Comments on: The Big Desert http://www.lib.unc.edu/blogs/ncm/index.php/2008/05/15/the-big-desert/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=the-big-desert Exploring the History, Literature, and Culture of the Tar Heel State Sat, 18 May 2013 12:37:45 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.5.1 By: Mike Childs http://www.lib.unc.edu/blogs/ncm/index.php/2008/05/15/the-big-desert/comment-page-1/#comment-999167 Mike Childs Thu, 21 Mar 2013 14:43:47 +0000 http://www.lib.unc.edu/blogs/ncm/index.php/2008/05/15/the-big-desert/#comment-999167 It wouldn’t be related to the nonexistent Arenosa Desert, put on N.C. maps starting in the 1670s, would it?

http://dc.lib.unc.edu/cdm/singleitem/collection/ncmaps/id/114/rec/13

]]> By: Ernie McClellan http://www.lib.unc.edu/blogs/ncm/index.php/2008/05/15/the-big-desert/comment-page-1/#comment-24390 Ernie McClellan Sun, 11 Apr 2010 02:30:48 +0000 http://www.lib.unc.edu/blogs/ncm/index.php/2008/05/15/the-big-desert/#comment-24390 Linda McRae, Town Clerk of Rennert, got the following explanation:

It’s located off Rennert Road near Mary C Road. Mr. Emmett McRae the former Mayor of Rennert said it was a wood dessert not sand and now the trees has been cleared and it is mostly farm land.

The town of Rennert has a facebook page now. It can be found at:

]]> By: Elizabeth Hull http://www.lib.unc.edu/blogs/ncm/index.php/2008/05/15/the-big-desert/comment-page-1/#comment-8631 Elizabeth Hull Fri, 16 May 2008 16:21:27 +0000 http://www.lib.unc.edu/blogs/ncm/index.php/2008/05/15/the-big-desert/#comment-8631 A comment in honor of Endangered Species Day: I’d be willing to bet that this “desert” was (or still is?) a home for the Venus flytrap, as I wrote about recently on the Hugh Morton blog. This is the area where Josephine Humphrey’s book “Nowhere Else on Earth” is set.

]]> By: Charles Blackburn, Jr. http://www.lib.unc.edu/blogs/ncm/index.php/2008/05/15/the-big-desert/comment-page-1/#comment-8624 Charles Blackburn, Jr. Thu, 15 May 2008 16:09:58 +0000 http://www.lib.unc.edu/blogs/ncm/index.php/2008/05/15/the-big-desert/#comment-8624 Here’s what William S. Powell says in the N.C. Gazetteer (p. 141):

The Desert, a pocosin in n Robeson County between Big Raft Swamp and Big Marsh Swamp. Oval shaped and presumed to be one of the Carolina Bays, which see. Covers 1,200 acres; water depth varies from 6 inches to 4 feet, but one spot is said to be bottomless. Game abounds here, especially deer.

And (p. 89):

Carolina Bays, oval-shaped lakes, swamps, pocosins, savannahs, and peat beds in se North Carolina, e South Carolina and ne Georgia. Several explanations have been advanced as to the origin of the Carolina Bays, but the most generally accepted one is that they were formed thousands of years ago by a shower of meteorites. White Lake, Jones Lake, Singletary Lake, and Lake Waccamaw are Carolina Bays. There also are numerous others, many of which no longer contain water.

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