Qualla: Newport, North Carolina

Newport, North Carolina: Introduction

Sat, 30 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Two theories explain the name. The first holds that Newport, formerly known as Shepardsville, became New Port to distinguish it from the Old Port of Beaufort just down the river. The second credits an early influx of Quakers from Rhode Island who named the place after their hometown of Newport. Both versions might be true; both are repeated in the town histories. What is certain is that by 1866 the crossroads community on the Newport River was officially chartered, and the name had stuck.

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Newport, North Carolina: Bell's Corner, Shepardsville, Newport

Sat, 30 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Before the charter, the settlement went by other names. Bell's Corner was one. Shepardsville was another, after a local landowner named Shepard who held the land in the early 18th century. The Newport River, navigable in those years all the way to Old Topsail Inlet, made the plac...

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Newport, North Carolina: Union Camp

Sat, 30 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

When the Civil War came, Newport sat at a strategic point on the rail line that ran from Goldsboro through Newport to Beaufort, completed in 1858 as the final 96-mile stretch of the Atlantic and North Carolina Railroad. The Newport Barracks operated here as a Union camp. After Ge...

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Newport, North Carolina: The Housing Project

Sat, 30 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

In the 20th century, Newport's economy turned eastward, toward the military bases that grew up after World War II. Part of the town's residential area, still called the housing project by locals, was originally built for civil-service employees and military personnel working at M...

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Newport, North Carolina: A School That Wouldn't Quit

Sat, 30 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Newport Consolidated School opened in 1926 and ran first through twelfth grade until 1966, when the county built a new consolidated high school, West Carteret High, in nearby Morehead City. The old school was demolished. But the alumni did not let it go. Members of the Newport Co...

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