No region has undergone more dramatic changes in the last century than Western North Carolina. Published in 1973, Western North Carolina Since the Civil War takes a look at the mountain people and their uniquely structured economic, political, social, and cultural systems. The Van Noppens specifically explore the different qualities of the mountain people such as their institutions, traditions, customs, and arts and crafts. Beginning with a dark period of social and economic disintegration after the end of the Civil War, the study traces the mountain peoples' lives from isolation to economic booms all while maintaining their traditions and cultural heritage.

Published in 1977, Western North Carolina is a narrative history of the Southern Appalachian Mountains up to 1880. Ora Blackmun depicts the stories of native Cherokee and Sequoyah people and pioneers such as William Bartram, Daniel Boone, Bishops Spangenberg and Asbury, and Zeb Vance.

The ancient hills of Western North Carolina have cradled a culture that encompasses Cherokee heritage, pioneer legacies and urban visions. For those who visit and those who make the region their home, there is something captivating about the mountains of Western North Carolina. We meet Lillian Exum Clement, the first female legislator in the South; and Nina Simone, the African American singing prodigy from Tryon. We get to view controversial elements of the Civil War in Western North Carolina from multiple points of view and draw our own conclusions. We comprehend the variety of people who have created the region as it exists now--alive with traditions, contradictions and promise. Instead of merely reciting historical fact, and with a warm, accessible style, Asheville Citizen Times writer Rob Neufeld helps readers understand the history of the mountains by allowing us to walk in the shoes of the Native Americans, farmers, soldiers and others who preceded us. More than an enlightening read, this book illuminates the progression of frontier life that we have come to know as Western North Carolina history. By linking the lives and experiences of the land's various inhabitants, Neufeld captures the spirit of Appalachia within this volume.

Antebellum Southern Appalachia has long been seen as a classless and essentially slaveless region - one so alienated and isolated from other parts of the South that, with the onset of the Civil War, highlanders opposed both secession and Confederate war efforts. In a multifaceted challenge to these basic assumptions about Appalachian society in the mid-nineteenth century, John Inscoe reveals new variations on the diverse motives and rationales that drove Southerners, particularly in the Upper South, out of the Union. Mountain Masters vividly portrays the wealth, family connections, commercial activities, and governmental power of the slaveholding elite that controlled the social, economic, and political development of western North Carolina. In examining the role played by slavery in shaping the political consciousness of mountain residents, the book also provides fresh insights into the nature of southern class interaction, community structure, and master-slave relationships.

Buried deep within the hills and hollers of North Carolina's majestic Appalachian Mountains are stories, traditions and a proud cultural heritage unlike any other. Hidden History of the Western North Carolina Mountains reveals the people, customs and folklore of the region, exploring bygone traditions, fascinating real-life characters and tales so tall they rival the peaks that shape the landscape. What was life like for workers in the gristmills? Was Abraham Lincoln actually born in Bostic in Rutherford County? Who was Amos Owens, and why was he known as the "Cherry Bounce King"? Journey through the mountains with North Carolinian Alice Sink as she investigates these and other questions, unveiling the history of life in western North Carolina that traditional accounts have overlooked.

"In the late twentieth century, residents of the Blue Ridge mountains in western North Carolina fiercely resisted certain environmental efforts, even while launching aggressive initiatives of their own. Kathryn Newfont provides context for those events by examining the environmental history of this region over the course of three hundred years, identifying what she calls commons environmentalism--a cultural strain of conservation in American history that has gone largely unexplored. Efforts in the 1970s to expand federal wilderness areas in the Pisgah and Nantahala national forests generated strong opposition. For many mountain residents the idea of unspoiled wilderness seemed economically unsound, historically dishonest, and elitist. Newfont shows that local people's sense of commons environmentalism required access to the forests that they viewed as semipublic places for hunting, fishing, and working. Policies that removed large tracts from use were perceived as 'enclosure' and resisted. Incorporating deep archival work and years of interviews and conversations with Appalachian residents, Blue Ridge Commons reveals a tradition of people building robust forest protection movements on their own terms."--p. [4] of cover.

"The Ultimate Guide to Asheville & the Western North Carolina Mountains is the regional guidebook to Asheville and vast mountain region of North Carolina. In print since 1998, this latest up-to-date edition written by a local author Lee James Pantas is a wonderful resource for vacation or relocation planning. An easy-to-use, superbly indexed guide that covers every aspect of Asheville as well as in-depth coverage of all of the other 70 cities and towns, from the foothills to the highest peaks, including Boone, Hendersonville, Hickory, Lenoir, Morganton and Waynesville"--Amazon.com.

Eighteen stories deal with witches, ghosts, an enchanted lake, a phantom choir, a lover's leap, Bigfoot, fairies, and magic.