![The cover of the Lake Mattamuskeet, Hyde Mainland [1965-1966] guide book. The cover features a picture of a white lighthouse, framed by a tree branch. Additionally, the cover features light yellow text that reads "Lake Mattamuskeet, Hyde Mainland 1965-66. Ocracoke, Hyde Coast"](https://www.digitalnc.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/03/LakeMattamuskeet_1965-1966_0001-756x1024.jpg)
With help from our partners at Friends of Hyde Countys Historic 1854 Courthouse, we are excited to announce dozens of brochures, maps, and other materials related to local Hyde County history, events and sites are now available on DigitalNC!
When planning your next visit to the coast, look no further than the information-packed brochures and maps that represent a long history of tourism in Hyde County. In addition to these materials, four binders document the history of Mattamuskeet Lodge from 1990-2000 to 2001-2017, publications featuring the lodge, and the history of the lodge’s annual event, Swan Days. Also in this batch is a 1960s guidebook that features information about activities such as bird watching, hunting, and fishing around Lake Mattamuskeet, Ocracoke Island, and Hyde County.
The final gem in this newest batch of materials from the Friends of Hyde Countys Historic 1854 Courthouse is a chattel mortgage book from the end of the 19th-century. This ledger book, used from 1877 to 1899, records the mortgage contracts and agreements brought before judges and officials across Hyde County. The more than two decade span of entries in this book makes its an incredibly rich source of information about Hyde County in the late 19th-century. It includes mortgage agreements documented by many individual officials who held different posts. Importantly, this can tell us not only the names of officials in Hyde County, but also the structure of the local government during this time. In addition, the agreements recorded in the chattel mortgage book provides a glimpse at the relationships that existed between the residents of Hyde County and offers potential insight into the economic and material realities of the time.
More information about our partner, Friends of Hyde Countys Historic 1854 Courthouse, can be found on their Facebook page here.
More materials, including an report on the historic Hyde County 1854 Courthouse, can be found on the Friends of Hyde Countys Historic 1854 Courthouse’s contributor page, which is linked here.
