Sylva is going to hit the big screen next year, made over as the fictional town of Ebbing, Missouri, and home to a character portrayed by Oscar-winning actress Francis McDormand.

As national champion Karen Tripp likes to say, cyclo-cross is a sport that you win by seconds. And that’s just how the Sylva resident conquered nationals in Asheville this year. By seconds — 34 of them. 

“I think my mind and my focus was there,” Tripp said. “They all have to come together just right, because not every race is like that.”

School officials in Jackson County will be crossing their fingers over the next few weeks, hoping to get a low number back from a study looking at the cost of putting artificial turf on the football field of Smoky Mountain High School.

Ask any Sylva long-timer, and they’ll tell you that Main Street today looks a lot different than it did ten, five or even just a couple years ago. There’s an energy, a bustle, and a new cohort of businesses moving in to drive the feeling.

When 91-year-old Gertrude Mashburn tells strangers she’s a World War II veteran — a topic she usually brings up early in a conversation — she’s often met with skepticism. 

The Sylva Board of Commissioners election came down to the flip of a coin — literally.

The race for Sylva town board has been crowded since filing began, and the election remained close all the way to the ballot box. 

One gets hungry strolling downtown Sylva these days. For a town of around 2,600 residents, there sure are a lot of savory scents wafting from restaurants and cafes in seemingly every direction.

Construction is now underway for a new emergency department at Harris Regional Hospital in Sylva, an $11 million project that will replace the existing emergency department, nearly 30 years old.

High Country Tire Shop is an extra-busy place these days. Ever since Mountain Faith, the bluegrass family band whose members all work at the shop, made a splash on the national stage with their performances on America’s Got Talent, fans have been coming from all over just to see the band members at work.