Manteo embraces the northern part of Roanoke Island, the historic island inset from North Carolina's Outer Banks. It is best known as the site of Sir Walter Raleigh's first settlement in the New World. In the early 1800s, the town was a small, unnamed fishing village on Shallowbag Bay. Roughly 300 years after the colonists mysteriously disappeared, the town was named Manteo after the Native American who befriended the settlers and was baptized by them. The peaceful life enjoyed by islanders radically changed when they were overwhelmed by Union army troops, Confederate prisoners, and 3,000 former slaves who made up the Freedmen's Colony during the Civil War. In 1899, Manteo incorporated and became the commercial and governmental center of Dare County. National recognition came several decades later in 1937 with the production of Paul Green's outdoor drama The Lost Colony. Manteo has undergone many timely and creative renovations, including an ambitious project that culminated in 1984 with the celebration of our nation's 400th anniversary on the island where America first began.
