Two Posts In One

I guess you ca see what I want for Christmas...Yeah somebody to shove...



Soul Asylum...Somebody To Shove


October 19th, 1925
As discussed both in the text and comments of the previous post the Shining Rock Ledge of the Pisgah National Forest had a wild fire, there were two, the first one in 1925 while it was property of Champion Paper, then another in 1942 after it became Forest Service Land. My Grandfather witnessed the first one from southern Transylvania County. He said the smoke could be seen for miles, as far as the Balsams could be seen. One site lists a reason for the first fire as being from a locomotive, while no reason is listed for the second one in 1942, it also says the fire was in 1924, but the Forest Service lists it as 1925. While I was a child it was my impression that the place known as Grave Yard Fields were called so because of the burned stumps of Firs and Spruces had turned white, looking like a grave yard. I may be wrong, something happens in old growth forests, trees are blown over and the upright roots eventually make into mounds, in this particular place they resembled a grave yard, hence The Grave Yard Fields. The mounds are now gone, the wild fire of 25 destroyed the soil. What was left, for the most part was just dirt. Now the place, once a conifer forest, is a high altitude savanna. And, the two are now rare climates. Sadly such a significant event is not well documented, at least not on line. The few people left that witnessed the logging, much less the fire are going.


I stand to be corrected...It happens...the Spruces were used for airplanes in WWI, not the Firs.

You can see the view from afar looking across Cold Mountain from this site, better look in daylight...

As well, this PDF File from USFS is worth a read.

Once, the piedmont of NC and SC was a vast savanna, as noted by early explorers. The French Broad River valley was a savanna. Willaim Bartram noted of the Little Tennessee River valley as having "grassy knolls". It was largely occupied by Cherokee Towns. We only see a glimpse of the great land this was.


Well, Southern Culture On The Skids will be playing The Orange Peel Saturday night. I won't be there, Saturday will be a thrilling day of Bear Hunting and Sunday will be spent in Clemson SC with the Army Reserves. My December Drill is being split up. The girls from the B52's made bee hive hairdos sexy, the SCOTS base player made them even sexier. First thing in the morning I'll pick a good SCOTS video out.

This is it, 69 El Camino


Hey, if you want music, go over to Ed's place. Jesus taught us to love our neighbor, John Birch taught us to beware of him.

It's darn near Christmas. Hmm.
The Appalachianist