French Broad hustler. [volume] (Hendersonville, N.C.) 1916-1919, 1919-04-03
:" OLD TIMERS "
(By Patsy O'Brien)

IVY uedfC > III LHS I1SHI6L1u0 WHSIe'
ever I so.
Farewell to the Highlands, farewell to
the North,
The birthplace OF valour, the country
of worth;
Wherever [ wander, wherever I rove,
The hills of the Highlands forever
love.
er'd with snow;
Farewell to the straths and the green
valleys below;
Farewell to the forests and wild-hang-
ing woods;
Farewell to the torrents and louc-
pouring floods.
my hearts in the Highlands, where
ever l go.
Robert Burns.
AS the "fount of eternal youth"
wooed Ponce de Leon to the new
world, so the price and quantity of
land has wooed many a Britisher to
america. The possession of land is q
consuming passion with "Old Eng
lands" sons. They think in hundreds
of acres while the American laughs at
his brothers eccentricities and is con
tent with enough ground to bury him.
When we stop to think of it we are
no longer astonished at finding so
many Scotch names through these
mountains, where but in the mountains
would the "canny Scotchman" feel at
home? 1t needs but very little scrat-
ching of the surface to bring forth
many interesting tales of these imi-
grants. Among the old settlers tina;
have come and gonr. We fini in the
group of Scotch names MacLaughli3
as the first.
In 1916 Mr.. MacLaughl;1 came from
Cleveland, Ohio, down thro Ign the
valleys of the ALLEGHENY Mountains,
over the Great Smokes, until on the
southern slope with the Blue Ridge
towering on all sides he came to Z
halt. 1t is said the great brawny
Scotchman wept like a baby when ne
looked around and saw to the East
and the West, the North and the South,
the blue of the mountains merging
into the blue of the sky. "Ah, he is
reported to have said, they are jusc
like the Draw hollands Of bonnie
Scotland.
He stayed and the place that is
now owned by Mrs. Seigling was his
home. Fashioned after the Scottish
it resembled the homes of the
lords in the "old countrie." Il
is much changed and moderEized now.
With Mr.. Mclaughlin came Mrs.
Eaird a true Scotch woman. She llv- |
I'd for a time in the little house on
street on the property of the
Pine Grove Lodge, later came Mr..
Baird, who bought a place near where
Osceola Inn stands today. Mrs /
3aird's last years were spent with a
nephew Mr.. John Waddel on the VII
ow road, she was well known anc
owed in this community and mourned
~ many when she died.
One Scotchman in a place will acc
Is a magnet, and SO we are not sur
orised to find that in 1858 another
by the name Of Conneli,
,ame to this valley straight from Stir
ing Scotland, which is at the head of
he Firth of Forth not very far from
glasgow. Mr.. Connell became the
manager of Mr.. Mlneux beautiful
called Brooklands, and twelve
later brought out his fiance
md thus established himself here. A
years later he left Brooklands and
vent up the Davidson River but in
8S9 he came back and bought the
singleton place known as Hillside
where he lived until his feeble health
tecessitated a change of life, when he
vent to live with one of his sons. Mrs.
is still living a delightful
Scotch lady who loves these
Mountains as she did the mountains
+ her childhood home.
The next few years rolled by with
ut any more additions to the little
but in 1871 Mr.. Finnily came
tut with his thirteen children anG
Fought a thousand acres on the Viii
road. On the place stands the
uins of the double log cabin where
le lived, and before the door stand
.wo Laburnum trees which he brougn:
him from Scotland. On the size
If the mountain where a rushing
,tream tumbles headlong into the val
ey below stands an old mill; moss