Vance County, North Carolina
| Vance County, North Carolina | ||
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 Location in the U.S. state of North Carolina |
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 North Carolina's location in the U.S. |
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| Founded | 1881 | |
| Named for | Zebulon Baird Vance | |
| Seat | Henderson | |
| Largest city | Henderson | |
| Area | ||
| • Total | 270 sq mi (699 km2) | |
| • Land | 254 sq mi (658 km2) | |
| • Water | 16 sq mi (41 km2), 6.0% | |
| Population | ||
| • (2010) | 45,422 | |
| • Density | 179/sq mi (69/km²) | |
| Congressional districts | 1st, 13th | |
| Time zone | Eastern: UTC-5/-4 | |
| Website | www |
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Vance County is a county located in the U.S. state of North Carolina. As of the 2010 census, the population was 45,422. Its county seat is Henderson.
Vance County comprises the Henderson, NC Micropolitan Statistical Area, which is also included in the Raleigh-Durham-Chapel Hill, NC Combined Statistical Area, which had a 2012 estimated population of 1,998,808.
The county was formed by the white Democratic-dominated legislature in 1881 following the Reconstruction Era from parts of Franklin, Granville, and Warren counties. The county is named after Zebulon Baird Vance, a Governor of North Carolina (1862–65 & 1877–79) and United States Senator (1879–94).
According to the 1955 book, Zeb's Black Baby, by Samuel Thomas Peace, Sr., this was a political decision to concentrate blacks and Republicans in one county and keep Democratic majorities in the other counties, an example of gerrymandering:
The formation of Vance County was accomplished largely as a political expediency. It was in 1881 when Blacks in large numbers were voting solidly Republican. Granville and Franklin Counties were nip and tuck, Democratic or Republican. From the Democratic standpoint, Warren County was hopelessly Republican. But by taking from Granville, Franklin and Warren, those sections that were heavily Republican and out of these sections forming the new county of Vance, the Democratic party could lose Vance to the Republicans and save Granville and Franklin for the Democrats. [U.S.] Senator Vance was a Democrat. He took kindly to this move and thanked the [North Carolina] Legislature for honoring him with naming the new county after him. At the same time...Vance showed his humor by always referring to Vance County as 'Zeb's Black Baby.'
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Wikipedia