Published by The History Press
Charleston, SC
www.historypress.net
Copyright 2017 by Christopher Blake
All rights reserved
Front cover: View from the Chimneys on the Gorges east rim. The pillar to the left is the Camel and ahead lie, first, Table Rock, then Hawksbill Mountain. Behind the view lie Shortoff Mountain and Lake James. Ken Thomas, public domain.
First published 2017
e-book edition 2017
ISBN 978.1.43966.168.0
Library of Congress Control Number: 2017934946
print edition ISBN 978.1.62585.884.9
Notice: The information in this book is true and complete to the best of our knowledge. It is offered without guarantee on the part of the author or The History Press. The author and The History Press disclaim all liability in connection with the use of this book.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form whatsoever without prior written permission from the publisher except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.
Sacred places are for the most part storied settings: a little part of some great soul cleaved to these walls, to these heights
Louis Aragon, surrealist poet
In our land [Ireland] there is no river or mountain that is not associated in the memory with some event or legend.I would have our writers and craftsmen of many kinds master this history and these legends, and fix upon their memory the appearance of mountains and rivers and make it all visible again in their arts.
W.B. Yeats
TO THE READER
The popular Linville Falls and the Linville Gorge Wilderness Area have been described dozens of times. Both fictional and historical accounts abound, and we have records of this wild and spectacular place that reflect the interest of botanists, geologists, preservationists, outdoors educators, students of pioneer culture, hikers and climbers and historians. No less valuable have been the creative interpretations of poets, painters, novelists and photographers.
This book offers a rich and representative sampling of these varied perspectives, familiarity with which, it is hoped, will deepen your experience of this exceptional place.
Christopher Blake
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
For all the help Ive gotten along the way, I am grateful indeed. One book opens another, the old alchemists were fond of saying, and in my searches I found authors like Carolyn Sakowski invaluable in pointing out to me source after sourcethe Jules Verne connection to Table Rock, for example. Her list of works cited at the end of Touring Western North Carolinas Backroads displays all that is best in a thorough bibliography. Much of my own work has involved merely procuring copies of the materials and providing brief introductory notes to them. And so my debts to other writers, curators and archivists are many and obvious. Here I should like to acknowledge assistance of those individuals and institutions that lent me the most support in my work.
For permission to reprint his poem on Bea Hensley, I heartily thank Mr. Jonathan Williams of Highlands, North Carolina. I thank Fred Brown, editor of Browns Guide to Georgia, for the permission to reprint Tom Pattersons 1978 article Linville. Thanks also to editor Jamie Shell at the Avery Journal-Times for letting me include rescue reports from his paper. River benefits greatly from the naturalist gorge expertise shared by local biology professor Stewart Skeate and speleologist Dr. Cato Holler.
For her help with statistical information on the Linville Gorge Wilderness Area, I thank Ms. Miera Crawford of the Grandfather Ranger District Office of the U.S. Forest Service, Pisgah National Forest in Nebo, North Carolina. Interpretive specialist for the Blue Ridge Parkway Jonathan Bennet is to be thanked for bringing Lyman Drapers biography of Daniel Boone to my notice.
I am highly grateful for the assistance of former special collections librarian Helen D. Wykle at the D. Hiden Ramsey Library of the University of North Carolina at Asheville. Ms. Wykle helped me obtain analog copies of historic photographs from the Ewart M. Ball Photographic Collection and rights of reproduction for them. Serendipitous was it for me to meet a person so well informed about the travel and tourism literature of western North Carolina.
Ms. Norma Myers, curator of East Tennessee State Universitys Archives of Appalachia at the Charles C. Sherrod Library, provided me with access to the D.R. Beeson Sr. journal and photographic album record of the trip to Table Rock Mountain that Mr. Beeson made with his friends in 1914. Mr. Beesons son D.R. Beeson Jr. of Johnson City, Tennessee, has graciously given permission for the publication of his fathers journal in this book.
Ms. Andrea Fey, former alumni coordinator of the North Carolina Outward Bound School in Asheville, was instrumental in answering my questions about the early years of Outward Bound at Table Rock Mountain. Ms. Fey also kindly let me make a copy of the promotional film Solo (1969), which includes footage of this editor and Anakiwa Crew. Messrs. Dave Mashburn and Jack Shirey were godsends in clarifying certain puzzling references in my Outward Bound 1967 course journal. Ms. Deb Whitmore, program director at Outward Bound, shared valuable insights on the growth of the school over the years since I attended and invited me to tour the much-changed facility.
I thank the staffs of the Carson Library at Lees-McRae College in Banner Elk, North Carolina; the Carol Belk Library at Appalachian State University Library in Boone, North Carolina; and the Burke County Public Library in Morganton, North Carolina. Mr. Keith Longiotti of UNC-Chapel Hills Wilson Library was especially helpful in locating the photographs among the Hugh Morton Collection. Parkway Publishers 2005 edition of River put me in touch with Linville living legends Bob Underwood and Allen Hydeand, through them, the very-much-active Gorge Rats (with its Lady Gorge Rats auxiliary) reached at www.linvillegorge.net. They all expanded my consciousness of this gorgeous place.
My Friends of Linville Gorge group (FOLG) has no Internet presence, nor much of an organization, but it offers gorge visits to hikers in good condition. Formed in 1993 around guided mushroom walks or forays conducted by fungi expert, or mycologist, Pete Whelihan, the group contracted in 2006 with the Grandfather Ranger Districts Adopt-a-Trail Program and undertook trail maintenance training at the USFS training facility in Woodlawn, North Carolina. Program coordinator Pat Wilson taught us the requisite non-motorized hand-labor means of maintaining wilderness access. FOLG adopted the Devils Hole Trail in 2006 and, in 2014, added care of forestry trails on the canyons west side: Bynums Bluff, Cabin and Babel Tower Trails, each joined by the main northsouth footpath paralleling the river, the Linville Gorge Trail. Many volunteer groups, including scouts, cooperate in keeping these wonderful trails open.
Finally, words fail to describe the magnitude of the debt I owe to my beloved friend and companion Dorothy Watson, with whom I moved to the Falls and Gorge area in 1993. Together, we learned about the birds, trees and wildflowers of the wilderness while exploring its many trails. My best friend, Pete Whelihan, brought his expertise with wild mushrooms to Gorge forays and continues to sell wild species to the chefs of Asheville from his My-Co Gardens farm in Alexander, North Carolina. Ms. Wendy Funk at the Linville Falls Lodge and Spears Restaurant and Ms. Martha Piercy at the Linville Falls General make the little community an especially friendly, hospitable place from which to launch gorge adventures.
