Newspapers / The Franklin Press and … / June 26, 1925, edition 1 / Page 5
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FRIDAY, JUNE 2 Z2i THE FRANKLIN PRESS PAGE THREE llic Civil War. Since that time the pe riod of development has gone for ward. At limes it lias been slow so slow to be seemingly inprcceptible At no time was it rapid. For three decades the lack of railroad' practic ally isolated this section. Highways are the product of the last few years. When the railroad did come, it left us tied to Georgia rather than our own. state, the large corporation' con trolling it, working through a lobbied legislature and some of our own gullible representatives, refusing to build the thirty miles necessary to couple a trunk line from the Ohio to the sea. Until the . coming of the surfaced highways this pratically made Ma con county, in all save political bound aries a portion of Georgia. For years we have been cut off by the lack of transportation system from our own State. The" very discrimi nation has however nroven our. greatest boon, for with the comple tion of our hard surfaced highways we have become the gateway through which the travel from Georgia, Ala bama, Flordia, Mississippi, and the other Southern States must pass in entering the great Western N. C. play ground. Rapid motor transit makes us one with Western North Carolina and gives us an untold advantage in our rail and motor connection with Georgia and the South. Wt must push rapidly forward and get ahead of our story. It is imposi ble within the scope of this' article to narrate all the minor incidents which has come about during the last 4rrt1' rrnrt At-Q f irvne Qttil. wtlilp it-- ift al- ways true that the history of any county is the biography of its peo ple, we cannot, here, do justice to them and therefore resist any im pulse toward personal biography. Macon has beep 'fortunate in the character, of its citizenship. It is, as if solidity of the mountain, the time less of the crags, the vision of far places from lofty heights, has crept into the souls and personalites of these men of Macon and had made them strong in faith and far reach ing the vision. It is not our province liere to record their lives. We shall merely chronicle some of the land marks of progress which they have brought about. . Macon Genaral Conditions In the Nineties. , For sonic years prior to 1889, va rious schools of a subscription nature had been taught at various places around town. In addition to this subscription school .a public school was erected. Neither were very large nor -was the term very long. In lSi9 the Methodist church built the building now occupied by the Franklin Terrace and established a school . under the principalship of Frank ' Siler. This school continued with several intermissions until the establishment of the graded schools some fifteen years or more ago. This school was established principally through the efforts of Dr. J. M. Lyle. As a general indication of condi tions jn Macon county as well as the progress made since that time it is in teresting to note that, in 1890, there were only four people in Macon coun ty who paid tax' on more than $10, 000.00 worth of property. Rope Elias was the largest proper ty owner.listing for taxation property valued at $27,895, N. L. Barnard listed $19,449, Jackson Johntson $13,342. and W. H. Higdon, property valued at $10,356. . The identical property to day 's worth between a half million and a million dollars. In 1895 the tot al value of all land in Macon county was .$804,000. The 'iiue today is be: ter than five million. For that year the ' following taxes; were collected: General purposes $6,543.72; Schools $4,755.10; States purposes $2,55591. In 1923 twenty-eight yi'ars later a toal of $116,710.17 was collected in this connty In short property valuations have grown 800 per cent and taxes, collect have increased in like proportion. Population grow.th has . not been so marked. In lls90 there were 9, 436 white and 666 colored inhabitants of Macon, a total of 10.102. The present population is a little over two thousand greater than at that time. It will be recalled that great numbers of our folks have gone to the west, particularly during the last three decades. We Tiave furnished a gov ernor for one western state, a con gressman or two from others and numerous leaders who have built up the present great empire of the west out of an unsettled wilderness. Lack of advantages for development owing to our isolation and lack of transpor tation failities have caused this emi gration. Hardly a family in the coun ty is without members in some state of the Rocky Mountain or Pacific slope secton. Happily this continued hegira no longer continues for th'e youth of Macon today sees greater opportunities at home than anywhere in the whole land. To fine roads and adequate transportation of products, more than any other one thing, is the multitude of opportunities due today. Highlands In 1872, Chas. Hutchison and S. F. Kelsey of Kansas bought BOO acres of land from J. W, Dobson on the west plateau of Satulah Mountain. The .legend has it that Kelsey and llutclii : on had taken a indp of the U. S. and, on it, had drawn two lines, one run ning from New York to New Or leans, the other from Chicago to Savannah 'or Charleston. Working under the theory that the point of intersection of these lines would be the exact center of popula tion between the great population ccitcrs of the east and would make an ideal location for a summer and health resort, they set out to locate the spot and came to Franklin and on to the present site of Highlands. Whether or not. that is a true story, is of little importance for they came to where Highlands now stands,' Kel sey bringing his family in that year and Hutchison his the next. , Others soon came, among them Capt. S. P. Ravenel of Charleston, S. G, who built a 'fine summer home. Others have come until today High lands is a prosperous town of over 500 people. It has been developed and built by a splendid type of people and perhaps represents as high type of cultured community as may be found any where. During the last few years it has established a bank, , put in a splendid water system and made other improvements. . ' It is the highest incorporated town cast of the Rockies, having an eleva tion of nearly four thousand feet above sea . level. It has steadily grown in favor as a summer and health resort. Railroad Development As has been pointfed out before Macon county fought for rail trans portation for years. Before the Civil War a project was under construction from Port Royal and Charleston, S. C. through Walhalla and Rabun Gap to the Tennessee river and .thence down it on the natural water grade, through to Knoxville and thfe Ohio river region. Work was well under way on this when the Civil War broke out. Structures of fine masonry may today be seen near Clayton, Ga., on the proposed line. Through the 'Blue Ridge between Clayton and Walhalla a long tunnel lacks only a few feet of being completed. The present Tallulah Falls Railway uses a mile or two of the grade completed by this antebellum project. The coming of the Civil War stop ped work on" this project before it reached the state line and MacOn was forced to forego a position on one of what would have been one of five trunkline railroads crossing the Blue Ridge into the Mississippi valley, south of the Potomac river. Various schemes 'were devised for the 'promotion of a railroad through .Rabun Gap during the three. decades following the war At one time the county authorized $100,000 in bonds to aid the construction of a line but plans fell through and the money was never made available. In 1884 the Mufphcy branch of the Western, N. C. R. R. entered Macotn county and extended for a distance of two and one half 'miles across the ertreme northwest corner. The com ing of this line did not affect the coun ty as its location lies in the most in accessable part. of it and through only one corner. v In connection with the construction of this line, a line was authorized by the legislature, from Almond up the Tennessee to Franklin. Under the terms of the act five hundred convicts were to be; placed on this line and it was to be pushed to completion. The W. N. C. R. R. had been about this time, leased to the Richmond and Danville R. R. The representative of this road made some kind of an ar rangement with the representative from Macon in the General Assembly by which the privision dealing with the Franklin-Almond line was killed. Whatever promises were made as a basis for this repeal, it is needless to say that they were unfulfilled. It was not until 1905 that ground was broken in Macon county for a railroad which should serve as a practical outlet. On November 13th of that year forces entered the coun ty at the. state line working on the Tallulah Falls lifte. . The first train to enter the county on this line was a work train which entered on May 9, 1906. The road was completed to Franklin during the sur.rner of 1907. "( During the Present Century The first bank chartered in Macon county opened for business in 1903 with a capital of $10,000. Geo. A. Jones was president and J. T. Siler cashier. In 1905, two years after opening it had deposits to the extent of $68,427.07, a surplus of $2,000.00 and undivided prohts of $3,033.00. Macon county adopted prohibition permanently in 1903. At 'that time the dispensary was voted out by an overwhelming majority. In 1893 Franklin was visited by a disasterous fire. All buildings east of where the McCoy block now stands on the south side of Mairt street were wiped out. Among these were the old Bell house on the site of the pres ent Franklin Hotel, a building owned by E. H. Franks, two stores owned by S. H. Lyle and E. H. Franks and a large iivery stable owned by "Uncje D." Cunningham. The total loss pf all of this property was estimated at $15,000. With the entrance of the U. S. into the World War in 1917 Macon county gave unsparingly of her wealth of money and of men. Over 1000 men went into service. Of that number 13. were killed and many more were wounded in more or less serious degree. . Liberty loan drives were over sub scribed ami the various war activities splendidly, supported. Macon County Today , Macon county contains 513 square miles, 328,320 acres, and is located on the headwaters of the Little Tennessee river. It lies mainly in a natural basin formed by the CoWce mountains on the eastern boundary and the Nanta hala mountains on the west. Macon county is watered by the , Little Tennessee, Cullasaja and Nantahala rivers, and by numerous creeks and smaller streams.. The county abounds in fertile valleys, where bountiful cfops can be grown with the mini mum , of labor and no commercial fertilizer whatever. Macon county's altitule ranges from 1,900 to 5,567 feet. The incorporated towns in the county, with population according to the 1920 . census, are : Franklin, the county seat,, 773; Highlands, 313. There are 19 other post offices in Macon county, and 4 Rural Free Delivery Routes, serving 97 miles" , of territory, and 3 Star Routes. Dujing the last twenty years great progress has been made. Franklin has paved her streets, put in electric lights, a water aid sewerage system, built her best buildings, has developed into a business center for the whole county, p.oads have been built, hotels erected. 'he population has increased tourists have come, and Macon coun ty has ju?t begun to awake, to come out of the chrysalis of her transfor mation. Her resources in natural endowment and in energy of her people have not been -.ouched. With abounding water power, virgin forests of finest hard wood, the fiuest climate in the world. with good. roads, unsurpassed scenery, with , vision, faith and energy her fu ture is beyond imagination. The pioneer days are over. The history of those days has been re corded here in a most general way. What is not written here is eternally carved in the life of her people, the soundness of her foundations, the high type of spirit which is the heri tage of her citizenship. . Her.luture lies before her. A future which lies in the sound development of every phase of her life; the con servative use and sensible' exploita tion of every resource that is hers. In every respect her history is a challenge to her future, the work of her pioneers a stimulus to their sons and daughters. nn AT JV C2 o nn o n , u u u w u JV - v Charley Morgan's place has passed the stage of being a mere garage. . It has become an institution. ' . Since the first old White Steamer puffed its way through the mud of Franklin's Main Drag and that was somewhere back yonder! Charley Morgan has been actively engaged in the auto mobile business. Mechanic, garage owner, dealer -he has been in touch with the business from every angle. And that particular bit of knowledge about the innards of a gas engine which Char ley Morgan has not acquired has been torn out of the book. , 1 In other words At Charley's place The City Garage your problem is met by knowledge, not guess work; and when the job is finished you KNOW that it is done RIGHT. We work on no other basis. ; And here is another consideration: At night when the other fellows have closed up you will find Charley Morgan's place open and a skilled mechanic there ready to help you out of your trouble. Likewise on Sundays. Y our phone. If you break down on the road, he will lend a sympathetic ear to your tale of woe. And, what's more important, get a trouble car out to you in record time. ; On the Fourth we would enjoy having you drop in for a friendly call. No matter whether you need anything for the old but or not, come in and say hello. We have a bunch of new accessories we'd like to have you lamp or maybe you'd be interested in hearing about the best light touring car in the world. -.r.,k rnUU.(.an'y: Anyway, drop by and swap yarns and tobacco with us, if nothing else. . , raw 11 TO AMBUS PALMER STREET V v PHONE 40 S . FRANKLIN, N. C j
The Franklin Press and the Highlands Maconian (Franklin, N.C.)
Standardized title groups preceding, succeeding, and alternate titles together.
June 26, 1925, edition 1
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