Maggie Valley Board of Aldermen welcomed Dave Angel to town Monday night after approving his request for a special exception permit to operate Elevated Mountain Distillery.

Maggie Valley had the opportunity to select new leadership in this election, but residents voted for incumbents to continue the progress made over the last four years. 

A brand new craft distillery is looking to set up shop in the former Carolina Nights dinner theater building in Maggie Valley, but the owner will first have to get special permission from town aldermen.

For a town that may only have 300 voters show up to the polls, the mayoral race in Maggie Valley has garnered plenty of interest this election year.

The four candidates vying for two seats on the Maggie Valley Board of Aldermen can all agree on one point — the town is in much better shape than it was two years ago. 

I was told “good luck.”

In August 2012, as one of my first assignments for The Smoky Mountain News, I found myself at the doorstep of the Maggie Valley Opry House. Owned and operated by acclaimed banjoist Raymond Fairchild, I was told “good luck” when it came to actually having a civil interview with the bluegrass icon. Referred to as “crabby” or “ironclad,” I wondered just how well my sit-down with him would actually go.

Heading north on State Road 135, just outside the small town of Nashville, Indiana, the stretch of pavement curves along a mountain ridge, as if you’re rolling along the spine of a snake. Though the last rays of summer are still holding strong back in Western North Carolina, fall colors had spilled onto the endless landscape of multi-colored trees and sheered cornfields in the heartland of America.

SEE ALSO: Stand tall or don’t stand at all A conversation with Raymond Fairchild

With Nashville in the rearview mirror, you roll up and down the foothills of rural Brown County. Soon, a large bright yellow sign appears to your right. You almost have to slam your brakes when it makes itself known at the last second. In big letters it states, “Bill Monroe’s Memorial Music Park & Campground — Home of the Brown County Jamboree.”

Elk and humans are still trying to figure out how to cohabitate in Western North Carolina since the herd was re-introduced to the Cataloochee Valley in 2001.

Six years ago, Becky Ramey and Terry Frady started a little festival in the parking lot of their Maggie Valley restaurant with improv performers on the back of a flatbed truck and one keg of beer.

Alaska Presley has talked for years about her vision of having the tallest cross in the western hemisphere placed on top of her Buck Mountain property in Maggie Valley, but now it seems that plan will not come to fruition any time soon.