History of Western North Carolina - Chapters 16-18



CHAPTER XVI.
NOTABLE CASES AND DECISIONS

NOT ESPECIALLY CONTENTIOUS. Considering our ancestry and former isolation,
we are not more contentious or litigious than others of our kind; but it
must be admitted that we sometimes indulge in a lot of unnecessary
litigation. Some of us are accused even of taking delight therein. Mr. J.
H. Martin tells of an old Covenanter who announced with glee that all his
children were married off, all his own debts paid, and that he had nothing
else to do now but "to spend the balance of his life a-lawin'." Owing to
the legislation regarding land grants and the registration of deeds, etc.,
much litigation has arisen, notably the large case of Gilbert V. Hopkins,
involving many thousands of acres of land in Graham and Cherokee counties.
That case was tried before Judge Connor in the U. S. Court at Asheville in
1910, but the jury disagreed. It was tried again before Judge Boyd at the
same place, and he decided it in favor of defendants, plaintiffs
appealing. A new trial was granted. But as no final decision has been
reached in it, no results can be stated here. In it are involved almost
every point of real estate law possible to arise. Pains haye been taken to
refer in this work only to the most notable cases that have been heard and
decided. Each was of interest at the time it was tried.

LITIGATION AND LEGISLATION. James McConnell Smith was the first white
child born west of the Blue Ridge, in Buncombe county, but he will be
remembered longer than many because of his will. He died December 11,
1853, leaving a will by devised to his daughter, Elizabeth A., wife of J.
H. Gudger certain real estate in Asheville, "to her sole and separate use
and benefit for and during her natural life, with remainder to such
children as she may leave surviving her, and those representing the
interest of any that may die leaving children."(1) A petition was filed in
the Superior court asking for an order to sell this property, and such an
order was made and several lots were sold with partial payments made of
the purchase money, when a question was raised as to the power of the
court to order the sale of the property so devised. In Miller, ex parte
(90 N. C. Reports, p.625), the Supreme court held that land so devised
could "not be sold for partition during the continuance of the estate of
the life tenant; for, until the death of the life tenant, those in
remainder cannot be ascertained." The sales so made, were, therefore, void.

But years passed and some of the property became quite valuable, while
another part of it, being unimproved, was nonproductive, and a charge upon
the productive portion. But there seemed to be no remedy till the city of
Asheville condemned a portion of the productive part for the widening of
College Street. The question then arose as to how the money paid by the
city for the land so appropriated to public use should be applied. On this
question the Supreme court decided in Miller V. Asheville (112 N. C.
Reports, 759), that the money so paid by way of damages should be
substituted for the realty, and upon the happening of the contingency-the
because death of the life tenant-be divided among the parties entitled in
the same manner as the realty would have been if left intact.

Upon this hint, on the petition of the life tenant and the remaindermen, a
special act was passed by the legislature (Private Laws of N. C., 1897,
Ch. 152, p.286) appointing C. H. Miller a commissioner of the General
Assembly to sell the land, the proceeds to become a trust fund to be
applied as the will directs.

This was done; but the Supreme court (Miller V. Alexander, 122 N. C., 718)
held this was in effect an attempted judicial act and therefore
unconstitutional. The legislature afterwards passed a general act, which
is embodied in section 1590 of the Revisal, for the sale of estates
similarly situated, and under this authority some of the land was sold and
the proceeds were applied to the construction of a hotel on another part.
The proceeds, however, proved insufficient to complete the hotel, and in
an action brought to sell still more of this land for the purpose of
completing the hotel, the Supreme court held in Smith V. Miller (151 N.
C., p.620), that, while the purchasers of the land already sold had
received valid title to the same, still as the hotel, when completed,
would not be a desirable investment, the decree for the sale of the other
land, in order to provide funds for its completion, was void because it
did not meet the statutory requirements that the interests involved be
properly safeguarded.

A LONG LEGAL BATTLE. In July, 1897, the First National Bank of Asheville
failed, and indictments were found in in Greensboro against W. E. Breese,
president, W. H. Penland, cashier, and J. E. Dickerson, a director, for
violating the United States banking laws.(2) In 1909 Breese and Dickerson
were tried on a new indictment at Asheville before Judge Purnell, Judge of
the United States District court of the Eastern District of North
Carolina, assigned to hold the court for this trial. The defendants were
convicted, but took an appeal and a new trial was granted. In 1902 Breese
alone was tried at Asheville before Judge Jackson of Virginia, and there
was a mistrial. In the same year the case was sent to Charlotte and there
was another mistrial. He was tried there again and convicted, and
sentenced to seven years in the penitentiary; but the court of appeals
quashed the indictment because two members of the grand jury who fonnd the
true bill had not paid their poll taxes. This apparently ended these
cases, as the offences by this time had been barred by the statute of
limitations. But District Attorney Holton resurrected the indictment fonnd
first at Greensboro in 1907, and Breese and Dickerson were tried at
Asheville upon that before Judge Newman of Atlanta, in the summer of 1909,
and convicted. They were sentenced to two years and to a fine of $2,500
each, but appealed. The court of appeals were unable to agree and, in
November, 1911, certified the case to the Supreme court of the United
States. In the spring of 1912 a motion was made before that court to
advance the case upon the docket. It was granted and the appeal decided
adversely to the defendants in October, 1912.

THE SOLICITORSHIP. In the controversies over the Solicitorship in this
section, between Ewart and Jones,(3) McCall and Webb,(4) McCall and
Zachery,(5) and McCall and Gardner, the impression has gone out that, in
one or the other of these cases, the Supreme court reversed its holding in
Hole v. Henderson(6) to the effect that an office to which a salary was
attached was property, and that the legislature could not deprive one
elected to such an office of his rights by abolishing the position. This,
however, is wrong, as that ease was not overruled nntil August, 1903, in
Mile v. Ellington (134 N. C. Reports, 131).

MANY LEGAL POINTS SETTLED. The Western Carolina Bank was chartered in 1887
(Ch. 48) and began business in January, 1889. It failed, however, October
12, 1897, and its officers executed a deed of assignment to Lewis Maddux,
its president, and L. P. McCloud, its cashier; but the Battery Park Bank
and other creditors commenced an action against the bank for the purpose
of setting this deed of assignment aside; in consequence of which Judge H.
G. Ewart, judge of the Circuit Criminal court, undertook to appoint
receivers of the property. A few days later Judge W. L. Norwood, holding
Superior court in Clay county, appointed the same parties receivers, there
being doubt as to Judge Ewart's jurisdiction.(7) George H. Smathers alone,
however, acted as receiver, the others having declined or resigned. There
was a class of creditors which filed a general creditors' bill between the
date of the appointment of receivers by Judge Ewart and the date of the
appointment by Judge Norwood, who thus sought to secure priority over the
assets not affected by the lien of creditors who had obtained judgments
before justices of the peace, as many had done; but the Supreme court
refused priority to those thus seeking to secure it.(8)

There were many other questions settled in the ensuing litigation, for
Receiver Smathers was removed and W. W. Jones, Esq., appointed in his
place in May, 1902; and he immediately began to collect the assets of the
bank, and to compel Madison county to pay certain of its bonds which he
held among the assets of the defunct bank. The Supreme court decided that
each stockholder was liable to the extent of double the amount of his
stock.(9) It at first denied the mandamus asked for to compel the
commissioners of Madison county to levy a tax to pay its bonds(10) but on
a rehearing granted the mandamus. (137 N. C., 579)

The question as to whether a married woman could escape her liability as a
stockholder was also settled adversely to such claim.(11) In pursuit of
the stockholders it became necessary for the receiver to get the
legislature to pass an act authorizing him to sue outside the State.(12)

LINVILLE LITIGATION. S. T. Kelsey and C. C. Hutchinson had started
Highlands; but Mr. Hutchinson, who was to have provided the money, found
himself unable to do so, and Mr. Henry Stewart, editor of the agricultural
department of a New York newspaper, bought, through Kelsey, all the land
Hutchinson was to have paid for. Then Stewart broke with Kelsey and the
latter turned his attention to the development of the Linville country.
Mr. S. P. Ravenal, Sr., advanced $500 for preliminary investigations,
which resulted in the formation, about 1890, of the Linville Improvement
Company with Messrs. Ravenal and Kelsey and the late Mr. Donald MacRae of
Wilmington, N. C., as the principal stockholders. Neither Ravenal nor
MacRae held a majority of the stock, thus giving Kelsey the balance of
power.

There were three distinct lines of policy advocated by each of these
gentlemen. Mr. MacRae wanted to bond the property for the construction of
a railroad from Cranberry; Mr. Kelsey wished to establish an industrial
center at Linville City; and Mr. Ravenal opposed both, but wanted to
establish a health and pleasure resort at Linville City, sell lots hold
the 15,000 acres of timber land the company had acquired for future
development. Mter a while Mr. Thomas F. Parker succeeded Mr. Ravenal and
Mr. Hugh MacRae succeeded his father, Mr. Donald MacRae. These two could
not agree and Mr. Kelsey, siding with the MeRaes, a receiver was applied
for and appointed between September 1, 1893, and September 1, 1894.

These disagreements among the stockholders of the Linville Improvement
Company in relation to the general policy to be pursued by the officers in
control, and especially in respect to the method of liquidating the
outstanding indebtedness and encumbering the property of the company, were
involved in an action brought against that company by T. B. Lenoir,
executor of W. W. Lenoir, and decided by the Supreme court. (See 117 N. C.
Reports, p.471) Thomas F. Parker had been president from September 1,
1893, to September 1, 1894, and Harlan P. Kelsey secretary for the same
time. A special master had rejected the claims of these two officers for
pay for services during this time, and the court held that they should
have been a1lowed to prove that they had a contract for employment with
the company for the entire year and not only up to the time of the
appointment of a receiver.

After a while Mr. MacRae offered to sell his interest or buy that of Mr.
Ravenal at a certain price. Mr. Ravenal sold.

A railroad was finally built to Pinola and Montezuma, two miles from
Linville City. But the golden opportunity had passed. For, while the
company was constructing the Yonahlossie turnpike from Linville City
around the base of the Grandfather mountain to Blowing Rock, erecting a
fine hotel and constructing a large dam for a lake at Linville City, the
press was ringing with praises of the beauty of the scenery, the
healthfulness of the surroundings and the general attractiveness of the
place. Visitors came in numbers from various parts of the country and
wished to invest in lots and build cottages. But, as the property was in
litigation, titles could not be made to the lots, and the boom subsided.
Blowing Rock, however, which before had been a mere hamlet, suddenly
developed rapidly and substantially, and is today one of the finest and
most attractive health and pleasure resorts in the mountains.

COLOR OF TITLE. In all countries one who enters upon land and holds
possession under any paper writing of record that proclaims to the world
that he is there by some real or pretended authority will secure title by
adverse occupancy than will he who "squats" upon land without any pretence
that he has any right to be there other than his bare possession. In the
early days of North Carolina the State granted large tracts of land to
William Cochran and William Tate in July, 1795; and in July, 1796, just
one year later, William Cathcart secured grants which were found to lap on
those lands already granted to Tate and Cochran. It was impossible for
Tate and Cochran to put settlers on their lands at that time, and having
the senior grant they rested on their rights. But Catheart was unwilling
to lose any portion of the land he had paid the State ten cents an acre
for, even though part of it was already the property of Tate and Cochran.
So, in September, 1838, he leased all this disputed land to Abram Johnson,
put him in possession of a part of it, and told him to exercise rights of
ownership over as much as he did not actually occupy as he could. In order
to do this Johnson built a forge near the Old Fields of Toe, and cut
timber and burnt charcoal at many other places on the land. More than one
hundred years after all these grants had been taken out the Supreme court
decided that Catheart's lease to Johnson was color of title to the lands
described therein, and that his title had ripened in seven years after the
date of the lease and Johnson's entry and Occupancy, the lease having been
duly recorded in Morganton. Thus a junior grant had held over its senior,
because of this color of title. (Cochran V. Improvement Co., 127 N. C.,
387)

ADAMS v. WESTFELDT. As early as 1850 or 1851, the late Stephen Munday
entered land on Little Fork ridge, the Foster ridge, south and southeast
of Haw Gap, and south of Thunderhead mountain, because he believed that
copper was in the land; but positive indications of its existence were not
found until about 1858. The war coming on and interest dying out, nothing
further was done about investigating the indications until about 1899.

In 1869 George Westfeldt of New Orleans bought, at the bankrupt sale of E.
H. Cunningham, four tracts of land on the waters of Hazel creek which had
been granted to the latter. In 1877 Westfeldt, through his agent, Tennent,
tried to locate these tracts, but had to call in Wm. R. McDowell, who
lived near Franklin, to assist. He located them several miles from where
Tennent thought they lay. About 1888 copper was discovered on one of these
tracts and men named Cook, Hall, Mark Bryson and others attempted to find
what grant covered the copper deposit. They discovered that Epp. Everett
of Bryson City had several grants which he had not succeeded in locating
satisfactorily, but which he appeared to think were several miles from the
Westfeldt lands. It was charged that, in attempting to locate one of these
grants on the copper vein, Adam Wilson had hacked a tree and then smoked
the hacks with pine splinters in order to give the marks the appearance of
age. On the other hand, Adams' side claimed that persons in the interest
of Westfeldt had chopped the marks entirely out of a corner tree and had
carried the marks off in the block of wood which had been removed. From
this smoked tree it was claimed the he been run in 1890; but it was not
satisfactory, and was abandoned, until in 1899, when W. S. Adams, of
Masuachusetts, bought up the Everett grants and took possession of the
copper lands. An old man living in Tennessee by the name of Proctor, who
had carried the chain when the Everett grants were originally located, was
brought to the land to help establish Adams' contention as to the
location. Westfeldt had warned Adams not to trespass on this land and, in
1901, he sued Adams in Swain county and won the suit. But a new trial was
granted by the Supreme court on the ground of the admission of incompetent
evidence. The case was, by consent, removed to Haywood county, where the
North Carolina Mining Company was made an additional defendant, and it set
up a claim to the land in dispute, under the act of 1893, for determining
adverse claims to real estate. Westfeldt won again, but the Supreme court
granted still another new trial, because thp trial judge had failed to
call proper attention to the difference between substantive evidence and
evidence that went merely to the credibility of a witness. Then the North
Carolina Mining Company brought its bill in equity in the United States
court for the Western District of North Carolina, to clear the title of
the cloud placed upon it by Westfeldt's claim to the land. Judge Pritchard
decided that he had jurisdiction, notwithstanding the pendency of the
action between substantially the same parties in the State court. He heard
the testimony, sitting as a chancellor, and without a jury to enlighten
the court upon the disputed facts; and a short time before the case was to
have been tried in Haywood, he filed his decree holding against Westfeldt.

After several years of effort the Supreme court of the tnited States
decided that Judge Pritchard had not had jurisdiction when he took the
case from the Superior court of Haywood county, and in 1910 the cause was
tried at Waynesville, the plaintiff winning. The Supreme court of North
Carolina in 1912 set the verdict aside, however, and the case will have to
be tried again.(13) Both Westfeldt and Adams have since died.

AN ERRONEOUS IMPRESSION. It is sometimes said that the Supreme court of
North Carolina has decided that a municipality may legally freeze a
prisoner to death. This is wrong, the decision in Moffit v. Asheville
having held quite to the contrary (103 N. C., p.237). It was decided that
when towns are "exercising the judicial, discretionary or legislative
authority conferred by their directors, or are discharging a duty imposed
solely for the public benefit, they are not liable for the negligence of
their officers, unless some statute subjects them to liability for such
negligence." Consequently, they held that the city was not liable for a
severe old and illness caused to Moffit by confinement, January 5, 1887,
in a cell in a room from which window lights had been broken, the city
having provided fuel and a stove and police officers to keep the room
comfortable.

CRANBERRY MAGNETIC IRON MINES. From Hon. A. C. Avery of Morganton it has
been learned that about 1780 Reuben White took out a grant for the 100
acres supposed to cover the iron deposit at these mines, and that Hon.
Waightstill Avery took out four small grants surrounding the Reuben White
grant.(14) In addition, he took out hundreds of 640-acre grants, covering
almost all of the North Toe valley from its source to Toecane, except that
here and there along the valley some older grants intervened. He also took
grants to lands along Squirrel, Roaring, Henson and Three - Mile creeks,
and the lower valley of South Toe and Linville rivers. In 1795 William
Cathcart took out two large grants, one known as the "99,000-Acre Tract"
and the other as the "59,000-Acre Tract," which two grants covered
practically all of what is now Mitchell and Avery counties, except some
tracts along the Blue Ridge, and embrace all the tracts along the streams
theretofore granted to Waightstill Avery. He devised all these lands to
his son, Isaac T. Avery. A controversy arose between the father of John
Evans Brown, agent for the claimants under the Cathcart grants, which
resulted in the execution of compromise deeds in 1852, by which I. T.
Avery got a quit claim to about 50,000 acres of land, so as to include
most of the land described, including the Cranberry Mines. The Reuben
White tract had in the meantime passed by a succession of conveyances to
William Dugger, who sold his interest to Hoke, Hutchinson and Sumner;
Dugger, Avery and Brown having entered into a written agreement under
which Avery and Brown were to hold one-half of one-fourth each of the
several interest in all the Dugger land outside of the Reuben White
tract.... But, before Dugger conveyed to Hoke, Hutchinson and Sumner, he
had contracted to sell to John Harding, Miller and another, and had put
Rarding in possession, so that the Hoke purchase was from Harding and
associates, taking the legal title from Dugger. Judge A. C. Avery, as
executor of his father's (I. T. Avery) estate, gave notice to Hoke and
company of the equitable claim of Brown and Avery in three thousand acres,
embracing the Cranberry ore bank, before they bought from Dugger, and in
the ensuing litigation compelled Hoke and Company to pay between fifteen
and twenty thousand dollars for the Brown and Avery interests in the
Cranberry ore bank.

BEFORE THE LITIGATION BEGAN. Exactly when the Cranberry Iron mine was
first operated cannot be determined now. Joshua Perkins and a man named
Asher built what was afterwards known as the Dugger mine, on the right
bank of the Watauga in what is now Johnson county, Tenn., and four miles
above Butler. Remains of the old forge are still visible there, just above
the present iron bridge, the forge itself having been washed away in the
freshet of 1886 or 1887. Tradition says that Perkins and Asher sold this
forge to William, Abe and John Dugger, and then went to Cranberry and
built the forge there. These Dugger brothers were the sons of Julius
Dugger who owned a farm on the right bank of the Watauga, opposite Fish
Springs; and soon took charge of the forge Perkins had built at Cranberry.
But when either forge was built "no man knoweth." Only one fact could be
secured, and that was that in November, 1886, Joshua Perkins bought a bill
of goods at Curtis and Farthing's store at Butler. All agree that he was
then over eighty years of age, and that he died soon afterwards. Assuming,
then, that he was eighty-six years of age in 1886, and that he was at
least twenty-one when he built the Dugger forge four miles above Butler,
the Cranberry forge most probably was built not earlier than 1821 to 1825.
Benjamin Dugger was also concerned in this Cranberry forge, but afterwards
went to Ducktown, Tenn. Upon his death John Hardin went into possession of
the mine, either by his own right or as guardian of Able's heirs. It was
sold by John Hardin or his son Councill Hardin, to Gen. R. F. Hoke for $10,
000 and he sold to the company now owning it. Shep. M. Dugger, in his
"Balsam Groves of the Grandfather Mountain" (p.15), says: "In the year
1850 the now famous Cranberry Iron mines were in their infantile state of
development. The Dugger family had been the first to build forges and
hammer iron in Tennessee, and the writer's grandfather and great uncle had
now crossed the line, and purchased the mines and tilt-hammer forge at
Cranberry."

THE CARTER AND HOKE LITIGATION. Thomas D. Carter had an equitable contract
for the sale of a part of the interest held under bond for title by John
Hardin, Miller and another, and this led to the litigation which
culminated in the case of Thomas D. Carter V. Robert F. Hoke and others
(64 N. C. Rep., p.348). It appears that, in May, 1867, the plaintiff
agreed to convey his interest in the Cranberry Iron mines to Gen. Hoke and
others for $44,000, and when he tendered a deed there-for he was given a
sight draft on a New York bank for the amount of the purchase money, which
draft was protested and never paid; but that the reason it had not been
paid was because it had been well understood by the parties to the
transaction that, although it was a sight draft, the funds to meet it were
to have been provided by the proceeds of a sale of the same property by
Hoke and associates to another purchaser, which contemplated sale Carter
had defeated. Upon this state of facts a receiver was appointed and the
sale of the property was enjoined. At the Spring term, 1869, of the
Superior court of Madison county, Hoke moved to dissolve the injunction
and end the receivership. Upon the hearing of that motion it appeared that
Hoke and associates had effected another sale of the property to the
Russells and associates, for $50,000, and they claimed to have been
innocent purchasers without notice. Judge Henry granted the motion; but on
appeal the Supreme court continued the injunction against a sale of the
property till Carter had been paid and the question as to whether the
Russells were innocent purchasers had been tried. Hoke and company soon
afterwards compromised with Carter and the title to the property was thus
settled so far as Carter was concerned.

A FURTHER STORY OF THE LITIGATION. The interests of the original
purchasers of the White and Avery Ore Bank tracts, as well as the
interests of the claimants of adjacent lands under a forge bounty grant
(junior to the 59,000 acre grant of 1796), were sold for partition under a
decree of the Supreme court at its session at Morganton before the Civil
War, and was bought by William Dugger. He subsequently paid the purchase
money and got a decree that James R. Dodge, clerk of the Supreme court at
Morganton, should make title to him. Before getting his title, however,
but after he had paid the purchase money, William Dugger entered into an
agreement with Isaac T. Avery and J. Evans Brown that the three should
hold an equal one-third interest in all the mineral outside of the
original White Ore-Bank tract. But this agreement seems not to have been
registered; and, the Civil War coming on, the sessions of the Supreme
court at Morganton were abolished. Then Col. Dodge, the clerk, died
without having made title to William Dugger. Meantime, Judge A. C. Avery
secured through Hon. B. F. Moore an ordinance of the Convention of 1866
authorizing Mr. Freeman, who was then clerk of the Supreme court at
Raleigh, to make the title to William Dugger which Col. Dodge should have
made. Clerk Freeman made this title to Dugger, but failed to include in it
any reference to the equitable agreement which had been made between
William Dugger, Isaac T. Avery and J. Evans Brown to the effect that each
should have a one-third interest in the property outside of the original
White Ore Bank tract. William Dugger, too, had sold his interest in the
property without excepting the two-thirds interest equitably owned by
Avery and Brown, and executed a deed therefor. These purchasers were
proposing to sell under their deed from Dugger without notice to Avery and
Brown; whereupon Judge A. C. Avery, as executor of Isaac T. Avery, who had
died, and J. Evans Brown gave notice of their equity to the proposed
purchasers, and thereby compelled the purchasers from Dugger to buy their
interest in the property. This covered all interests in the property.(15)

THE NANTAHALA TALC CASE. About 1895 or 1896 there was considerable
litigation over the rich and valuable talc and marble mine or quarry at
Hewitts in Swain county. Thomas and others had bought from the late
Alexander P. Munday, as executor of the late Nimrod S. Jarrett. The
Nantahala Marble and Talc Company of Atlanta had also bought land
adjoining from the same party. On a question of the location of a boundary
line between these properties the case was tried at Asheville before the
late Judge Paul, United States district judge of Virginia, who had been
transferred to this jurisdiction for the purpose of hearing this case. He
decided it in favor of Thomas and his co-plaintiffs; and it was appealed
to the circuit court of appeals, where in February, 1901, this decision
was sustained. (106 Fed. Rep., p.379, and 76 Fed. Rep., p.59)

(1. Mrs. Elizabeth Smith died in October, 1912)

(2. W. H. Penland, having agreed to furnish valuable information to the
government, was not tried)

(3. 116 N. C., 570)

(4. l26 N. C., 700)

(5. 4 Dev., p.1)

(6. Dev., p.1)

(7. Fisher v. Bank, 112 N. C., 769)

(8. Bank v. Bank, 127 N. C. Rep., 432)

(9. Smathers v. Bank, 135 N. C., 410)

(10. Jones v. Com., 135 N. C. Rep., p. 215)

(11. Bank v. Maddux, 156 N. C.)

(12. Pub. Laws 1903, Ch. 283)

(13. In this decision it was held that lands in the vacant and unsurveyed
class as shown on the maps required to be made by the act of 1836 and
deposited in register of deeds office at Franklin were subject to entry,
Justice Walker discussing the matter fully)

(14. Cochrans v. Improsernent Ce., 127 N. C., 387, and Dugger v. Robbins,
100 N. C., 1)

(15. Letter of Hon. A. C. Avery to J. P. A., February 7, 1913)



CHAPTER XVII.
SCHOOLS AND COLLEGES

A LAGGARD IN EDUCATION. North Carolina has little reason to be proud of
her early history in the cause of education. For years there was greater
illiteracy in this State than in any other, and the improvement of late
years has not been any greater than it should have been. In 1816 the
legislature appointed a committee with Archibald D. Murphey at its head to
suggest a plan for State education. The plan suggested in 1817 provided
for primary schools in each county and for ten academies in different
parts of the State, with the State University at the head. A school for
deaf, dumb and blind was provided for and the children of the poor were to
be supported while at school. But this benevolent scheme to provide for
the children of the poor defeated the entire plan.(1)

THE LITERARY FUND. In 1825 the legislature created a literary fund which
was to come from the sale of swamp lands and other sources. In 1837 part
of a large sum derived from the United States was added, making the entire
fund about $2,000,000.(2)

PUBLIC SCHOOLS BEGIN. With the income from this and a tax voted by most of
the counties public schools were begun in 1840. In 1852 Calvin H. Wiley
was elected superintendent of public instruction, which office he held
till 1865. The schools grew from 777 in 1840 to 4,369 in 1860. The number
of all students in colleges, academies and primary schools increased from
18,681 in 1840 to 177,400 in 1860. This applies to the entire State.

LOSS OF THE LITERARY FUND. The State kept the literary fund intact during
the entire period of the Civil War, keeping the schools open and
conducting them with such books as could be provided. It needed the
literary fund for the soldiers in the field, but it would not touch a
penny except to educate its children. But this fund was held by the banks
of the State, and when the Reconstruction legislature voted not to pay the
Confederate debt, the banks were ruined, for the State owed them large
sums. Thus one million dollars of the fund was lost.

THE EDUCATIONAL GOVERNOR. Gov. Aycock did much for education during his
term from 1900 to 1904. Rural libraries were started and a loan fund
provided.

PIONEER TEACHERS AND PREACHERS. In 1778 or 1779 Samuel Doak, who was
educated at Princeton College, N. J., came to Washington county and soon
after his arrival opened a good school in a log cabin on his own farm.
This is said to have been the first real institution of learning in the
Mississippi valley. In 1788 Doak's school was incorporated by North
Carolina as Martin Academy. In 1795 the territorial legislature
incorporated Martin Academy as Washington College, located at Salem, and
Doak was made its president.(3) In 1785 the legislature of North Carolina
incorporated Davidson Academy, near Nashville.

THE FIRST SCHOOLMASTER OF BUNCOMBE. Soon after the Swannanoa settlement
was established in 1782, a school was started in accordance with the
principles of the Presbyterians. "Robert Henry taught the first school in
North Carolina west of the Blue Ridge."(4)

OLD-FIELD SCHOOLS. Col. J. M. Ray gives the following description of these
antiquated methods of teaching the young idea how not to shoot In lieu of
kindergarten, graded and normal schools "was the Old-Field school, of
which there were generally only one or two in a county, and they were in
session only when it was not 'crop-time.' They were attended by little and
big, old and young, sometimes by as many as a hundred, and all jammed into
one room-a log-cabin with a fire-place at each end-puncheon floor, slab
benches, and no windows, except an opening made in the wall by cutting out
a section of one of the logs, here and there. The pedagogue in charge (and
no matter how large the school there was but one) prided himself upon his
knowledge of and efficiency in teaching the 'three R's'-readin', 'ritin'
and 'rithmetic-and upon his ability to use effectively the rod, of which a
good supply was always kept in stock; He must know, too, how to make a
quill pen from the wing-feather of goose or turkey, steel and gold pens
not having come into general use. The ink used was made from 'ink-balls'-
sometimes from poke-berries~and was kept in little slim vials partly
filled with cotton. These vials not having base enough to stand alone,
were suspended on nails near the writer. The schools were paid for from a
public fund, the teacher boarding with the scholars. The common plan was
for all to study aloud, and this was universally so when getting the
spelling lesson, which was the concluding exercise and most exciting part
of the inside program. Two of the good spellers of the school were
appointed by the teacher as captains, and they made selections alternately
from the scholars for their respective sides in the spelling match. The
first choice was determined by spitting on a chip and tossing it up, the
captain tossing it asking the other 'Wet or dry?' and the other stating
his choice. If the chip fell with the side up as designated, he had 'first
pick' of the spellers, and of course selected the one thought best. If he
lost, his opponent had first pick. Another plan was 'Cross or pile?' when
a knife was used the same way, the side of the handle with the ornament
being the cross. Some of these old pedagogues were very rigid in
discipline-almost tyrants-a day without several fioggings being unusual.
They sometimes resorted to queer plans to catch up with mischievous
scholars; one I distinctly remember-it is not necessary to say why I so
distinctly remember it-was to put the school on its behavior and leave the
building, cut around to some crack or opening and watch inside movements.
This watchinggenerally resulted in something.

OLD SCHOOL GAMES. "The outside sports made bearable all inside oppression,
however. 'Base,' 'cat,' 'bull-pen,' and 'marbles,' were the leading
popular games, and were entered into with a zest and enthusiasm unknown in
these times. The sensational occurrence of the session was, however, the
chase given some party who, in passing, should holler 'school butter!' But
such party always took the precaution to be at a safe distance and to have
a good start, and stood not upon the order of his going, but went for all
that was in him; for to be taken was to be roughly handled-soused in some
creek, pond or mud-hole. The pursuers were eager and determined, sometimes
following for miles and miles, and having but small fear of being punished
for neglect of studies. On the contrary, the offence was of so high an
order (and I never understood just why) that sometimes the teacher would
join in the race."(5)

A PRIMITIVE SPELLING BOOK. Col. Allen T. Davidson gives this picture of a
time earlier than any Col. Ray can remember: "The first schoolmaster I
remember (on Jonathan's creek) was an old man by the name of Hayes. He was
a good old man, and had a nice family, and had come to that back-country
to 'learn' the young idea how to shoot. I was about six years old (1825).
We could not then get spelling-books readily. I had none, and was more
inclined to fun than study. The old man or his daughters dressed a board
as broad as a shingle, printed the alphabet on it, bored a hole through
the top, put a string in it, tied it around my neck and told me to get my
lesson. I did not make much progress; but was greatly indulged by the old
man, and 'went out' without the 'stick,' which was the passport for the
others. The old man wore a pair of black steel-rim spectacles, with the
largest eyes I ever saw, and was a great smoker. There were no matches in
those days, and no way to get fire except by punk and steel; hence, he had
to keep fire covered up in the ashes in the fire-place to light his
pipe... When I would bring in the sticks with which to replenish the fire,
I would usually bring in two or three buckeyes, which I slipped into the
ashes as I covered the wood. The wood would smolder to a coal and the
buckeyes would get hot, but they would not explode until the air reached
them, when they would explode like the report of a musket, scattering the
hulls, ashes and embers all over the house, in the old man's face and
against his spectacles. This always happened whenever he uncovered the
coals to light his pipe. The good old man never did discover the cause of
the explosions. He has long since gone to his reward, and I remember him
with tenderest affection."(6)

THE BLAB SCHOOL. At the earliest period of the most isolated schools,
there were but few books, and spelling was usually taught and learned by a
sort of chant or sing-song, iri which all, teacher and scholars, joined.
Young and old joined in this exercise, and children often learned to spell
who did not readily distinguish the letters of the alphabet. These were
often chalked or written with charcoal against the walls.

NEWTON ACADEMY. From 1797 to 1814 the Rev. George Newton taught a
classical school at this place [Newton Academy] which was famous
throughout several States.(7) Mr. Newton was a Presbyterian minister,
reported to the Synod at Bethel Church, South Carolina, October 18,1798,
as having been received by ordination by the Presbytery of Concord
(Foote's Sketches on North Carolina, 297). He lived on Swannanoa until
1814, when he removed to Bedford county, Tennessee. There for many years
he was principal of Dickson Academy and pastor of the Presbyterian church
in Shelbyville, and there he died about 1841.(7) "At that time there was a
building which had been used for church and school purposes, known as
Union Hill Academy. The house, which was a log one, was removed and in
1809 a brick house took its place. In the same year its name was changed
to that of Newton Academy."(8) Here for many years the people resorted to
preaching and sent their children to school, and buried their dead. In
1857 or 1858 the brick building between the present academy and the grave
yard was removed and the brick academy now there was erected. (See Clayton
v. Trustees, 95 N. C., 298)

DR. ERASTUS ROWLEY. "The old Newton Academy was the only institution in
the county which, up to 1840, had ever been dignified with as big a name
as that of Academy. This was a very old structure when I first entered it
in 1844. Dr. Erastus Rowley taught here that year. The house was a very
long one and rather wide-one story, divided into two rooms-one very long
room and one small one. It was built of brick and stood on the top of the
knoll some distance above where the present one stands. Many of the older
men of this section received their education at this widely known
institution and its fame has always been almost co-extensive with that of
Asheville."(9)

DR. SAMUEL DICKSON. "In 1835 Dr. Samuel Dickson, a Presbyterian minister,
established here a seminary for young ladies, which was most successfully
carried on for many years. It was a school which even in this day of
improved educational methods would stand in the highest rank. Miss
Marguerite Smith of Rhode Island also taught in this building at the same
time. At it were educated all the girls in this section of the country.
Dr. Dickson lived and carried on this school in the first brick house put
up in Asheville. It was a handsome colonial residence, known afterwards as
the 'Pulham place,' on South Main street. The first woman who ever became
a regular practitioner of medicine in America was a member of this school,
Dr. Elizabeth Blackwell."(10)

COLONEL STEPHEN LEE, SOLDIER AND SCHOOLMASTER. "Dr. Frastus Rowley also
taught the male school at the old Newton Academy for quite a while. He was
a 'Yankee' but a most excellent teacher, as well as a fine preacher.
Col.Stephen Lee, about this time, established a school for boys on the
Swannanoa four miles from Asheville, which had a wide reputation and he
did good in all this mountain section. It may be said without intended
disparagement to others that Col. Lee's equal as a teacher has scarcely
been found in this country; his memory lingers with and is blessed by many
of the 'old boys' of today.

"Col. Lee's school for boys was far famed and many of the best citizens of
this country and South Carolina remembered with gratitude, not only the
drilling in Latin and Greek received from this most successful educator,
but also the lessons in high toned honor and manhood imparted by this
knight 'without fear and without reproach.' Col. Lee came from South
Carolina and opened his school first in a large brick house built by
himself on Swannanoa, known as 'The Lodge'- afterwards famous as the
hospitable summer residence of Mr. William Patton. Colonel Lee afterwards
moved to Chunn's Cove, where he taught until, at the call of his country,
he and his sons and his pupils enlisted in the cause which they believed
to be right. He was a graduate of West Point and distantly related to Gen.
R. E. Lee."(11)

Col. Stephen Lee, son of Judge Thomas Lee of Charleston, S. C., was born
in Charleston, June 7, 1801, was educated at West Point and for some years
after taught in the Charleston College. In September, 1825, he was married
to his cousin, Caroline Lee, also of Charleston; they had fifteen
children, nine boys and six girls. Some years after he was married he
moved to Spartanburg, S. C., where he lived only a few years, moving with
his family to Buncombe county, N.C. In Chunn's Cove he started his school
for boys, which he kept up as long as he lived, except for two or three
years in the sixties, a part of which time he was in, command of the 16th
N. C. Regiment, serving his country in West Virginia and the rest of the
time drilling new recruits and preparing them for service. Besides serving
himself, he sent eight boys into the Confederate army, four of whom gave
their lives to the cause. At the close of the war he returned to his
school duties and prepared many young men for their life work. He died in
1879, and is buried in the Asheville cemetery.

MRS. MORRISON AND MISS COUSINS' SCHOOL. Another school now long passed
away, and existing only in the tender memories of its pupils, was taught
for girls by Mrs. Morrison and Miss Cousins, on Haywood street, the
present residence of Dr. H. H. Briggs.

SAND HILL SCHOOL. Captain Charles Moore, son of Captain Wm. Moore, was a
man of ability and learning, a strict Presbyterian and a most useful
citizen, who early realized the importance of education to a people so
isolated as were the men of his time. Consequently, early in the
nineteenth century he erected a small frame building on his farm, since
famous as Sand Hill School. It was a school house and church for ministers
sent out by the Mecklenburg Presbytery, and later became the most useful
institution of learning west of the Blue Ridge, to which boys from all the
surrounding counties came as long as Captain Moore lived. Among them were
the late James L. Henry, Superior court judge; J. C. L. Gudger, Superior
court judge; the late Riley H. Cannon, Superior court judge, and Judge
George A. Jones of Macon, who held the position of judge by appointment
for nearly two years. Among those living, are Captain James M. Gudger,
Sr., solicitor; J. M. Gudger, Jr., member of Congress; H. A. Gudger, chief
justice of the Panama Canal Zone; Superior Court Judge Geo. A. Shuford,
Judge Charles A. Moore, the late Hirschel S. Harkins, former internal
revenue collector for this district; the late Fred Moore, Superior court
judge; the late James Cooper, a prominent lawyer of Murphy; Hon. W. G.
Candler, member of the legislature; Thomas J. Candler, Dr. James Candler,
and Dr. David M. Gudger. Captain Charles Moore is said to have been
largely instrumental in erecting the first Presbyterian church in
Asheville. He insisted on employing only the most competent teachers for
Sand Hill School, among them being Prof. Hood and W. H. Graves, both
highly educated teachers. He died about the close of the Civil War.
Professor S. F. Venable, a graduate of the University of Virginia, also
taught at Sand Hill.

ANOTHER EARLY SCHOOL. Bishop Asbury records the fact that in September,
1806, he and Moses Lawrence lost their way in Buncombe county when within
a mile of Killion' s on Beaverdam creek, and spent the night in a school
house, without a fire. The floor of this school room was of dirt, on which
Moses slept, while the Bishop had a "bed wherever I could find a bench."
This was not Newton Academy, for he had already recorded the fact that he
knew the Rev. George Newton in November, 1800. Besides, Newton Academy was
more than three miles from Killion's. Just where this school house was
seems to have escaped the knowledge of all our local historians.

SILAS MCDOWELL. He was born in York District, S. C., in 1795, and for
three sessions was a student at Newton Academy, near Asheville. He was
apprenticed to learn the tailor's trade at Charleston, S. C., and worked
as such at Morganton and Asheville. He married a niece of Governor Swain,
and moved to Macon county in 1830, where for sixteen years he was clerk of
Superior court. He was a practical mineralogist and geologist, botanist
and a scientist of ongizial views. His descriptions of mountain peaks
attracted much attention; but his "Theory of the Thermal Zone" gave him
great reputation and was published in the Agricultural Reports of the
United States. He died in Macon county, July 14, 1879.

A BENEVOLENT "SQUEERS."(12) A most unique character among the teachers of
that day was Robert Woods or "Uncle Baldy," as he was generally called,
for his head was bald as a door knob with the exception of a light fringe
at the base of his cranium. Although a finished classical scholar and
perfect in mathematics as well as all the higher branches taught in that
day, he would not teach in the higher schools, but preferred to labor in
what was then known as the "old field," where there was seldom anything
taught but the elementary branches--such as spelling, reading, writing
"ciphering." Occasionally he would have a boy who wanted to take a little
Latin or Greek, or the higher mathematics, which he was thoroughly
competent to teach. He was singular and very economical in his notions of
dress. He made one suit last him for many years. I can see him now in
imagination, with a long tail blue jeans coat that came down to his knees
and which had seen service so long that the threads of white filling were
showing plainly. The collar was large and when turned up came nearly to
the top of his head. His pants were of heavy "linsey woolsey" of deep
brown color and very baggy. His vest was of the same material and buttoned
up to his chin, with a good flap at the top, his shirts were of heavy red
or purple flannel, his shoes were of a style of heavy home made
comfortable brogan that were very generally worn in that day. This was his
dress and the only one I ever saw him wear. When he was not hearing
recitations he constantly walked the floor of the school room from end to
end with a swinging walk with his hands crossed upon his back and in one
of them a six foot birch "tidivator," and when he would catch a boy with
his eyes wandering or at meanness he would give him a keen rap across the
shoulders and say in a savage tone, "mind your book." In the summer time
when the flies were bad he would tie a large red bandanna handkerchief
over his head which he could arrange something after the fashion of a
woman's sunbonnet and thus he could save fighting the flies, but with all
his queer ways and habits he was a most excellent, useful and successful
teacher and a good old gentleman. For many years he taught acceptably in
various parts of this county.

FIRST SCHOOL HOUSE IN ASHE. The first school house in Jefferson was of
logs and stood on a branch in the eastern end of Jefferson in a lot owned
by Felix Barr, just left of the blacksmith shop. He removed it in 1873 or
1874. A fine spring is near the former site.

BURNSVILLE ACADEMY. In 1851 Rev. Stephen B. Adams, now deceased, of the
Methodist Church, established the Burnsville Academy and taught there
several years. He was the father of Judge Joseph S. Adams, also now
deceased. Out of this grew:

MARS HILL COLLEGE, which was established by the most prominent members of
the Baptist denomination in 1857, after realizing the necessity for such a
college. Thomas Ray, John Radford, E. D. Carter, Daniel Carter, Stephen
Ammons, Shepard Deaver, Rev. J. W. Anderson and Rev. Humphrey Deweese were
prominent in establishing this institution. During part of the Civil War
the buildings were used by the soldiers, but after the close of that
struggle the buildings were repaired and others added. It has done and
still is doing great good.

WEAVERVILLE COLLEGE was established by the Methodist Church, South, about
the year 1856. It is sifuated on land where formerly camp meetings were
held. It has been greatly enlarged and improved of late years. It is co-
educational. It has done excellent work in the past and continues to do
the same now.

ASHEVILLE MALE ACADEMY. In 1847-48 the citizens of Asheville erected a
brick building on the north side of what is now College street about a
hundred yards east of Oak. It stood till August, 1912, when it was
removed. In it Prof. James H. Norwood taught till about 1850, when he
removed to Waynesville, where he remained till shortly before the Civil
War, when, having been appointed Indian agent in the Northwest, he removed
there and was afterwards killed by the Indians. During part of the time he
taught at this academy Col. Stephen Lee also taught there, but soon
removed to Chunn's cove.

ASHEVILLE FEMALE COLLEGE. About 1850 or 1851 this college was established
on the land now bounded on the north by Woodfin, on the east by Locust, on
the south by College and on the west by Oak streets. Part of it is used as
a hotel and the remainder is now the high school's property. At first it
was Holston Conference Female College, but was afterwards known as the
Asheville Female College, and subsequently as the Asheville College for
Women. It prospered and had a large patronage from the start under the
presidency of Dr. John M. Carlisle, Dr. Anson W. Cummings, Dr. James S.
Kennedy, Dr. R. N. Price, Dr. James Atkins, Mr. Archibald Jones.

ASHEVILLE SCHOOL FOR GIRLS. This was begun in 1911, with Miss Ford as
principal, assisted by several competent teachers. It occupies the
handsome and commodious residence built by Col. N. W. Woodfin at the
corner of North Main and Woodfin streets, Asheville, and enlarged by the
late Dr. J. H. Burroughs.

SULPHUR SPRINGS SCHOOL. William Hawkins taught in the school house on the
hill above Sulphur Springs from 1838 till long after 1845. A school had
been maintained at that place by Robert Henry's influence and largely at
his expense since 1836. The grave yard still there is just back of the
place where the old school house stood. The late Riley Cannon, the Jones,
Hawkins and Moore children attended school there in the old days.

MRS. HUTSELL'S GIRLS' SCHOOL. Mrs. Hutsell, the wife of the Rev. Mr.
Hutsell, a Methodist preacher, taught a school for girls about four miles
west of Sulphur Springs from 1840 to 1853, and took some of the scholars
to board at her house. Her husband and Francis Marion Wells of Grassy
Creek, Madison county, were brothers-in-law.

"ORDER OF THE HOLY CROSS" AT VALLE CRUCIS.(13) In 1840 a gentleman from
New York, in search of rare wild flowers, wandered into Valle Crucis. He
called this beautiful vale to the attention of Bishop Levi S. Ives of the
Protestant Episcopal Church, who, on July 20, 1842, held services there
and promised to send a missionary. In December, 1842, Rev. Henry H. Prout
arrived and began work in the Lower Settlement, near the Tennessee line.
In August, 1843, Bishop Ives returned and purchased 125 acres of land
which was subsequently increased to 2,000 acres. His first intention was
to "make this valley an important center of work for the entire diocese,
to include a missionary station, a training school for the ministry, and a
classical and agricultural school for boys." The necessary buildings
having been constructed in 1844, school was opened early in 1845, with
thirty boys which number increased to fifty during that summer. Rev. Mr.
Thurston was at the head of the mission and of the school. There were
seven candidates for the ministry, several of whom were assistant
teachers. Upon the death of Mr. Thurston the Rev. Jarvis Buxton, then a
candidate for holy orders, took charge of the school and Mr. Prout carried
on the missionary work. But Dr. Buxton removed to Asheville in 1847, where
he became rector of Trinity church, resigning that position in March,
1890. This withdrawal from Valle Crucis was in consequence of the
introduction into the mission of Valle Crucis by Bishop Ives, in June
1847, of the "Order of the Holy Cross," planned by himself and which he
intended, it was said, to develop into a monastic institution. The Bishop
was the General of the Order, the members of which were divided into three
classes: those in the abbey at Valle Crucis only taking the mediaeval vows
of chastity, poverty and obedience; others taking lighter vows; and some
taking lighter vows still.

Both the clergy and laity might belong to either class. The Rev. Mr.
French was appointed Superior, Mr. Buxton having declined the appointment.
Many divinity students became connected with the order, but none of them
abandoned the church. The chapel having been destroyed by fire, the little
band rebuilt it by themselves, locating it in a little grove at the foot
of a hill. Instead of bells a bugle was used to summon them to worship,
and to work. Rev. William West Skyles of Hertford county, had joined the
mission in 1844 as a farmer, and was ordained a deacon in August, 1847. He
was now called "Brother William," while the Rev. Mr. French was addressed
as "Father William." All were required to work the farm two hours every
day. But reports of the new order had spread through the diocese, funds
had failed to arrive, but the committee on the State of the church at the
convention held at Wilmington in 1848, favored the mission, saying that
its importance is immense as the nursery of a future ministry because of
its retirement,... its hardy and useful discipline and great economy." At
the convention held at Salisbury in May, 1849, Bishop Ives gave assurance
that "at this religious house no doctrine will be taught or practice
allowed" not in accord with the principles and usages of the church, "the
property of the establishment having been secured to the church for the
use of the mission on the specified conditions." At a later day the Bishop
declared that from the date of the convention at Salisbury the order had
been dissolved. Its regular existence, therefore, scarcely covered two
years. The committee on the state of the church having reported in 1849
that they had assurances on which they could rely that "no society whose
character, rules and practices are at variance with the spirit if not with
the laws of this church is at present in existence in this diocese," the
convention ordered 1,000 Copies of the report distributed throughout the
diocese. In July, 1849, Bishop Ives visited Valle Crucis, however, and
addressed a pastoral letter to the diocese which was considered a defiance
and a partial retraction of the assurances he had given the convention
during the previous May. Consequently, funds for the mission almost
entirely ceased, and some of the students sought work elsewhere. Mr.
French left the mission in the winter of 1850 and Bishop Ives appointed
the Rev. George Wetmore to take charge of Valle Crucis. At the convention
of 1850, held at Elizabeth City in May, Bishop Ives alluded to his
assurances of 1849, in which he had denied private confession, absolution
and Christ's real presence in the Eucharist, etc., and still claimed that
there had been no heresy or schism. A committee in 1851 investigated Valle
Crucis and reported that the Bishop's explanation was satisfactory.

Bishop Ives visited Valle Crucis in the summer of 1852 and consecrated
Easter chapel above Shull's Mills. In September, 1852, he asked for $1,000
and six months' leave of absence. He sailed for Europe and on the 22d of
December, 1852, he resigned as bishop and declared his "intention to make
his submission to the church of Rome." He had been bishop over twenty
years. Dr. Thomas Atkinson, who had been rector of Grace church,
Baltimore, was elected to succeed him May 22, 1853. The title of the Vaile
Crucis property was never in the Episcopal church. It was sold by Dr.
Ives' legal representatives to Robert Miller who worked the mission
grounds as a farm.

The little chapel which Rev. Mr. Skiles had succeeded in having built on
Lower Watauga at a cost of $700, was consecrated by Bishop Atkinson August
22, 1862. Mr. Skiles, who had done many deeds of charity and love, died at
the home of Col. J. B. Palmer near what is now Altamont, in Avery county,
December 8, 1862. His remains were interred in the churchyard of St. John
the Baptist, December 18, 1862. This chapel was removed in 1882 to a spot
higher up the Watauga river, near St. Jude postoffice, and in 1889 Mr.
Skiles' remains were reinterred in the new churchyard under the direction
of Rev. George Bell of Asheville.

The Episcopal church has purchased a large part of the original mission
property and now maintains a flourishing school for girls there. The
buildings are large, handsome and modern, the orchards and farms are well
cultivated and the work accomplished is uplifting and enduring. The
principal credit for this work is due Right Reverend Junius M. Homer,
Bishop of Asheville, who since his consecration in 1900 has been untiring
in building up at this favored spot a useful and elevating school for
girls. An investigation of this work and the success which is already
evident will convince the most skeptical of its value and importance.

VALLE CRUCIS SCHOOL FOR GIRLS. "The school property consists of a farm of
500 acres, woodlands, apple orchards, dairy farm, vegetable garden and
poultry yard. It is in Watauga county. There are two fine buildings,
Auxiliary Hall and Auchmuty Hall. Auxiliary Hall was built with that
portion of money given the Bishop of Asheville, Rt. Rev. Junius M. Homer,
from the united offerings of 1901, added to other smaller gifts. It is a
frame building of handsome proportions, and contains the assembly hall for
the school and six class rooms on the first floor; the dining room and
kitchen on the second floor; and a dormitory for two teachers and twelve
girls, on the third floor, with linen closets and bath rooms adjoining.

"Auchmuty Hall is the regular dormitory building for the school. It is
built of concrete blocks, and has thirty rooms with capacity for six
teachers and sixty girls. The ground floor has office for the principal, a
living room, and a prayer room, where daily morning and evening prayers
are said. This building was put up at a cost of $15,000, the gift of
friends personally interested in the school and missionary work. These
buildings are well designed for school purposes and those in authority are
diligent in carrying out the deliberately planned policy of the school,
viz.: that of making this a model school industry, that shall be
sufficiently economic to be self-supporting after the equipment of $50,000
is completed and an endowment of $50,000 is added to insure the salaries
of the necessary teachers in the school. It is the policy of the Bishop of
Asheville to have here an industrial school which will educate women, home
makers, so that the growing generation of men and women from the
Appalachian mountains shall be the type known as 'faithful unto death.'

"Half a century ago a school for boys was opened at Valle Crucis by Bishop
Ives who named the place because of the natural formation of the valleys,
Valle Crucis, or the Vale of the Cross.

"The property of the school, however, was lost to the church until a few
years ago when sufficient interest in the mountain region was awakened to
enable the church to buy back the best portions of the old school farm and
commence the erection of the present industrial school."

SKYLAND INSTITUTE at Blowing Rock was established about twenty-five years
ago (1891) by Miss E. C. Prudden, and is supported by the American
Missionary Association. It is a girls' school with industrial training.

MAST SEMINARY. This is at Mast postoffice on Cove creek, Watauga, and is
the gift of Mr. N. L. Mast to the Presbyterian Church. It is only a little
over two years old, but will flourish. Both sexes taught.

WATAUGA ACADEMY. This was established in the summer of 1899 by Messers D.
D. and B. B. Daugherty at Boone, their childhood home. They are
brothers.(14) The Dougherty family, both men and women, not only in Ashe
and Watauga, but in Johnson county, Tenn., also, have for years been zeal-
ous in the work of education, religion and the uplift of their States.
This was the beginning of the Appalachian Training School.

COVE CREEK ACADEMY. Twenty years ago (1893) this useful and successful
school in the western part of Watauga county, was presided over by Mr.
Julius C. Martin, now a distinguished lawyer of Asheville. It flourished
under his management as principal, and has continued on the road to
success.

ASHEVILLE FREE KINDERGARTEN. Miss Sara Garrison was a teacher in 1889 in a
kindergarten school in the factory district. In the same year an
association was formed and two kindergartens established and placed in
charge of Miss Garrison and Miss Slack of Baltimore. They were so
successful that a training school was established for fitting women to
teach such schools, and Mrs. Orpha Quale of Indianapolis taught a class of
eight young ladies. Four kindergartens were in operation. Mr. George W.
Pack having donated a school building necessitated the incorporation of
the association in 1892. He met most of the expenses of one of the
teachers who worked at half rates rather than have the school suspend. In
1894 only two kindergartens were in operation and Mr. George W. Vanderbilt
opened another for colored children in the Young Men's Institute at his
own expense. A New England lady secured $200 from friends in Boston and
the Asheville board of aldermen gave $150 for a kindergarten to be re-
established in the factory district. The public kindergartens were
suspended for want of funds in the year 1912, but arrangements have been
made to reopen them.

BURNSVILLE BAPTIST COLLEGE. About the time the Presbyterians established
their college at Burnsville the Baptists erected a large and handsome set
of college buildings, which have done a great work ever since.

BINGHAM SCHOOL was founded in 1793, at Mebaneville, N. C., by Rev. Wm.
Bingham, who was succeeded by the late W. J. Bingham, and he by the late
Col. Wm. Bingham. After the death of the last named, in 1873, Major Robert
Bingham became superintendent. The military feature, introduced during the
Civil War, has been retained. This school was removed to Asheville under
Col. Robert Bingham's superintendence in the fall of 1891; though the
original Bingham School, as it is claimed, continues to flourish at
Mebaneville. Both schools are doing well.

RURAL LIBRARIES. Small but carefully chosen libraries have been placed in
our country schools. This means that six hundred thousand country children
have such opportunities of enriching their lives by reading as were never
before offered to the young people of North Carolina.

ALLEGHANY SCHOOLS. Sparta has had a high school almost from the beginning
of the town, Prof. Brown having located there in 1870, and with the
exception of short intervali, has had charge of it ever since. There are
also a good many academy buildings at Whitehead, Laurel Springs,
Scottville, Piney Creek, Elk Creek and Turkey Knob. In 1909 the Orange
Presbytery established a high school at Glade Valley, there being four
buildings, all steam-heated and modernly equipped.

BAPTIST MOUNTAIN MISSIONS AND SCHOOLS. Mr. A. E. Brown has furnished a
list of schools which are maintained by the Home Mission Board of the
Southern Baptist Church. A tract gives the following information.

"Some Mountain Mission School work in this region is being done by
Northern Methodists, the Congregationalists, the Disciples and the
Southern Presbyterians. Aside from the work done by Southern Bap tists,
however, the Northern Presbyterians are doing the largest Mountain Mission
School work in the South. Here and there in the mountain region Baptists
have tried to operate schools all along during the past, but not until the
Home Mission Board put the denomination behind the educational efforts in
the mountains was there any permanency in the work. The people have
responded nobly to the leadership and backing furnished by the Home Board.
Southern Baptists are probably better equipped for this work than any
other denomination. This is ground on which to base a deepened sense of
responsibility and not ground for any unworthy pride.

"To sum up: There are more white people per square mile in the mountains
than in any region of equal size in the South. The isolation of the
mountains is for lack of means for inter-communication, and not for lack
of people.

"There are more native born American whites ready to be trained and to
profit by training in this district than in any other."

The schools in the mountains of North Carolina follow:

"Mars Hill College, Mars Hill. Five buildings, nine teachers, 360
students; territory, Madison county and part of Buncombe; draws students
from every section of the South.

"Yancey Institute, Burnsville. Four buildings, five teachers, 261
students; territory, Yancey county.

"Mitchell Institute, Bakersville. Two buildings (with the third to be
erected in the near future), four teachers, 140 students; territory,
Mitchell and Avery counties.

"Fruitland Institute, Hendersonville. Four buildings, seven teachers, 221
students; territory, Hendersonville, Transylvania and Polk counties.

"Round Hill Academy, Union Mills. Three buildings, six teachers, 169
students; territory, Rutherford and McDowell counties.

"Haywood Institute, Clyde, N. C. Two buildings, four teachers, 80
students; territory, Haywood county.

"Sylva Institute, Sylva. Four buildings, three teachers, 87 students;
territory, Jackson and Macon counties.

"Murphy Institute, Murphy. Three buildings, three teachers, 96 students;
territory, Cherokee and Clay counties, N. C., and Polk county, Tennessee."

JOHN O. HICKS, PEDAGOGUE.(15) John O. Hicks, originally from Tennessee,
built a school at Hayesville just at the close of the Civil War that has
been a noted high-school ever since. Hicks, after some thirty years of
successful teaching, turned the school over to N. A. Fessenden of Boston,
Mass., and went to Walhalla, South Carolina, and after a few years
teaching at that place moved to Texas, where he died in 1910.

The same school that John O. Hicks organized and built up at Hayesville is
still in operation with an enrollment of over two hundred. The influence
that has gone out from this school has permeated the whole county until
the public schools of the county are unsurpassed. From this school have
gone out hundreds of men and women who are prominent over the United
States. Among them are the Revs. Ferd. McConnell, Geo. W. Truett and T. F.
Marr; the Doctors W. S., M. H., and W. E. Sanderson of Texas and Oklahoma;
lawyers, O. L. Anderson, J. H. and Luther Truett and the lamented Judge
Fred Moore.

APPALACHIAN TRAINING SCHOOL was incorporated in 1903, succeeding the
private school of Professors B. B. and D. D. Dougherty, at Boone. It began
in 1899 when $1,500 was appropriated on condition that an equal sum should
be provided from private sources. In addition, $2,000 per annum was
appropriated for maintenance. With the first $3,000 appropriated the
present brick administration build ing was started. Other appropriations
followed and other buildings were erected until in 1911 the maintenance
fund was increased to $10,000 per annum for all succeeding years. There
have been contributions from people in every State east of the Mississippi
river except from New England. There are now 500 acres of valuable land,
six large buildings, farm houses and barns, two dormitories and a mess
hall. There are three sessions annually of four and a half months in the
fall and spring, and two and a half months in summer. Average attendance
is 200, while over 400 were taught in 1911. There is a full faculty. Board
for women is $6.50 and for boys $7.50 per month. In 1913 the legislature
appropriated $15,000 to erect a brick dormitory for girls capable of
holding 200 students. It is in course of erection.

A CAMP SCHOOL. There is a summer camp which comes to Bryson City every
summer, and is situated on the left bank of the Tuckaseegee river about
half a mile below the town. It is composed of boys from various colleges
who thus pursue their studies through the summer. They live in tents, but
the kitchen and mess hall are of wood. The professors have their families
with them and live in the same camps.

SOLITUDE, OR ASHLAND. Toward the close of the nineteenth century Professor
F. M. Wautenpaugh of Omaha, Neb., succeeded in having a large and
convenient building erected on a high hill overlooking Solitude, and for
four or five years conducted a business college and high school most
satisfactorily. But the stockholders grew impatient for a dividend on the
money they had invested in the enterprise and the school closed. It is now
owned by a religious society popularly known as the Holiness People. A
religious paper called The Sword of the Lord, is published monthly at
Solitude by Rev. E. L. Stewart. There is also a public school house, neat
and attractive, which is attended by about 140 children.

BAPTIST HIGH SCHOOL, MURPHY. The Baptist high school occupying the site of
the former residence of the late Ben Posey, Esq., a distinguished lawyer,
was built in 1906-7, and afterwards enlarged. There are dormitories and
other buildings. It is in the southern part of town, about half a mile
from the court house.

THE MURPHY GRADED SCHOOL. The Murphy graded school cost $30,000 and stands
on Valley River avenue in the eastern part of the town, midway between
Murphy and East Murphy. It is built after the colonial style and overlooks
Valley river from its site on a splendid elevation. It has twelve class
rooms, a library, an auditorium, a principal's office, closets, electric
lights and water. It was built in 1909 and is a credit to the community.

CULLOWHEE NORMAL AND INDUSTRIAL SCHOOL. "In 1888, a number of the leading
citizens of Cullowhee, desirous of a better school than the ordinary
public school of that day, organized themselves into a board of trustees
for the establishment of what was to be known as the Cullowhee High
School. They procured the services of Prof. Robert L. Madison as
principal, and under his leadership and supervision the school began to
flourish and make rapid progress. In 1893, the institution was recognized
by the State, and through the efforts of Hon. Walter E. Moore,
representative from Jackson, an appropriation was secured for the purpose
of establishing a Normal department of the school for the training of
teachers. At the session of the General Assembly, in 1905, through the
efforts of Hon. Felix E. Alley, representative from Jackson, the
appropriations were still further increased and the name of the school was
changed to Cullowhee Normal and Industrial School, the institution then
becoming a State school for the training of teachers.

"The State has recently erected a large and commodious home for young
ladies. The building was designed by a competent architect, is well
furnished, and is equipped with water works, steam heat and electric
lights. The administration building is furnished with patent desks and
chairs, is lighted by electricity and heated by steam. The handsome
auditorium is seated with opera chairs and will accommodate six hundred
persons. The institution has a newly installed sewerage system and is
supplied with an abundance of pure water from distant mountain springs.
The electric light and steam heating plants are both located on the school
grounds and owned and operated by the institution.

"The supreme purpose of the school is the development and training of
teachers. It proposes not only to give the student training in the
fundamental and cultural branches of study, but so to train him or her as
to prepare them to teach."

MISSION WORK OF NORTHERN PRESBYTERIANS. In the summer of 1884 Dr. Thomas
Lawrence was a guest of Rev. L. M. Pease, originally of New York city,
who, with his wife, had founded the famous Five Points mission in New York
city, but who had removed to Asheville in the seventies, and had started
and was then conducting a school for girls. On a drive into the country
Dr. Lawrence was impressed with the fine looks and intelligence of some
boys he saw at a school, and Mr. Pease offered to devote all his landed
property near Asheville for a training school for girls of the vicinage.
At that time the Home Mission Board was seeking a location for some such
training school. The result of this conversation was the transfer of this
property to the Home Mission Board. The late Mrs. D. Stuart Dodge was
active and influential in effecting this. The terms were satisfactory to
all concerned, and a life annuity from the private purse of the Rev. D.
Stuart Dodge, D. D., of New York, having been secured to Mr. and Mrs.
Pease, the Home Industrial school was soon thereafter organized, in 1887,
with Mr. Pease as superintendent and Miss Florence Stephenson as
principal, a position she still holds. The success of this school
encouraged the evangelization of the mountain region and the Normal and
Collegiate Institute was opened in September, 1892, with Dr. Lawrence as
president and Mrs. Lawrence as principal, with a faculty of fourteen
expert teachers and officers, on part of the Pease property. Dr. Lawrence
retired when he reached seventy-five years of age in 1907, and Prof. E. P.
Childs succeeded him. Thereafter five other boarding schools have been
established in this section, it being the policy of the Presbyterian
Church to hand these flourishing schools to their respective communities
just as soon as they are able to assume the expense and responsibility of
their support and management. Of the twenty-two elementary day schools
planted during the last quarter of a century in the more sequestered and
needy communities seven have been successfully transferred to local public
school authorities. The remaining fifteen are still doing good work; while
in four other centers additional social, kindergarten and Sabbath school
work is being done under the management of the board. Miss Florence
Stephenson, Miss Mary Johns, Miss Julia Phillips, Miss Frances Goodrich,
Dr. J. P. Roger, a Christian physician, have done a great work for our
people and their names are house-hold words in many a mountain cabin. Dr.
G. S. Baskerville made a success of the farm school on the Swannanoa
river, after the school had been organized by Prof. Samuel Jeffries, a
graduate of the agricultural department of Cornell University, in 1893.
Dr. J. P. Roger is in charge of the farm school now.

The following is a list of the schools and churches established in Western
North Carolina, exclusive of those established elsewhere in the South:

Normal and Collegiate Institute, 1902. Prof. E. P. Childs, president. Miss
Mary F. Hickok, principal. Fifteen teachers and officers. Average
enrollment, 304.

Home Industrial School (preparatory to the Normal and Collegiate
Institue), 1887. Miss Florence Stephenson, principal. Teachers and
officers, ten. Average enrollment, 140.

Pease Home (for little girls), 1908. Miss Edith P. Thorpe, matron. Adjunct
to Home Industrial School, and furnishing school of practice for Normal
and Collegiate Institute.

These three boarding schools for girls occupy, with the chapel, manse, and
superintendent's home, the beautiful suburb of Asheville, ceded by Mr.
Pease. The whole plant is valued at $200,000.

Farm School, nine miles from Asheville, on the Swannanoa river, 1895, J.
P. Rogers, superintendent. Sixteen teachers and officers. Spacious school
and farm buildings and 650 acres of fertile land.

These four flourishing boarding schools form the Asheville group. Their
success has been largely possible through the wlse counsel and constant
beneficence of Dr. D. Stuart Dodge, New York City, who inherits a name
which has, for three generations, been synonymous with philanthropy.

Bell Institute, Walnut, Madison county, 1908. Miss Margaret E. Griffith,
principal. Five teachers and officers. Average attendance, 284; 65
boarders. Value of school property, $12,000.

Dorland Institute, Hot Springs, Madison county, 1887. Established by the
late Dr. Luke Dorland, in his old age, after a long life of eminent
usefulness in other fields. Miss Julia E. Phillips, principal. Eleven
teachers and officers. The plant is valued at $40,000, and provides school
room and dormitory accommodations for 70 girls, farm and home for 30 boys,
having, in addition, an attendance of 60 day pupils.

Stanly McCormick Academy, Bnrnsville, Yancey county. Prof. Lowrie Corry,
principal. Seven teachers and officers. Six buildings, including school
building, principal's home, separate dormitories for boys and girls.
Average attendance, 206; 50 boarders. Building and grounds valued at $46,
000. This prosperous academy has a magnificent patron in Miss Nettie
McCormick, Chicago, Ill.

Besides the schools of higher grade, above mentioned, a successful academy
was maintained more than ten years at Marshall, which prepared for and
subsequently gave place to the excellent graded school now being
maintained by the public authorities.

In addition to these boarding schools, 21 elementary day schools were
meanwhile being planted in the remotest and most inaccessible regions,
under carefully trained Christian teacher--fourteen in Madison, four in
Buncombe, and three in Yancey county, with an average attendance of 1,200
pupils, under 41 teachers. The moneys invested in school buildings and
teachers' homes, the people contributing as they were able, would
aggregate $30,000.

In accordance with their policy, as already remarked, the board, in the
more recent years, has been gradually retiring from these fields as the
local authorities became able and willing to take over the work. The value
of properties in buildings and lands, held for educational purposes,
including the seven boarding and 21 day schools, aggregates $400,000, not
to make mention of the salaries of, on an average, more than 100
efficiently trained teachers necessarily employed.

Col. Robert Bingham, one of the most experienced and eminent educators of
the commonwealth, in an article published in the North American Review,
refers to the prudence and wisdom which has characterized the
administration of this mission school work, and says, in substance: "Of
all the moneys donated by northern philanthropists for the betterment of
education in the South, those contributed by the Northern Presbyterian
Church has been most judiciously and wisely expended."

The list of the organized churches is as follows: Oakland Heights,
Asheville, Buncombe county; College Hill, Riceville, Buncombe county;
Reems Creek, Reems Creek, Buncombe county; Brittain's Cove, Brittain's
Cove, Buncombe county; Jupiter, Jupiter, Buncombe county; Cooper's
Memorial, Marshall, Madison county; Barnard, Barnard, Madison county;
Allanstand, Allanstand, Madison county; Big Laurel, Big Laurel, Madison
county; Dorland Memorial, Hot Springs, Madison county; Burnsville,
Burnsville, Yancey county.

SOUTHERN PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH SCHOOLS.(16) Glade Valley School, near
Sparta; organized 1910; boarding and day school for boys and girls;
buildings and furnishings worth $20,000. Five teachers in regular service;
130 students; full academic course; board and tuition per month, $10.

Lees-McRae Institute, at Banner Elk; established 1901; boarding and day
school for girls; industrial, there being no servants Buildings,
furnishings and farm worth $25,000. Eight teachers; 165 students; usual
academic course with manual training. Tuition and board per month, $8.

Lees-McRae Institute at Plumtree; organized 1902; boarding and day school
for boys; industrial, large farm connected with school; buildings, farm,
furnishings, stock, etc., worth $22,000. Five teachers and about 110
students. Course prepares for freshman class in good college. Board and
tuition, $8, many of the students making as much by their own labor.

Mission Industrial School, near Franklin; organized 1911; boarding and day
school for girls; industrial, no servants. Buildings and furnishings worth
$10,000. Five teachers and 75 students. Course same as that of best high
schools. Board and tuition, $8 per month.

The Maxwell Home and School, near Franklin; organized 1911, for homeless
boys who are destitute. Manual training, chiefly, the farm containing 500
acres. Buildings, furnishings and farm, worth $15,000. Three teachers,
capacity for 30 boys at present. With $50 to get a start, a boy can make
his own way here.

Mountain Orphanage. At Balfour, established in 1905 by Home Mission
Committee of Asheville Presbytery. Mr. and Mrs. A. H. Temple have charge
of 40 children. Property worth $5,000.

COLORED PEOPLE'S SCHOOLS.(17) "Very soon after the war the importance of
the education of the colored people, now citizens and voters, was
impressed upon the minds of the thinking people of this section. The first
effort in this direction was the parochial school of the Protestant
Episcopal Church, which was opened in 1870, and was taught by Miss A. L.
Chapman of Rochester, N. Y. After two years she was succeeded by Rev. Mr.
Berry, who was both pastor and teacher. This double office has been filled
without interruption by educated and influential colored men up to the
present time, and many heads of families look back with gratitude to the
little room on South Main street, and the parochial school building on
Valley street, where the rudiments of an education were obtained, and
foundations of character laid, which have been a blessing to them and
their households.

"In 1885 Rev. L. M. Pease, recognizing the importance of hand, as well as
head and heart training, erected a bui1ding for an Industrial school on
College street, and opened it the same autumn with three thoroughly
educated colored teachers. At the close of the school year, being
financially unable to continue it, he deeded the property to the Woman's
Board of Home Missions of the Methodist Episcopal Church, which continued
the work under the superintendence of Rev. Newell Albright, whose health
was such as to require a residence in this climate. When Mr. Albright
resigned after one year, the school was thoroughly organized and
established and has continued to do excellent work under the
superintendence of Miss A. B. Dole, who, by her judicious management of
the race question, and devotion to the interests of the colored people,
has made many friends among both races.

"Rev. C. F. Dusenberry of the Presbyterian Church has a parochial school
on Eagle street, under the auspices of the Holston Presbytery, where
industrial work is taught to some extent, and a kitchen garden conducted..
The purpose of this is to teach correct methods of housekeeping, such as
making fires, washing dishes, setting and waiting on tables, laundry and
chamber work.

"In the Victoria suburb a combined chapel and school house was erected
five years ago by a donation from Mr. Taylor of Cleveland, O., where a
flourishing day school has greatly benefited the population. Mrs. W. I.
Erdman was the projector and manager of this school till her removal to
Philadelphia one year ago. The teacher's salary is paid by the Freedman's
Board of the Presbyterian Church, by which they are also appointed.

"In 1892, Mr. Stevens, the principal of the public school for colored
pupils, was greatly in~pressed with the necessity of an institution for
colored young men on the plan of the Y.M. C. A. He set about devising
plans for the erection of a building for this purpose, and made a journey
during vacation to Bar Harbor, Me., for the purpose of soliciting aid from
Mr. George Vanderbilt. In this he was successful, and Mr. Charles McNamee
was commissioned to erect a structure, suitable for the purpose
contemplated, on the corner of Eagle and Market streets. It is a fine,
substantial building with a tiled roof. There are stores and offices on
the first floor and a large lecture hall. On the second floor is a library
and reading room, a parlor and school room and the office of the
superintendent. This was occupied by Mr. Stevens for one year, and the
following one by Mr. John Love, an Asheville boy, who was graduated at
Oberlin, O., and resigned one year ago to take work in Washington, D. C.
The present incumbent is B. H. Baker, a graduate of Howard University.

"The lecture hall has been in demand for lectures, concerts, exhibitions
and entertainments, and on Sunday afternoons for a song service with a
large attendance. There is a religious service one night in the week, a
night school for boys and a kindergarten eight months in the year."

CHARLES McNAMEE, ESQ., for many years the attorney and adviser of Mr.
George W. Vanderbilt, who erected the Young Men's Institute at the corner
of Eagle and Spruce streets, Asheville, for the use of colored people,
about the year 1893, in a letter dated October 24, 1895, says that he is
the trustee of the property and that "It was the original intention that
the income of the building over and above the running expenses should be
devoted to paying Mr. Vanderbilt back the principal and interest of the
cost of the building and ground." The foregoing references are to times
prior to November, 1895.

MRS. HETTY MARTIN. This good lady was the wife of the late General James
Green Martin. They came to Asheville during the Civil War, after which
they faced poverty with brave hearts. Mrs. Martin was the daughter of the
ate Charles King, president of Columbia College, New York, granddaughter
of Rufus King, first American minister to the Court of St. James, and a
sister of General Rufus King of the United States army. Notwithstanding
her northern birth and ancestry, Mrs. Martin's fidelity to the South was
unquestioned. Recognizing the fact that if left to their own resources the
newly enfranchised negro race of the South must necessarily retrograde,
Mrs. Martin soon after the Civil War exerted herself to advance their
educational and religious training. It was through her influence that St.
Mathias Episcopal church was organized and for years supported by the aid
of white people. She also assisted in the erection and furnishing of the
flue new church that crowns one of the hill-tops in the eastern part of
Asheville, and in which so many reputable and self-respecting colored men,
women and children have received spiritual guidance. Her influence for
good in this community is incalculable.

MISS ANNA WOODFIN. This good woman is a daughter of Col. N. W. Woodfln,
and although a confirmed invalid for many years, she has, nevertheless,
exerted a wonderful influence for good in this community. In 1884 she was
largely instrumental in organizing the Flower Mission, of which she is
still an honored member. This was intended to be "an auxiliary to the
State branch of that department of the National Woman's Christian
Temperance Union, with the object of carrying flowers to the homes of the
sick and destitute1 to prison cells, to hospitals and almshouses." Bible
texts and songs and readings often went with the flowers. Its work
revealed the need of a hospital and, as the society was
interdenominational, the cooperation of all the churches was secured, and
soon the Mission Hospital was open in 1885. The Associated Charities is
also an outgrowth of this grand scheme.

DONATION OF A LIBRARY. About 1905 Professor Charles Hallet Wing, of
Brighton, Mass., donated to the county of Mitchell on certain conditions a
large and well-arranged library building and 15,000 selected and valuable
books, a book-bindery, etc., all situated at Ledger, on the road from
Marion to Bakersville, where Professor Wing lived several years and gave
the people in the neighborhood the free use of his library, besides
binding without charge any pamphlets or books in need of such treatment.

PROFESSOR CHARLES HALLET WING. Of this public-spirited gentleman we read
(Carolina Mountains, p.326) that "after many years of notable service as
professor of chemistry in the Boston Institute of Technology" he came to
Ledger, Mitchell county, N. C., "before there had been any change in the
customs of the country, to escape the turmoil of the outer world.
Professor Wing vehemently disclaimed any share in changing - he would not
call it 'improving' the life of the people, but he made his charming log
house, his barn and outbuildings, also his fences with their help." He
also built a school house and library building, provided two teachers, and
himself "conducted a manual training department." There were 250
applicants for admission to his school the first year it was opened,
ranging from six to forty years in age. This school was successfully
conducted "without the infliction of any sort of punishment." Fifteen
thousand books were sent there by friends of Prof. Wing, and the library
was kept by a native youth who was taught to rebind books, "as some of the
most used books were those that had been discarded by the Boston Public
Library." Small traveling libraries of seventy-five volumes each were sent
around the country and loaned. "The library was free, with rules, but no
fines, and it is illustrative of the quality of the people that the rules
were not broken and that at the end of the first year not a book was
missing, none had been kept out overtime, while less than six per cent of
those taken out had been fiction" (p.327).

GEORGE W. PACK. Elsewhere has been mentioned the donation by this
gentleman of a valuable library building to the city of Asheville, and his
aid to the free kindergartens of that city.

BREVARD INSTITUTE. This school for training girls and boys in the
practical things of life is situated near Brevard, and was started in
1895. "Besides the ordinary academic subjects and special religious
training the pupils are taught a dread of debt, promptness in attending to
business obligations of every sort, a love for thoroughness and accuracy
in doing work of every sort, self-control in the expenditure of money, and
a knowledge of simple business transactions." There is also a business
course, a department of music and one of domestic art. (Carolina
Mountains, pp.225-226)

ALLENSTAND COTTAGE INDUSTRIES. This is a form of settlement work which
began, "long before the present wave of prosperity had drawn near the
mountains," in the north-western portion of Buncombe county "away up on
Little Laurel, near the Tennessee line . . . and close under the wild Bald
mountains." It was "formerly a stopping place or 'stand' for drovers who
stopped over night with their cattle, sheep, horses and swine" on their
way from Tennessee to South Carolina. Here old4ashioned spinning, weaving
and dyeing were revived and are being taught. (Carolina Mountains, pp.226-
228)

BILTMORE INDUSThIES. From the same work (p. 231) we read that wood-carving
is taught and practiced at Biltmore, as well as old-fashioned spinning,
weaving and dyeing, and also embroidery, some of the graduates in wood-
carving carving chairs for the great establishment of Tiffany of New York,
and more than one hundred of the pupils are earning a livelihood by the
wood-carving craft.

SCOTCH BLOOD ANSWERS FIRST CRY TO BATTLE. From the Carolina Mountains
(p.149) we learn that although the men of these mountains had remained for
years without an ideal and were without Opportunity to display their
natural ability and trustworthiness of character, nevertheless, when
George W. Vanderbilt began his operations at Biltmore he employed these
very men and kept them under an almost iron discipline. He found "the
Scotch blood at the first call to battle ready," and now "all the
directors of the great estate, excepting a few of the highest officials,
are drawn from the ranks of the people, who proved themselves so
trustworthy and capable that in all these years only three or four of
Biltmore's mountaineer employees have had to be discharged for
inefficiency or bad conduct."

(1. Hill, p.175)
(2. Ibid., 376)

(3. G. R. McGee's, p.110)

(4. From "Alexander~Davidson Reunion," 1911, by F. A. Sondley, Esq. p.24)

(5. Col. J. M. Ray in Lyceum, p, 19, December, 1890)

(6. Col. Allen T. Davidson in Lyceum, p.8, January, 1891)

(7. "Asheville's Centenary." NOTE. Newton Academy is on the east side of
South Main Street, Asheville, and nearly opposite the Normal and
Collegiate Institute.)

(8. From Judge S. C. Pritchard's address before Normal and Collegiate
Institute, 1907)

(9. "Rerniniseenees" of Dr. S. S. T. Baird, 1905)
(10. Ibid)
(11. Ibid)
(12. Ibid)

(13. Condensed from William West Skiles' "A Sketch of Missionary Life."
1842-1902. Edited by Susan Fenimore Cooper, N.Y., S. P. Pott & Co.,
Publishers.)

(14. From facts furnished by Prof. D. D. Dougherty)

(15. By C. H. Haigler, Hayseville, N. C.)

(16. Information furnished by Rev. R. P. Smith, superintendent and
treasurer)

(17. Woman's Edition, Asheville Citizen. The references are prior to
November, 1895)



CHAPTER XVIII.
NEWSPAPERS

HIGHLAND MESSENGER. At some time prior to 1842 the late Joshua Roberts and
Rev. David R. McAnally founded the first newspaper ever printed in
Asheville, the Highland Messenger. John H. Christy, a practical printer,
was associated with them in its publication. He married Miss Ann Aurelia
Roberts August 23, 1842, which must have been after the paper had been
started, she having been a daughter of Joshua Roberts. J. H. Christy
subsequently moved to Athens, Ga., where he published for many years the
weekly Southern Watchman, and during Reconstruction was elected member of
Congress from the Athens district, but was not allowed to take his seat on
account of political disabilities. His son is now one of the publishers of
the Andrews Sun. Dr. David R. McAnally was a Methodist preacher and moved
to St. Louis, Mo., where he edited the Christian Advocate. He was
sometimes mentioned in connection with the bishopric in the Southern
Methodist Church.

James M. Edney obtained control of the Highland Messenger and it
afterwards became the Spectator. It was edited by John D. Hyman, who moved
to Asheville about 1853, and Z. B. Vance. In it, in 1857, Gov. Vance
published an account of the finding of Prof. Elisha Mitchell's body.(1)
Thomas Atkin, of Knoxville, established the Asheville News about 1848 or
1850 and it ran a long time under that name. The late Major Marcus Erwin
as editor wrote brilliantly for it. This paper, although nominally
independent, supported Major W. W. Rollins for the State senate in 1866.
On the day the election returns had to be made, Lee Gash, of Henderson
county, was 27 votes ahead of Major Rollins, at sundown, with the votes of
Mitchell county still not in. At ten o'clock that night the Rev. Stephen
Collis arrived with them, having been delayed by high water. There were
770 votes for W. W. Rollins and only one vote for Mr. Gash; but they had
arrived a few hours too late.(2)

THE ASHEVILLE CITIZEN. This paper, at first a weekly, was established by
Randolph Shotwell, who came to Asheville from Rutherford in 1869. About
1870 Col. V. S. Lusk sent a bill to the grand jury, while he was
solicitor, against certain men for Ku-Kluxing some negroes, and the grand
jury threw it out. There then ensued some newspaper controversy and the
next Col. Lusk knew of it was a blow, dealt by Shotwell, knocking him to
his knees. While in this position Lusk fired upward and wounded Shotwell
in both legs. Shotwell gave Lusk a Masonic sign and Lusk fired no more.
This happened on the public square about 1870 or 1871. Shotwell sold the
Citizen to Natt Atkinson and went to Rutherford, after having been
convicted of assault upon Lusk, sentence having been suspended at Lusk's
request. Shotwell was soon afterwards convicted of Ku-Kluxing and sent to
the Albany penitentiary, but was pardoned by Gen. Grant upon application
of Col. Lusk, who had then been appointed United States district attorney.

JOHN P. KERR'S RECOLLECTIONS. In a letter dated June 11, 1912, Col. John
P. Kerr, a veteran newspaper man, and now private secretary to Gov. Craig,
wrote as follows:

"The first newspaper published in Asheville within my recollection was the
News and Farmer. I am sure that this was the successor of the News, which
had been printed by Rev. Thomas (?) Atkins, a Methodist preacher,
subsequent to and perhaps during the war. R. M. Stokes was the editor of
the News and Farmer, as I recollect, in 1868-1869. The printing office was
in the building now known as the 'Hub,' N. W. Pack Square and N. Main
street. It was up stairs. Stokes subsquently moved his paper to Union,
S.C. The Pioneer, a weekly Republican paper, was also being published in
Asheville in l868-1869. I began my apprenticeship as a printer on this
paper. It was at this time edited by A. H. Dowell, with C. W. Eve as local
editor. This paper was founded, I think, by A. H. Jones who represented
this district in Congress at this time. The office was on the third story
of the Patton Building, corner S. Main and S. E. Pack Square. Capt.
Atkinson printed a paper in the rear room on the second story of the same
building that the News and Farmer occupied, and I set type for him as a
printer. About 1869 or 1870 the News and Farmer was purchased by Randolph
Shotwell, who changed its name to the Asheville Citizen. Between 1870 and
1874 R. M. Furman took hold of tbe Citizen. His office was in the basement
of the same building, the 'Hub.' Randolph A. Shotwell was either
associated with Furman or else he ran another paper for a short time in
Asheville during the period above mentioned. Thomas D. Carter started
during this same period the Expositor; which also had its office in this
same building when it began, but it was subsequently moved to the Legal
Building, which covered the site now occupied by the big building, and I
think became the property of Gen. R. B. Vance, then a member of Congress,
and was edited by his brother-in-law, Maj. W. H. Malone. During this
period Jordan Stone became associated with Furman in the Citizen, as did
also Col. J. D. Cameron. I feel sure that the Citizen was a daily when I
returned to Asheville in 1887. After an absence of several years Jordan
Stone sold his interest in the paper about 1888, and went to California.
Subsequently, perhaps about a year later, R. M. Furman sold his interest,
and Col. J. D. Cameron ran the Citizen for a few weeks or months alone.
The paper was then sold to Capt. T. W. Patton and J. G. Martin. Mr. Martin
soon sold his interest and in either 1889 or 1890 a company was formed
composed of T. W. Patton, W. F. Randolph, A. E. Robinson and John P. Kerr,
who took charge of the paper. This was continued for only one year, after
which Randolph Robinson and Kerr ran the paper until 1889, with F. E.
Robinson as editor. In 1889 J. P. Kerr sold his interest to Dr. W. G.
Eggleston, who became the editor. Dr. Eggleston remained with the paper
for less than a year. After this there were a number of changes in the
ownership of the paper which can be more accurately ascertained by the
files of the paper itself. In 1887 Theodore Hobgood was running a dally
paper in Ashevrne called the Advance. Its offices were in the basement of
the old Legal Building. The present Gazette-News was the outgrowth of the
Advance.

"I have no definite recollection as to the various steps in the life of
the Gazette-News. After the sale or discontinuance of the Advance,
Theodore Hobgood and - Fitzgerald began the publication of a morning
newspaper in the Barnard Building, or the building which preceded it. This
ran oniy a short time when they sold it to W. F. Randolph and John P.
Kerr, who ran it only a few weeks. This was about 1888. The Asheville
Register was the name of a Republican weekly paper published for a number
of years, and founded, I believe, by R. M. Deaver. R. B. Roberts was its
editor for some years."


THE ASHEVILLE CITIZEN PUBLISHING COMPANY was incorporated April 1, 1890,
A. H. Fuller, T. W. Patton, J. G. Martin and T. A. Jones being named as
incorporators. It was the influence of this paper largely which secured
the election of the late Capt. T. W. Patton as mayor on an independent
ticket, in May, 1893.

THE ASHEVILLE DAILY GAZETTE was established in March 1896. It was
incorporated as the Gazette Publishing Company April 2, 1897, Fred A.
Johnson, J. M. Johnson and James E. Norton being named as incorporators.
Mr. Norton, who had had fifteen years experience in reportorial and
editorial positions on the New York Tribune Times, Commercial Advertisser
and Brooklyn Eagle, continued in active management of the editorial and
business affairs of the paper, except for a short interval in the fall of
1898 (?) when the late Robert M. man had control of the editorials, till
1903-04, when the paper was sold to the Evening News Publishing Company.
It was converted into an afternoon paper, the Citijen, which before had
been an evening paper, having taken the field as a morning journal. The
Gazette was a Republican paper the last three years of its existence. Geo.
L. Hackney had the two papers combined as the Gazette-News, under which
name it has continued to flourish.

WATAUGA DEMOCRAT. It was started by Joseph Spainhour and the Democratic
party prior to June 13, 1888. R. C. Rivers, its present owner, and D. D.
Dougherty took charge July 4, 1889. Mr. Rivers has been with it since.

WATAUGA ENTERPRISE AND NEWS. The former ran in Boone in 1888, L. L. Green
and Thomas Bingham conducting it. The News was begun in January, l913,(4)
by Don. H. Phillips.

JEFFERSON OBSERVER. This paper is a weekly Democratic paper, published at
Jefferson, Ashe county, and was establish about 1901 by Talbott W. Adams,
formerly of Edgefleld county S. C. He is still in control of it. A
Republican paper was started in 1909 but failed. It was called the
Jefferson Watchman, and ran only three or four months. In 1910 an effort
was made to revive it under the name of the Industrial-Republican
Publishing Company of Jefferson, N. C., but it failed.

GENERAL ERASTUS ROWLEY HAMPTON. For several years during 1890 and
thereafter, Gen. Hampton published a weekly paper in Jackson county.

FRANKLIN PRESS. This Democratic weekly was conducted by the late W. A.
Curtis at Franklin, Macon county for a number of years prior to his death
in 1900. It is still flourishing.

THE CAROLINA BAPTIST was the first newspaper printed in Hendersonville. In
1855 Rev. James Blythe, W. C. Berin and J. M. Bryan, as editors, started
this paper, but later Prof. W. A. G. Brown became its editor. A copy was
recently shown dated June 22, 1859.

HENDERSONVILLE HUSTLER. This newspaper was started in Hendersonville ten
or a dozen years ago and is still flourishing. Now M. L. Shipman,
Commissioner of Labor and Printing, is its editor and proprietor.

FROM THE REPORT OF THE COMMISSIONER OF LABOR AND PRINTING.
WEEKLY NEWSPAPERS.

COUNTY        Town          Name of Paper          Editor      Proprietor
Mitchell   Bakersville   Mitchell Co. Kronicle   T M Gosorn   T H Gosorn
Swain      Bryson City   Bryson City Times       H W Carter   H W Carter
Transylvania Brevard     Sylvan Valley News      O L Jones   Jones & Wilson
                                                 R B Wilson
Watauga    Boone         Watauga Democrat        R C Rivers   R C Rivers
Yancey     Burnsvllle    Eagle                   J M Lyon    Eagle Pub. Co.
Ashe       Jefferson     Recorder                W T Adams    W T Adams

CAPTAIN NATT ATKINSON was born November 15, 1832, in McMinn county, Tenn.,
near Charleston. He was a graduate of Hiwassee College and of Col.
Wilson's private school in Alamance county, N. C. He married Harriet
Newell Baird, daughter of Mary and Israel Baird, of Buncombe county; N.
C., February 2, 1858. There were twelve children. He was admitted to the
Asheville bar in 1868, and practiced law till 1873. He purchased the
Asherille Citizen in 1870, and edited the same for three years following,
when he sold that paper and moved to a farm on Swannanoa river, where he
remamed till 1882, when he returned to Asheville and entered the real
estate business, which he continued till his death, August 25, 1894, at
Salisbury, N. C. He was one of the most useful and enterprising of
Asheville's citizens, encouraging every enterprise of merit, and
forgetting his own interest in that of the community. He was the president
of the Atlanta, Asheville and Baltimote. Railroad Company, and began the
actual construction of the first street railway in Asheville under what is
known as the Farinholt charter, which he sold to E. D. Davidson and
associates, thus defeating an attempt was making to build and operate a
steam railway the streets of Asheville and insuring the present system. He
was also interested in the construction railways, and was really the
father of the graded schools of Asheville. He was elected to the
legislature of 1879 and by legislation secured largely through his efforts
saved the State what he estimated to be $175,000. He was a captain in Gen.
M. Vaughan's brigade of the Confederate Army, and was one of the personal
escort of Hon. Jefferson Davis on his flight southward from Richmond via
Charlotte in April, 1865.

THE LYCEUM. This monthly was published in Asheville from May, 1890, until
some time in 1892. Tilman R. Gaines of South Carolina was its editor and
proprietor. In it were published many papers of value, among which should
be mentioned "Reminiscenses of Western North Carolina," by Col. Allen T.
Davidson; "Poets of the South," by L. M. Hatch; "Persecution of the Jews,"
by W. H. Malone; "Protection of Birds," by J. D. Cameron; "State
Landlordism and Liberty," by Judge C. E. Fenner; "Two Days with Gen. Lee
at Charleston," by Col. L. M. Hatch; of Forty Years Ago," by Col. J. M.
Ray; "Should Women Vote?" by H. B. Stevens, and an address by Col. Charles
W. Woolsey on "The Asheville Art Club."

THE ASHEVILLE EVENING JOURNAL. About September, 1889, this paper started
on its career, Messers. Clegg & Donohue being its editors and proprietors.
Its advertisement in the Lyceum of September, 1890, (p.22) mentions that
it "is now in its second year."

THE ASHEVILLE NEWS AND HOTEL REPORTER. This was a weekly paper which began
publication in January, 1895, at Asheville with the late Natt Rogers as
editor and the late Richard M. Furman as manager and publisher. It was
intended as an advertising medium for hotels principally, but soon reached
a wider sphere of usefulness, and until the health of Mr. Rogers became
too much impaired it enjoyed a period of popularity and considerable
prosperity. Its life was about sixteen months.

ROBERT MCKNIGHT FURMAN. He was born September 21, 1846, at Louisburg, N.
C., and enlisted in the Confederate army in the spring of 1862, and served
till the close of the Civil War. He moved to Asheville in the spring of
1870, and in 1873 he was married at Tarboro to Miss Mary Mathewson. He
edited the Asheville Citizen from 1873 till Messers J. D. Cameron and
Jordan Stone joined him, after which the three conducted that paper till
about 1880. He moved to Raleigh in 1898 and became editor of the Morning
Post, which flourished under his management till after his death at
Beaufort, N. C., May 12, 1904.

THOMAS WALTON PATTON. He was for several years editor of the Asheville
Citizen, during which time its columns were open to all public spin ted
causes. He was born at Asheville, May 8, 1841, his father, James W.
Patton, having been a son of James Patton, one of the pioneers of
Asheville. His mother was Miss Clara Walton of Burke, and his grandmother
on his father's side was a daughter of Francis Reynolds of Wilkes county.
His mother's father was Andrew Kerr of Kelso, Scotland. He was educated by
Col. Stephen Lee, from whose school he was graduated in 1860, after which
he went to Charleston, S. C., and entered the office of his uncle, Thomas
Kerr, a cotton factor. He enlisted in the Buncombe Rifles in April, 1861,
and at the expiration of the six months' enlistment, he reenlisted,
becoming captain of company "C" of the Sixtieth North Carolina Infantry,
in which he served till the surrender of Johnston's army. In 1862 he
married at Greensboro, Ala., Miss Annabella Beaty Pearson. In 1866 he
removed to Alabama, where his wife and child soon afterwards died. He
returned to Asheville and went into co-partnership with the late Albert T.
Summey, in the mercantile business, for a short time. In 1871 he married
Miss Martha Bell Turner, a daughter of James Calder Turner, a civil
engineer who aided in the laying out and construction of the Western North
Carolina railroad to Asheville. He and his sister, Miss Frances L. Patton,
soon became active in all charitable and philanthropic work. He was
elected a county commissioner in 1878, when he made it his first business
"to visit the county paupers, whom he found 'farmed out' to the lowest
bidder and living in huts far from the public road or any possibility of
public inspection," which system he immediately abolished. He also visited
the jails regularly, keeping up the practice of visiting prisoners and
paupers till his death. "When, in 1893, he considered that the city
administration was extravagant, if not actually corrupt, he did not
hesitate one instant but declared himself an independent candidate for
mayor, and was overwhelmingly elected. His two terms as mayor $25 a month
as a salary, resulted in much "economy honesty, progressiveness and
effiuiency" which reduced "expenses one-half without in the least
diminishing the efficiency of the public service." In April, 1898, he
enlisted in the First North Carolina regiment, and served in Cuba, as
adjutant. His object was to influence the younger men for good, and the
survivors of that war have named the local camp in his honor. He did much,
with his sister, Miss F. L. Patton, to establish and operate the Mission
Hospital, the Children's Home and other works of benevolence. He died at
Philadelphia, November 6, 1907, and was buried at Asheville with every
mark of respect.

THOMAS DEWEESE CARTER. He was born on Little Ivy in what is now Yancey
county, February 14, 1834, and died July 29, 1894. He married Miss Sarah
A. E. Brown of McDowell county, August 14, 1855. He owned a large interest
in the Cranberry iron mine in Mitchell, now Avery, county and during the
Civil War manufactured tools there for the Confederate government. About
1870 he wrote a series of spirited articles on the political situation for
the Raleigh Sentinel and the Asheville Citizen. This was the commencement
of a long and active experience as a militant newspaper editor for his
power as a writer of virile English was pronounced. In the spring of 1872
he came to Asheville and began a series of articles concerning the Swepson
and Littlefield frauds, publishing his communications in the Citizen, till
Captain Natt Atkinson, its editor and owner, sold that paper to Robert M.
Furman, which necessitated the launching of a new weekly known as the
Western Expositor, by Col. Carter. This paper immediately attracted
attention not only throughout State, but the New York Herald paid
editorial tribute to vigor of the Expositor's well written and vigorous
editorials. Just about 1876 Col. Carter sold the Expositor to the late W.
H. Malone, retaining only control of the editorials till after the great
campaign of 1876, when the Democrats again gained control of the political
affairs of North Carolina.

(1. A copy of this article can be found in "The Balsam Groves of
Grandfather Mountain" by S. M. Dugger, p. 261)

(2. W. W. Rollins to J. P. A., May 31, 1912)

(3. In July, 1871, the late Captain Natt Atkinson was running the Weekly
Citizen and continued to do so till 18?3, when the late Robert M. Furman
took charge of it.)

(4. The Watauga Journal was the first paper ever published in Boone, but
was soon succeeded by the Enferprise, both being Republican. The Journal
was started by a Mr. McLauchlin of Mooresvillc, N. C., but he afterwards
removed to Johnson City, Tenn. The Watauga News suspendcd publication in
1914.)