| Official Name: | Bear Poplar, North Carolina |
| Settlement Type: | Populated place |
| Subdivision Type: | Country |
| Subdivision Name: | United States |
| Subdivision Type1: | State |
| Subdivision Name1: | North Carolina |
| Subdivision Type2: | County |
| Subdivision Name2: | Rowan |
| Unit Pref: | Imperial |
| Population As Of: | 2000 |
| Timezone: | Eastern (EST) |
| Utc Offset: | -5 |
| Timezone Dst: | EDT |
| Utc Offset Dst: | -4 |
| Coordinates: | 35.6761°N -80.6933°W |
| Postal Code Type: | ZIP code |
| Area Code: | 704 |
| Blank Name: | FIPS code |
| Blank1 Name: | GNIS feature ID |
| Blank1 Info: | 1019855 |
Bear Poplar is an unincorporated community mostly within Steele Township in Rowan County, North Carolina, United States. Some of the western part extends into neighboring Mount Ulla Township.
There are two stories of the name origin. The community was first known as Forty-Four because it was located 44 miles from Charlotte and Winston-Salem.[1] The community got its name Bear Poplar around 1775 when Thomas Cowan was walking with his wife and child about a mile away from his farm when they noticed a bear crossing the road which then ran up a big poplar tree.[2] According to another source, the community was first known as Rocky Mount, the name of a plantation owned by Henry Kesler. It was renamed to Bear Poplar in 1878 when the first post office was established.[3]
Although a road bears the name of the community, the center of Bear Poplar isn't at Bear Poplar Road. It is located about a mile away at the intersection of NC 801 Hwy, Hall, & Graham roads. The community extends about a mile in each direction from this intersection; the eastern border is located right before Bear Poplar Road.
At some point Bear Poplar had four stores, two cotton gins, a foundry, a garage, a blue granite quarry, a school, a blacksmith shop, and a post office. The first Post Mistress, Lucy J. Kistler, was appointed in 1878. Bear Poplar Post Office ceased operation in 1966. The community is now served by Mount Ulla Post Office.
An ancestral seat of Cowan and Krider families, Wood Grove, is located just outside Bear Poplar. Mount Ulla Barn Quilt, the largest community barn quilt in the United States from 2019 to 2021, is on the wall of a local Bear Poplar store, Elsie's (formerly West Rowan Farm, Home & Garden). The Mount Ulla Community Barn Quilt is 500 square feet, twenty square feet larger than the previous title holder—a community barn quilt in Ashland, Kansas.[4] The Mount Ulla Barn Quilt held this title from 8 July 2019 until it was surpassed on 23 October 2021 by the "Always Original Barn Quilt Mural" in the nearby town of Cleveland, North Carolina.
The Bear Poplar Post office first opened on 12 Sep 1878 with Lucy J. Kistler postmistress. There would be 9 more postmasters until it ceased operations in 1966:
On 11 February 1966, the Bear Poplar post office was changed to a rural branch of the Salisbury Post Office. The post office in Bear Poplar was completely closed 7 years later on 23 June 1973.