil War, but so is the ghost story that claims he still walks the state historic site.

In colonial and antebellum America, witchcraft was a thing to be feared. North Carolina never had its own Salem Witch Trials, but it did keep laws on the books to address witches and the state's folklore is littered with traditions regarding the minions of the dark.

Ghost on the Water

Poplar Grove Plantation hosted the Foy family for more than a century, but some believe more than their memories linger in the house today. Could the antebellum plantation be haunted?

Prohibition was a time when good citizens broke the law for a drink. Like much of the country, the Cape Fear was full of illegal distilleries, speakeasies and even tragic face offs between bootleggers and the cops.

Cornelius Harnett was a Patriot who raised in the Cape Fear and hunted by the British during the American Revolution because of his role in stirring up rebellion among the colonists and fighting for political separation from the crown.