Western Carolina Democrat and French Broad hustler. [volume] (Hendersonville, N.C.) 1913-1915, 1913-06-05
WORDS OF WISDOM.

Wonderland 10 Graphically For
trayed.
In season and out of season The
Sun for more than ten years has
been preaching the gospel OF
good roads to the public OF
Rutherford county. The natural
beauties of the Chimney Rock
section, and the inviting POSSIBLE
bilities of Hickory Nut Gap, have
been pressed upon them by urgent
editorials, and the copied articles
of the tourists and newspaper cor
respondents. Summer after sum-
NE has come and gone; Ashevifle
and Hendersonville have more
than doubled in population; the
private boarding houses In Hen
derson county and along the
Reedy Patch Gap have been filled
to OVERLOOKING oftentimes by visi-
tors who have scattered out and
found quiet and rest in this noun
tain Wonderland; and the hotels
at Chimney Rock and along the
Hickory Nut Gap have had Incl
dental patronage from the over
flow of these towns. Yet Ruth
erfordton and Rutherford county,
the natural gateway to Hickory
Nut Gap and Reedy Patch, have
been negligible, because in the
first place, the country road from
Rutherfordton, the terminus Of
the Seaboard Air Line, has not
been improved, graded and kept
in proper condition, and conse-
quently, the Seaboard Air Line
has not thought it worth while to
take up the matter of advertising
this beautiful section. The South
ern Railway from Spartanburg on
the South and from Marion on the
North of US, has pre-empted Hen
Jacksonville on the one side. and
Asheville on the other, and so
tourists from the eastern and cen
trail portions of our own State
have been thus diverted from
Hickory Nut Gap which one Of
the greatest geologist of this
country said was "of all the great
mountain passes the most wonder
full and most beautiful" The
great engineers of half a century
ago said Of this gap "that it was
the most easy and practical of all
the passes through the Blue
Ridge" In an article written
more than half a score of years
ago, Col. Fred Olds said, cit is a
strange fact that the only bit of
railroad which those great minds
of the past planned between the
South Atlantic ports and the Pa.
eifc is the little portion between
Rutherfordton, N. c., and Knox
vile. Tenn, traversing this very
Nut Gap" rH'~-
Things shave changed wonder
fully in the last decade; and we
feel, gentlemen of the Seaboard
Air Line, that we have put the
matter up to you. Our county
has voted the issue of $250,0O0 for
road improvement and forces of
hands are at this moment work
ing between Rutherfordton and
Chimney Rock, repairing the road
skillful direction Of a road
builder and engineer. The road
will be ready by June LIST for
travel. Will you help us by illus
trated folders and hand-books,
such as the Southern has publish
ed about Hendesonville and Ashe-
to make a start this season,
and bring to this gateway the
tourist travel that naturally be-
here and which has been di-
verted from us?
Chimney Rock and Hickory Nut
Gap are on the proposed highway
from Charlotte to Asheville. In
addition'to the $250,0OO, part of
the $4,OOO appropriated by the
Federal Government will probably
be spent here. Before long this
highway will be completed. Some
will. then take up an
electric line to Chimney Rock and
Bat Cave, and the water power for
such a line is right here now.
Our county invested a hundred
thousand dollars in the Seaboard,
and we naturally look to it as our
road. If Opportunity knocks but
once, it would seem that hour has
come.
Col. John T. Patrick is up at
Chimney Rock and he's not there
for nothing. He's a sane, intelli-
gent hustler. He has invested
largely there, and his coming has
enhearted all our people. Some
Company is going to open up the