North Carolina, USA
The Tar Heel State (12)
Capitol: Raleigh
Admitted into Union: November 21, 1789
State Flower: Dogwood
State Tree: Pine
State Bird: Cardinal
Population: 8.5 million

The Great Take-Off! In 1903, the Wright Brothers made the first successful powered flight of a heavier-than-air machine at Kill Devil Hill near Kitty Hawk. The Wright Memorial at Kitty Hawk commemorates their achievement with a granite pillar that soars into the wild blue yonder. When you have places to go, the North Carolina Kitty Tote will never let you down.

Unsolved mystery: The first English colony in America was established on Roanoke Island in 1585. The first English child born in America, Virginia Dare, was born in Roanoke in 1587. Shortly thereafter, the colony vanished without a trace, except for the word "Croatoan" scrawled on a nearby tree.

Keep it clean…and finely tuned. In North Carolina, couples sharing a hotel room must stay in separate beds at least two feet apart. Any monkey business in the space between can get you busted. It’s also illegal to sing off key.

”Don’t forget to call!” In Forest City, you’re still required to call City Hall before driving into town, so folks have time to literally “hold their horses” while you speed past in your car.

”Look, Ma, I’m under arrest!” In the town of Kill Devil Hills, you may not ride a bicycle without both hands gripping the handle bars.

Tops: North Carolina is the Union’s top producer of furniture, tobacco, bricks, textiles, and sweet potatoes. The latter is the state vegetable, thanks to the lobbying efforts of schoolchildren.

Sticky nickname: The mascot of the University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill (the Union’s oldest state university) is the Tarheels. This nickname for North Carolinians harkens back to when the state produced a lot of tar. The story goes that someone saw footprints made by someone who had stepped in tar, and the name stuck.

Coffee with that? Krispy Kreme Doughnuts was founded in Winston-Salem in 1937 by Vernon Rudolph, who bought a secret recipe from a French chef in New Orleans.

Firstville: Fayetteville was the birthplace of the Union’s first African-American member of Congress (Hiram Rhoades Revels), the first miniature golf course, and Babe Ruth’s first professional home run (1914).

Home Sweet Mansion: Ashville’s Biltmore Estate is America's largest private home, with 255 rooms, an award-winning winery, and extensive gardens.

A new kind of bubbly! Pepsi was invented in New Bern in 1898.

Cover your mouth! Between 1492 and 1692, European settlers carried diseases to the New World that ultimately killed off roughly 95% of the Cherokee Nation.

Pancakes, anyone? Duplin County is home to the world's largest frying pan.

Famous North Carolinians: David Brinkley, Howard Cosell, Virginia Dare, Elizabeth Dole, James B. Duke, Donna Fargo, Roberta Flack, Ava Gardner, Andy Griffith, O. Henry, Andrew Johnson, Charles Kuralt, Sugar Ray Leonard, Dolley Madison, Ronnie Milsap, Thelonious Monk, Edward R. Murrow, Walter Hines Page, Floyd Patterson, James K. Polk, Soupy Sales, Earl Scruggs, Randy Travis, Thomas Wolfe