The fictional town, Twin Peaks, first welcomed FBI Agent Dale Cooper on the show’s (of the same name) pilot episode that aired on April 8, 1990. The bureau sent Cooper there to help in the murder investigation of Laura Palmer.
This episode’s description on IMDB describes Twin Peaks as a small northwest town in Washington. The spirit of a small-town setting is indeed represented successfully throughout the show.
When the cast was on The Phil Donahue show, an audience member asked showrunner Mark Frost, what gave you the idea for the show? He said, “We thought we should do a mystery story set in a small town with a lot of mood and atmosphere.”
David Lynch and Mark Frost visually stunned us with their small town where Pete Martel discovered the homecoming queen dead and wrapped in plastic. But what about other characteristics people associate with a small town, like size and population?
Driving into Twin Peaks, Cooper would’ve driven right past the “Welcome to Twin Peaks” sign of two hand-painted identical brown mountain peaks with snow tops and fantastic trees.
We know that the population of Twin Peaks is 51,201 from the welcome sign. I don’t know how Lynch and Frost came up with this number, but it seems to be their population threshold of a small town.
North Carolina has 552 municipalities in its 100 counties. Many cities, towns, villages, and hamlets are within the Tar Heel State’s boundaries. So if Twin Peaks was a real place in North Carolina, how would it rank among these places in terms of population? How many small towns does NC have according to the Lynch and Frost threshold?
| Ranking | Municipality | Total Population |
| 1 | Charlotte | 864,871 |
| 2 | Raleigh | 462,219 |
| 3 | Greensboro | 295,483 |
| 4 | Durham | 279,106 |
| 5 | Winston-Salem | 247,917 |
| 6 | Fayetteville | 208,497 |
| 7 | Cary | 171,603 |
| 8 | Wilmington | 115,976 |
| 9 | High Point | 113,148 |
| 10 | Concord | 102,566 |
| 11 | Asheville | 93,272 |
| 12 | Greenville | 87,815 |
| 13 | Gastonia | 79,483 |
| 14 | Jacksonville | 73,224 |
| 15 | Chapel Hill | 60,920 |
| 16 | Huntersville | 60,166 |
| 17 | Apex | 58,066 |
| 18 | Burlington | 56,563 |
| 19 | Rocky Mount | 54,375 |
| 20 | Kannapolis | 52,173 |
| 21 | Twin Peaks | 51,201 |
| 22 | Mooresville | 48,431 |
| 23 | Wilson | 47,914 |
| 24 | Wake Forest | 46,387 |
| 25 | Hickory | 42,831 |
North Carolina is bursting out of stitches with small towns which fall under the Lynch Frost small-town threshold. If real, Twin Peaks would rank among the top 25 largest populated municipalities at 21st place shown in the above table. Twin Peaks’ population of 51,201 would create a wedge between Kannapolis (52,173) and Mooresville (48,431). It’s crazy to think that Twin Peaks would have a larger population than the remaining 531 NC municipalities.
Remove Twin Peaks from this list, and I’ve lived in four of these places and have visited most of them. Of course, Charlotte and Raleigh are large cities from living there. Any cities above and around 100,000 should be considered larger cities for North Carolina.
Several of these lower-ranking cities and towns closer to Twin Peaks’ population didn’t feel that small to me. Maybe that’s because they’re suburbs of the larger cities, or it’s because I only lived in NC, and that’s my threshold. Kannapolis and Mooresville have major shopping centers connected by interstates and have bunches to do. Maybe both their daytime population make both seem more significant. The commuters drive in for work and leave when work is over.
So what makes Twin Peaks feel like “a town where a yellow like still means slow down, not go faster?” I believe several things.
The exterior shots of mountains, forests, and rivers isolate Twin Peaks.
Everyone knows everyone and is connected by each other’s secrets, families, and tragedies.
And the town has no big box stores, supercenters, or franchises. I love this about the show. Everyone shops at the Horne’s Department store, eats at the Double R Diner, and stays at the Great Northern. It could be the early 1990s, and the Horne Brothers needed more development time.
Twin Peaks is an incredible show that ran for two seasons of 30 episodes. The creators undeniably nailed the small-town vibe, even if some of the North Carolina places with similar populations feel the opposite to me. Who knows, maybe the next great murder mystery will be set in Kannapolis or Mooresville.
The original Twin Peaks is currently streaming on Paramount Plus.
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