Rep. Queen invites labor secretary to Oconaluftee
 

Rep. Queen invites labor secretary to Oconaluftee

In an effort to save the Oconaluftee Job Corps Center from being shut down, N.C. Rep. Joe Sam Queen, D-Waynesville,…
Read More

Comment

Each floor features a cozy community room and a shared kitchen. Cory Vaillancourt photo
 

Major expansion set to open at Pathways

As homelessness continues to rise in Western North Carolina, Haywood County’s innovative and effective adult shelter is about to cut…
Read More

Comment

Haywood takes precaution amid measles outbreak
 

Haywood takes precaution amid measles outbreak

As public health officials continue to monitor the measles outbreak across the nation, Haywood County Schools will be taking more…
Read More

Comment

Shining Rock holds illegal meeting to dismiss parent grievances
 

Shining Rock holds illegal meeting to dismiss parent grievances

Editor’s note: This is the fourth in a series of stories on Haywood County’s public charter school, Shining Rock Classical Academy,…
Read More

Comment

Canton alderman resigns
 

Canton alderman resigns

Just 18 months after winning the second of two open alderman seats in the town of Canton, James Markey told…
Read More

Comment

Franklin cuts nonprofit funding from budget
 

Franklin cuts nonprofit funding from budget

The town of Franklin’s adopted 2019-20 budget will not include funding for local nonprofit organizations as it has in the…
Read More

Comment

Macon County raises taxes to fund public education
 

Macon County raises taxes to fund public education

The property tax rate in Macon County will be increasing by half a cent after commissioners approved a 2019-20 budget…
Read More

Comment

Denny Laine.
 

Carry me back to the days I knew then: Rock Hall of Famer Denny Laine rolls through WNC

Simply put, singer/guitarist Denny Laine is one of those mystical characters you cross paths with almost serendipitously.  He’s an old…
Read More

Comment

Fireworks during Phish at Bonnaroo 2019.
 

This must be the place: In a minute I’ll be free and we’ll be splashing in the sea

On Monday morning, as I woke up, packed and said goodbye to Bonnaroo for this year, I can say —…
Read More

Comment

Waynesville man arrested for solicitation, stalking
 

Waynesville man arrested for solicitation, stalking

Leonard “LJ” Green, of Waynesville, was arrestedby June 11 by the Waynesville Police Department for Solicitation for Prostitution and two…
Read More

Comment

A rare look into Swain County's past
 

A rare look into Swain County's past

Editor’s note: This column first appeared in a June 2005 edition of The Smoky Mountain News. Several weeks ago I…
Read More

Comment

Bears active in Panthertown
 

Bears active in Panthertown

Recent reports of increased bear encounters in Panthertown Valley have prompted a call for caution among visitors.
Read More

Comment

A vision for the Tuck: New WATR director looks to make strides in water quality improvement
 

A vision for the Tuck: New WATR director looks to make strides in water quality improvement

The Watershed Association of the Tuckasegee River has a new leader. Two years after former executive director Roger Clapp retired…
Read More

Comment

Jackson County to vote on budget
 

Jackson County to vote on budget

Jackson County Commissioners held a special-called meeting Tuesday, June 11, to vote on the proposed budget for fiscal year 2019-2020,…
Read More

Comment

Haywood NAACP members began submitting their opinions of the lynching monument at a meeting June 1.
 

NAACP mulls lynching monument in Haywood County

Last month, members of the Haywood Branch of the NAACP took a trip to Montgomery, Alabama to visit a museum…
Read More

Comment

McCoy, Sneed will be General Election  principal chief candidates
 

McCoy, Sneed will be General Election principal chief candidates

Voters made their choices during last week’s Primary Elections in Cherokee, with Teresa McCoy coming in as the top vote-getter…
Read More

Comment

Earl Lanning, known as a maker of historic rifles, is also an accomplished sculptor.
 

Haywood County to welcome Revolutionary War monument

Earl Lanning was just a little boy in Haywood County during the 1930s, he developed three ambitions. “I used to…
Read More

Comment

No tax increase in Waynesville budget
 

No tax increase in Waynesville budget

It's starting to sound like a broken record in Haywood County as North Carolina’s municipal budget season comes to a…
Read More

Comment

Abundant Labs CEO Chip Miller (left) and Haywood Chamber President CeCe Hipps announce Miller’s new endeavor in Canton.
 

Hemp processing operation coming to Canton

Haywood County’s latest economic development victory — a state-of-the-art, $12 million hemp processing facility — means that Canton will become…
Read More

Comment

Records show Catawba casino developer donated to bill sponsors
 

Records show Catawba casino developer donated to bill sponsors

Federal campaign finance records show that Wallace Cheves, developer for a proposed Catawba Indian Nation casino in Kings Mountain, donated…
Read More

Comment

Opposing abortion because of the victim
 

Opposing abortion because of the victim

To the Editor: In the June 5 issue of The Smoky Mountain News, Hannah McLeod imputes the motives of those…
Read More

Comment

Thanks for speaking out so forcefully
 

Thanks for speaking out so forcefully

To the Editor: I commend Hannah McLeod for speaking so forthrightly and forcefully about the new extreme abortion laws.
Read More

Comment

Twenty down,  20 more to go
 

Twenty down, 20 more to go

To the Editor: Hats off to Scott McLeod and the staff at SMN for navigating two decades of informative, entertaining…
Read More

Comment

Thank the hard-working journalists
 

Thank the hard-working journalists

To the Editor: Congratulations The Smoky Mountain News for its 20th anniversary. As a fifth-generation journalist, I thoroughly enjoyed reading…
Read More

Comment

Respect for others missing in Edwards’ response
 

Respect for others missing in Edwards’ response

In the most recent edition of the SMN (June 5), I read a guest editorial written by Mr. Sam Edwards…
Read More

Comment

You won’t make friends like this again
 

You won’t make friends like this again

 By the time she was 4-years-old, my daughter was better at making friends than I have ever been. When we…
Read More

Comment

Oconaluftee Job Corps center to close
 

Oconaluftee Job Corps center to close

  For more than 50 years, disadvantaged youth struggling to find their way in the world have had the chance…
Read More

Comment

Interstate 40's westbound lanes in Haywood County are now closed indefinitely.
 

Interstate 40 closed indefinitely after another rockslide

Less than four months after a rockslide in Haywood County closed a 20-mile stretch of Interstate 40, it’s happened again.…
Read More

Comment

Tiny hemp seedlings sprout at the North Carolina Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services' Mountain Research Station in Haywood County in July, 2017.
 

Abundant Labs to open hemp processing facility in Canton

Haywood County’s latest economic development victory – a state of the art, $12 million hemp processing facility – means that…
Read More

Comment

Jackson County to vote on budget June 11
 

Jackson County to vote on budget June 11

The Jackson County Commissioners will adopt the budget for fiscal year 2019-2020 in a special-called meeting at 1:30 p.m. Tuesday,…
Read More

Comment

Primary Election results return to Cherokee
 

Primary Election results return to Cherokee

Preliminary results are in from Cherokee’s June 6 Primary Election.
Read More

Comment

A work by Michelle Railey.
 

The art of togetherness

Five years ago, Michelle and Robby Railey had one question in mind. “How do we get to the next level?”…
Read More
Passion is no excuse for spreading error
 

Passion is no excuse for spreading error

Upon seeing Hannah McLeod’s recent guest column published in these pages on May 29, my first reaction was that it…
Read More

Comment

When the universe offers gifts, unwrap them
 

When the universe offers gifts, unwrap them

The final school bells have rung.  When I was teaching, the last few weeks of school were grueling and felt…
Read More

Comment

Kids get running outside. Donated photo
 

Kids in Parks logs one million TRACK Trails adventures

In its mission to engage children with the outdoors, the Blue Ridge Parkway Foundation’s Kids in Parks program is marking…
Read More

Comment

Limestone sand was added directly to the stream at Wolf Laurel Branch to reduce acidity of the water. Water clarity returned to normal after 30 minutes. Donated photo
 

Lime treatment reverses acid rain effects

You can’t always believe what you see. The water in our mountain streams is sometimes polluted even though it appears…
Read More

Comment

Mainspring expands to Sylva
 

Mainspring expands to Sylva

Mainspring Conservation Trust now has an office in downtown Sylva. 
Read More

Comment

The Naturalist's Corner: 20 years are in the can; as they say in the biz
 

The Naturalist's Corner: 20 years are in the can; as they say in the biz

I can’t, thinking back now, remember what the two floors below us were at 9 Main Street, in 1999 when…
Read More

Comment

Loving every word of it, all 630,000
 

Loving every word of it, all 630,000

Let’s start with some basic mathematics. For 20 years, I have reviewed books for The Smoky Mountain News. For some…
Read More

Comment

Anna Fariello.
 

Fariello receives Lifetime Achievement Award

Author and curator Anna Fariello was given a Lifetime Achievement Award at the Folk Art Center during the annual meeting…
Read More

Comment

Backstage in Canton with Balsam Range, January 2013. (photo: Garret K. Woodward)
 

This must be the place: No fear or shame in the dignity of your experience, language and knowledge

The first week I lived and worked in Western North Carolina, I slept underneath my desk in the old newsroom…
Read More

Comment

BearWaters Brewing.
 

Crafting together community: How craft beer impacted WNC

According to recent numbers, there are around 75 breweries within Asheville and greater Western North Carolina. And 19 of those…
Read More

Comment

This 1999 photo is of (from left) Neil Torda, Greg Boothroyd and me, the three founders of The Smoky Mountain News. Torda was a jack-of-all trades who did all the IT work and was a graphic designer. He now works in IT at Western Carolina University.
 

Twenty years later, another edition done

In the beginning, one doesn’t even think about the long run. When you’re fighting every day to survive, there’s no…
Read More

Comment

Since the mid-1990s several groups have been working to return the GSMNP  to solid footing in WNC’s outdoor recreation and tourism-driven economy.
 

1999: Smokies works to overcome hurdles

It’s no coincidence that the Great Smoky Mountains National Park was the subject of The Smoky Mountain News’ first-ever front-page…
Read More

Comment

Adult male elk can weigh up to 1,000 pounds, though 600 to 800 pounds is more common.  @bigrromantic photo
 

2001: Elk return to Western North Carolina

“A large herd gathered last week on a remote, historical farmstead maintained by the Great Smoky Mountains National Park, in…
Read More

Comment

2003: The end of Eric Rudolph’s run
 

2003: The end of Eric Rudolph’s run

He was a seasoned dumpster diver by now. For the last three summers, he’d regularly swoop down in the dead…
Read More

Comment

Many, including these residents of Clyde, lost everything. File photo
 

2004: Floods ravage Western North Carolina

The tiny central Haywood County town of Clyde lies more than 270 miles from the Atlantic Ocean, more than 400…
Read More

Comment

2005: State passes education lottery system
 

2005: State passes education lottery system

Nearly 15 years after the North Carolina General Assembly narrowly passed a bill establishing an education lottery system, state legislators…
Read More

Comment

2007: Journey from the Road to Nowhere
 

2007: Journey from the Road to Nowhere

If you can’t understand why people in Swain County are distrustful of the federal government, then you are among those…
Read More

Comment

In this 2009 photo, Rick Boyd conducts a foreclosure sale of two large tracts owned by developer Legasus outside the Jackson County courthouse while concerned citizen Thomas Crowe follows along.
 

2008: Real estate takes a major hit

The housing bubble was finally bursting in 2008 as the Great Recession became the new reality in Western North Carolina…
Read More

Comment

Smokey Mountain News Logo
SUPPORT THE SMOKY MOUNTAIN NEWS AND
INDEPENDENT, AWARD-WINNING JOURNALISM
Go to top
Payment Information

/

At our inception 20 years ago, we chose to be different. Unlike other news organizations, we made the decision to provide in-depth, regional reporting free to anyone who wanted access to it. We don’t plan to change that model. Support from our readers will help us maintain and strengthen the editorial independence that is crucial to our mission to help make Western North Carolina a better place to call home. If you are able, please support The Smoky Mountain News.

The Smoky Mountain News is a wholly private corporation. Reader contributions support the journalistic mission of SMN to remain independent. Your support of SMN does not constitute a charitable donation. If you have a question about contributing to SMN, please contact us.