High Point

High Point earned its name by simple geography: it was the highest point on the railroad line between Goldsboro and Charlotte. Nowadays the city's biannual high point is hosting the International Home Furnishings Market, the largest wholesale furniture trade show in the world. Each spring and fall for a week or more, so many people flood the town that its population of 93,000 nearly doubles. The city is also the home of the North Carolina Shakespeare Festival.