Franklin, NC
Getting our Raisin’s
Residents of Sylva and Highlands did some community-building Memorial Day weekend. In Sylva, a volunteer effort to build a downtown park reached a milestone with the raising of the park’s timber frame pavilion. In Highlands, a 200 year-old covered bridge, shipped from New Hampshire, was drawn into place by a team of oxen [...]
REGIONAL(5.30.08)–Back in the winter I touched on North Carolina Attorney General Roy Cooper’s decision to open 1,896 miles of North Carolina back roads to 53-foot tractor-trailer traffic.
The roads, which include US Highway 64 between Franklin and Hendersonville and US 19 between Maggie Valley and Cherokee, are now limited to shorter trailers, most commonly used by [...]
REGIONAL/STATEWIDE(5.26.08)–Our oldest daughter, a kindergardener, got an automated call from her school principal at 6:30 yesterday morning, urging us to have her ready to test when she got to school.
“Avoid sugary foods,” he advised.
We weren’t sure six-year-olds were actually subject to end-of-year tests. If so, she didn’t cram. We’re certain that older schoolchildren and their [...]
SYLVA-This has been my opening line this past week with all of my friends and acquaintances: “Have you been to the Jackson County Farmers’ Market in downtown Sylva yet this year?”
I started this market, oh, maybe five or six years ago. It got off to a slow start, and has been growing slowly over the [...]
DEALS GAP–Residents of relatively remote Graham County are beginning to have to deal with the mixed blessing of motorcycles.
Deal’s Gap – a section of NC Highway 129 that is well-known nationally among motorcyclists – attracts thousands of cyclists each year. Known as “the Tail of the Dragon”, the road winds along the western border of [...]
FRANKLIN–I grew up in the Cullowhee valley, which, for Jackson County, is relatively broad and flat-bottomed. The valley is drained by a strong-flowing creek, and the Tuckasegee River passes nearby.
In centuries past, the lush valley was home to several Cherokee settlements, known by the eighteenth century as the “Out Towns” – because they were located [...]
CULLOWHEE–The first development phase of a regional “toolbox” of best planning practices wrapped up early last week with a summary presentation by planning and design specialists The Lawrence Group.
Approximately 150 community leaders from across the western tip of the state were on hand at Western Carolina University for the presentation, which ended up an intensive, [...]
SYLVA–North Carolina Attorney General Roy Cooper ruled on May 6 that the state’s 58 community colleges must immediately cease admitting undocumented students to degree-seeking programs.
The ruling came as a surprise to most everyone, including the community college system itself, and makes North Carolina the only state in the union to pursue such an action. In [...]
SYLVA–This has been my opening line this past week with all of my friends and acquaintances: “Have you been to the Jackson County Farmers’ Market in downtown Sylva yet this year?”
I started this market, oh, maybe five or six years ago. It got off to a slow start, and has been growing slowly over the [...]
My daughter, Ada, is a six year-old is deeply entrenched in what the manager of the children’s collection at our neighborhood bookstore knowingly calls the “horse phase”. The variety of toy horses corralled in our home is amazing, from scrubby My lil’ Ponies – undoubtedly unearthed in a ditch somewhere – to nerve-wracking mechanical horses, [...]