The Waynesville Public Art Commission will hold a dedication of a new public art piece entitled “Chasing Tadpoles” during the Frog Hop at 5 p.m. Saturday, Aug. 2, in the Historic Frog Level District.

Metalsmith William S. Rogers is one of several studios participating in the July 26-27 Jackson County Farm, Garden, & Studio Tour. The combined farm and arts tour is a first for Jackson County.

Country music megastar Travis Tritt will perform at 7:30 p.m. Saturday, July 26, at the Smoky Mountain Center for the Performing Arts in Franklin.

By Sarah Kucharski • Staff Writer

The race for the 11th District’s U.S. House of Representatives seat is officially off and running as the filing period closed Tuesday (Feb. 28), but a recent tour of the district found that a lot of voters are not yet interested in the November race.

By Chris Cooper

The brainchild of programmers Robert Smith (no, not the guy from the Cure) and Bill Walters, Blue Stone produces evocative, dreamy textures that skate between subtlety and head-spinning surprise. Taking cues from Enigma, Tangerine Dream and maybe some Enya and Sarah Brightman, Breathe goes for the dreamy soundtrack feel and manages to bring some world influences to the mix.

By Sarah Kucharski • Staff Writer

Travel writer and National Public Radio commentator Jeff Biggers spent 20 years collecting and researching the stories and historical papers that make up the backbone of his new work The United States of Appalachia.

By Michael Beadle

OK, first things first — Craig Karges is not a comedian though he makes his audiences laugh. He’s not a magician, though he uses magic. And he’s not a psychic, though psychic happenings occur in his shows.

He likes to refer to himself as an “extraordinist” — someone who demonstrates extraordinary phenomena like floating tables, metal bending, and mind reading — and shows you just how amazing life can be if you’re willing to trust your intuition.

By Michael Beadle

Art class is not just a place to make art for yourself — sometimes it’s a place to help those who are less fortunate.

“We need to help the homeless people,” said Hunter Creson, a fifth grader at Central Elementary School.

Kindergarten

The other day I went to a kindergarten class for “Career Day.” I had 15 minutes to talk about cartoons, draw some cartoons, and find out what these 5-year-olds knew about cartoons.

When I was a kid, adults talking about what they did was a very big deal for me. Especially if they enjoyed it. Nothing is more encouraging than seeing people’s eyes light up when they are talking about something they love doing.

By Michael Beadle

Sequoyah is perhaps one of the most recognizable names in Native American history — and quite rightly so. After all, he was the only person in human history to invent a language on his own without first having the skills to read or write.

The symbols he developed into a syllabary are used to identify all the syllabic sounds of the Cherokee language, a feat that helped the Cherokees record and save their culture.

By Michael Beadle

It’s a special day for 14-month-old Tawodi Clapsaddle.

Several adults including his father, Ethan, look on as the curious toddler explores tiny furniture and grabs a hold of toys in his new classroom at the Dora Reed Tribal Childcare center in Cherokee.

I pride myself on being a good cook. After 10 years of effort, I have finally mastered homemade cinnamon rolls. Entire batches have been known to disappear in seconds. I can cook suppers dripping with cheeses and overflowing with tangy marinaras. I can do Southern meals with fried chicken and mashed potatoes and gravy and lots of garden vegetables. I cooked for a local inn and heard guests say that the main reason they returned was the food. I don’t consider myself a gourmet by any means, but I do figure that I have learned some things about food and making it taste good.

By Michael Beadle • Columnist

The recent worldwide protests against cartoons depicting the Islamic prophet Mohammed have given humanity a chance to take a closer look at itself, and it’s not a pretty sight.

Too often the opportunity for self-examination and honest discourse about our differences — whether based on culture, religion, ethnicity, gender, or sexual orientation — give way to the worst humanity has to offer: ignorance, fear and hatred.

A coalition of environmental groups and local residents lost their appeal against a logging operation in the Nantahala National Forest in Jackson, Macon and Swain counties.

Residents in Macon and Jackson counties joined three regional conservation groups — Southern Appalachian Forest Coalition, Western North Carolina Alliance, and Southern Appalachian Biodiversity Project — to appeal a proposed logging operation. Their top complaint was logging on Kirby Knob, located on the ridge above Savannah and Tilley creeks on the border of Jackson and Macon counties. Kirby Knob is designated as a Natural Heritage Area by the state and is one of the highest points in Jackson County.

By Marshall Frank

“A great civilization is not conquered from without until it has destroyed itself from within.”

— Ariel Durant, author and historian

Not long ago, I was encouraged by a publishing company to write a book on the infiltration of Islam inside the United States, and what effect it might have on our nation.

“This is an administration that believes in natural resource exploitation, and hang any future cost to the public owners. This is not incompetence at work (as some might say, looking at Iraq or Katrina), but ideology, and these people are very good at what they do.”

— Bill Thomas, the Conservation Chair for the Pisgah Group of the Sierra Club

Counties with national forest or park land in their borders get two types of money from the federal government: payment in lieu of taxes, known as PILT, and a 25 percent cut of logging revenue.

Those pitching the plan to sell off pieces of the national forest claim the parcels on the list are inconsequential.

The tracts on the chopping block are small, isolated islands surrounded by privately-owned land, don’t contribute to forest ecology, aren’t used for recreation, are too small for logging and are generally more trouble than they’re worth for the forest service, say those who proposed the sale.

When Dick Morgan, a fisherman from Maggie Valley, heard that two acres on Hurricane Mountain was on the chopping block in the proposal to sell off portions of the national forest, the gravity of the plan hit home.

One of this favorite fishing holes, Hurricane Creek in the Harmon Den area of Haywood County, comes off the mountain, close enough to its own headwaters to host coveted native brook trout. If sold, the tract atop Hurricane Mountain would make a trophy house site for someone, but sediment from the construction would muddy his precious Hurricane Creek, he said.

By Sarah Kucharski • Staff Writer

Macon County Art Association publicity manager Pat Mennenger busied herself arranging crackers on a platter while a gaggle of fellow board members unwrapped homemade hors d’oeuvres, positioning them on two tables in the back of the association’s Uptown Gallery on Main Street in Franklin.

By Chris Cooper

Duncan Sheik demonstrates a sort of understated brilliance that’s almost alarming when you hear it. Ballads slip from majestic to broken at the turn of a phrase. Grit and political outrage collide with hypnotic guitar and carefully arranged strings. The list of enthusiastic descriptions could just go on and on.

By Michael Beadle

A farm girl recounts her memories of a special calf named Rupert and a gravedigger tells of his long career around a cemetery. These two poignant and yet comical stories about birth and death feature masterful storytellers in one-person, one-act plays for one special evening of theatre and music.

Ali Farka Toure

Guitarist Ali Farka Toure has been hailed for his distinctive mix of Arabic-influenced Malian sound and American blues — often billed as the West African answer to John Lee Hooker. Toure was born in 1939 into a family from the Timbuktu region of Mali with noble roots tracing back to the Spanish Moors who first crossed the Sahara to control the salt and gold trade.

By Sarah Kucharski • Staff Writer

Macon County and Natural Resources Conservation Services officials have negotiated a settlement to a disputed bill submitted by engineering firm McGill Associates that came in approximately $200,000 higher than expected.

The Golden LEAF Foundation has made a $1,573,109 grant to Haywood Community College to establish an advanced machining center at its Regional High Technology Center in Waynesville.

The Downtown Waynesville Association’s Patsy Rogers was honored as a Main Street Champion in a recent Main Street awards ceremony in Salisbury, and a project recognzing DWA’s 20th anniversary was given an Award of Merit.

By Sarah Kucharski • Staff Writer

Sylva voters will have another go at passing liquor by the drink in this May’s primary elections.

Since 1994, Sylva has held two votes, both rejecting liquor by the drink sales. The margin of defeat decreased from 163-91 in 1994 to 220 to 209 in 2001 — numbers supporters say are indicative of changing tides and a possible groundswell of support that might carry the vote over this time.

The Land Trust for the Little Tennessee (LTLT) recently acquired a “working farm conservation easement” protecting 53 acres of rich bottomland and a half-mile of Little Tennessee River frontage on the historic Hall Farm in the Cowee community of northern Macon County.

By Sarah Kucharski • Staff Writer

Arthur Pitts sat in a plastic lawn chair waiting to pick up prescriptions from The Village Pharmacy in Waynesville Monday afternoon (March 13).

At 73, he is one of the nation’s many Medicare subscribers. His coverage comes through a Blue Cross Blue Shield plan, which he says has been fairly reliable so far.

By Sarah Kucharski • Staff Writer

As the revamped Medicare system moves from policy to practice, pharmacies nationwide increasingly are faced with confused customers and bureaucratic red tape.

Customers come in with a prescription to be filled and for one reason or another are denied. Sometimes customers are simply trying to refill their prescriptions ahead of time, perhaps in preparation for a trip. But most often the problem is a result of human error, such as information that doesn’t match up between customers’ insurance cards and what’s in the computer system like birthdays or cardholder identification numbers.

Western North Carolina Rep. Charles Taylor, R-Brevard, has spoken out against the proposed sale of 300,000 thousand acres of National Forest land.

During U.S. Forest Service Chief Dale Bosworth’s testimony on the Forest Service’s 2007 budget request hearing before the House Interior Appropriations Subcommit-tee, which Taylor chairs, Taylor said the sale was “not going to happen.”

The Burroughs Wellcome Fund has announced a three-year, $138,600 grant to renew its support for science education programs for middle and high school students on the North Carolina side of Great Smoky Mountains National Park.

Concerned by continuing decline of the cerulean warbler, five conservation groups, including some based in Western North Carolina, filed a lawsuit against the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and Interior Secretary Gale Norton calling for the bird’s protection.

By Michael Beadle

By day, Nancy Lux crunches numbers as a certified public accountant in Waynesville. After work, you may see her whizzing by on her road bike breaking the sound barrier.

Well, maybe not that fast, but in an all out track sprint, she can get up to 40 miles an hour — not bad for someone who took up competitive cycling about four years ago.

North Carolina Gov. Mike Easley called last week for roadless areas to be protected in the Nantahala and Pisgah national forests — in opposition to a Bush Administration move last year that lifted bans on logging and road building in roadless areas.

By Chris Cooper

It’s tricky when you find the word “hype” used repeatedly in the glowing fan reviews of a band, as in: “living up to the hype” or “easily surpassing the hype” and so forth.

By Michael Beadle

Succulent shrimp. Marinated roast beef. Creamy soups and sweet vegetables. And don’t forget dessert.

The annual Parade of Nations will showcase international folk troupes along Main Street in Waynesville on Saturday, July 26, as part of the annual Folkmoot USA extravaganza.

The free parade will begin at 10:30 a.m. at the historic courthouse and travel up Main Street through the center of downtown Waynesville for three blocks. This year’s Folkmoot festival and parade will feature the dance, music and culture of seven countries: Colombia, Turkey, Taiwan, Russia, Trinidad and Tobago, Romania and Hawaii.

Folkmoot USA had a $9.2 million impact on Western North Carolina in 2013, according to an economic impact study conducted by Tom Tveidt of SYNEVA Economics.

The study included the Western North Carolina region but focused on Haywood County, showing that Folkmoot’s overnight visitors spent $6.6 million during their visit. Outside day-trippers spent an additional $89,000 in Haywood County.

Only overnight and outside day-trip visitors were included in Folkmoot’s study.

The Swannanoa Chamber Music Festival will continue with the Jasper Quartet at 7:30 p.m. July 20 at the Haywood Arts Regional Theatre in Waynesville.

The quartet will perform the “Octet” by Schubert. This massive, classic piece of chamber music was one of Schubert’s final pieces and is regarded as one of his greatest compositions. The “Octet” will be preceded by the Caprice sur des airs Danois et Russes (Caprice on Danish and Russian Airs) by Camille Saint-Saens. 

Ticket prices are $21.40 for individual tickets and $80.25 for a series ticket. For more information about the programs and musicians, www.swannanoachambermusic.com. This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. and 828.452.0593.

Two renowned storytellers will be performing during the Franklin Folk Festival from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. Saturday, July 19, at the Franklin Town Hall Meeting Room.

Teller Wendel Craker will spin yarns and share folklore drawn from a range of periods, subjects, and styles, including our Southern Appalachian Mountains.

Yona Welch, who was born into the Bird Clan of the Eastern Cherokee and raised on the Qualla Indian Boundary, inherited a rich tradition of songs and stories from his ancestors who have lived in the mountains for thousands of years.

This program is sponsored by the Arts Council of Macon County, with funding from the North Carolina Arts Council.

www.artscouncilofmacon.org or 828.524.7683.

The Andy Roddick Mountain Challenge will be July 25-26 at the Cedar Creek Racquet Club in Cashiers.

The Smokin’ in the Valley Western North Carolina BBQ Festival will be from noon to 9 p.m. July 25 and 10 a.m. to 8 p.m. July 26 at the Maggie Valley Festival Grounds.

Renowned rock band Collective Soul will perform at 8 p.m. Thursday, July 24, at Harrah’s Cherokee.

Folkmoot USA, North Carolina’s official international folklore festival, will hit the stage for a special performance at 7:30 p.m. Thursday, July 24, at the Smoky Mountain Center for the Performing Arts in Franklin.

A six-part lecture series on nature, ecology and conservation will kick off with a program titled “Plott Balsams Business Case for Conservation” at 6:30 p.m. Thursday, July 17, at the Jackson County Library in downtown Sylva.

The relationship between the tourism economy and conserved landscapes will be discussed by Erika Zambello, Stanback intern for The Conservation Fund. She will share data-driven visitor surveys that estimate per-day tourist spending and reveal tourist preferences, opinions on future development and how changes on the landscape would impact their future visitation. Taken together, these results can create a business case for protecting land in North Carolina. 

The six-part series will focus on topics relevant to the conservation arena in the seven western counties and is hosted by the Land Trust for the Little Tennessee and the Jackson County Parks and Recreation Department.

The free programs will be held at 6:30 p.m. in the Jackson County Public Library’s Community Room in downtown Sylva. 828.524.2711 or visit www.ltlt.org. 

Other upcoming topics include:

• The Ecological Recovery and Restoration of the Pigeon River: Can the ‘Dirty Bird’ Clean Up? on Friday, July 25, byDr. Tom Martin, Western Carolina University.

• Leopold Land Ethics Leaders on Thursday, July 31, by Rob Hawk, North Carolina Cooperative Extension.

• Golden Winged Warbler and Early Successional Habitat on Thursday, August 7, by Patrick Farrell, N.C. Wildlife Resources Commission.

• The Mountains-to-Sea Trail – 1,000 Miles Across N.C. on Thursday, August 21, by Kate Dixon, Friends of the Mountains-to-Sea Trail.

• Conserving the Natural and Cultural Histories of the Southern Blue Ridge on  Thursday, August 28, by Paul Carlson, Land Trust for the Little Tennessee.

Highlands will get a chance to experience South Africa through a presentation from Jim and Ellen Shelton, long-time birders whose recent trip across the globe allowed them to glimpse some spectacular birds and mammals.

More than a dozen farmers and gardeners will be featured in the annual Jackson County Farm Tour coming up July 26-27.

Tour-goers get a self-guided brochure and can visit the sites in whatever order they please, running from 1 to 6 p.m. both days.