I volunteered this week to create the post for Swannanoa in part because it has been my home for the majority of my life. I was educated in grades 1-12 in “the Valley” (as you will hear natives often call the community including Black Mountain and Ridgecrest). In the 20th century, Swannanoa was transformed by
Sometimes things just make you wonder, like the name “Chicken Hill.” As a Buncombe County native, I remember asking my dad as we would cut through West Haywood to avoid (what we called then) the Westgate Bridge, “Why is that place called Chicken Hill?” and his response, always trying to teach me better observe my
It’s hard to say exactly where the Cane Creek community begins and ends. Maybe the area between the Limestone and Fairview fire districts? Is it a mile-wide corridor along the entire length of Cane Creek stretching plumb from South Asheville nearly to Gerton? It’s really hard to say, but however you want to describe the
Fetching its name from Hezekiah Barnard, who owned stock stand and inn near the Forks of Ivy in the 19th century, Barnardsville is one of Buncombe County’s most rural communities. Things get a little fuzzy on where exactly Barnardsville ends and Democrat and Dillingham begin, but we’ll get into that when we look at those