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Durham County, NC area info

Together with Raleigh and Chapel Hill, Durham is one of the three cities of an area called “The Triangle”. The name is derived from a research park created in 1959, called the Research Triangle Park located mostly within Durham County.

Anchored by the cities of Raleigh, Durham and the town of Chapel Hill — in Wake, Durham and Orange counties, the Research Triangle area regularly tops the lists of the best places to live, work and raise a family.

Centrally located in the Piedmont region of North Carolina, the Triangle is home to the state capital, the world-renowned Research Triangle Park, world-leading universities and medical centers, and a plethora of arts, recreation and entertainment options.

Durham County
The county seat, Durham, is home to Duke University, North Carolina Central University, Durham Technical Community College, and the North Carolina School of Science and Mathematics. It’s a city rich in history that grew rapidly after the Civil War, largely due to the tobacco and textiles industries.

Today, tobacco and textiles have given way to medicine and technology, and the city is nationally known for a growing creative class as much as the Durham Bulls of Hollywood fame. An historic strength of the city is its diversity of cultures and perspectives that together make for an open and welcoming community. Durham was home to “Black Wall Street” in the early 20th century, and a strong African-American business community continues to thrive to this day.

Duke University, which began as Trinity College in 1892, is now known as one of the world’s finest universities. Its business, medical and law schools consistently rank among the nation’s best, and its storied NCAA men’s basketball team (the Duke Blue Devils) has made 14 NCAA Final Four appearances.

Durham is especially famous for its downtown areas, and the community hosts several nationally recognized arts events. Downtown’s historic Carolina Theatre is the host of the North Carolina Gay & Lesbian Film Festival and the Full Frame Documentary Film Festival. The American Dance Festival, a six-week series of dance performances by nationally renowned artists, is held on the Duke campus every summer, and there are numerous jazz and blues festivals and concerts throughout the year. Specialty shops and galleries sit along Ninth Street and the redeveloped West End, centers of Durham’s thriving creative population.

Home to most of the Research Triangle Park and the Raleigh-Durham International Airport, Durham County also boasts the North Carolina Museum of Life and Science and Eno River State Park.

Wake County
Wake County is the second most populous county in North Carolina. Formed in 1771, it was named for Margaret Wake, wife of Gov. William Tryon, one of the first provincial governors of North Carolina.

Cary, the second-largest town in Wake County and the fifth-largest center in North Carolina, has sought to carefully manage its growth and development over the past decade. It even chose to keep the “town” designation in spite of its population of around 100,000. Offering a range of living options, Cary is especially popular with people who work in the Research Triangle Park.

The county is also home to smaller communities such as Apex, Wake Forest, Morrisville, Zebulon, Holly Springs and Fuquay-Varina and other towns offering a mix of the rural, suburban and urban. Among the largest counties in the state, Wake County is a place where high-tech and homegrown sit side by side.

Orange County
The county seat of Orange County is Hillsborough, a town rich in history — it was once the capital of North Carolina and featured one of the first NASCAR tracks of the inaugural 1949 season.

Its most famous municipality, though, is Chapel Hill, home to the oldest state university, the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. With a population of slightly more than 50,000, the town of Chapel Hill offers refined living with a college-town feel. It boasts a vibrant music scene, a number of nationally recognized eateries, and a host of coffee shops, bars and specialty shops in its downtown area. Franklin Street, the town’s main boulevard, hosts numerous street fairs and public activities as well as the Morehead Planetarium, the Ackland Art Museum and plenty of unique retail opportunities. The UNC Tar Heels, a perennial top-20 NCAA basketball team, play in the Dean E. Smith Center, popularly known as the Dean Dome.

Carrboro, located immediately west of Chapel Hill and known for its Carrboro Music Festival, and Mebane are also found in Orange County.