Knightdale, North Carolina

== History == === Early history === In 1700, the Lords Proprietor of the Carolina Colony hired John Lawson to explore the area.

He began his 1,000-mile (1,600 km) trek near present-day Charleston, South Carolina, and according to his diary, passed through the area sometime in February 1701.

In 1730, John Hinton settled in what would one day be called Knightdale in an area near the Neuse River, not far from where Hodge Road and Old Faison Road now intersect.

Eventually, Johnston County was carved out of Craven County in the 1750s and Wake County carved out of Johnston County in 1771.

Although Knight did not live to see the railroad arrive in Knightdale, not long after his death in 1904, the railroad finally came to the community that would bear his name.

Named for Henry Haywood Knight, a local Wake County landowner who donated land to found a railroad depot, the town was incorporated in 1927.

On February 7, 1940, a fire broke out in the center of town.

In 1952 a municipal water system was installed.

Since 1990, the community has experienced a significant population boom, getting its own high school in 2004, and a new freeway bypass in 2006.

=== 21st century === In 2002, Knightdale's first female mayor, Jeanne Milliken Bonds, was elected.

For the period 2007-2011, about 5.9% of the population lived below the poverty line; by comparison, 16.1% of North Carolina residents lived below the poverty line.

Knightdale's population grew 10.4% from 2010 to 2013, making it the second fastest-growing community in the Research Triangle region for that time period.

Median income for a household was $75,285 in 2011; by comparison, Median income in North Carolina for the same time period was $46,291.

A large destination park, Knightdale Station Park, opened in 2013 just to the east of the old downtown area as part of a revitalization effort, the park was expanded in 2018 to ...

=== Mingo Creek Greenway === The Mingo Creek Greenway was completed in July 2014.

== Demographics == === 2020 census === As of the 2020 United States census, there were 19,435 people, 6,110 households, and 4,114 families residing in the town.