Asheville UNCA Buncombe Catch All: Flood of 1916

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You know what is a really, really good idea right now, as wildfires are showing up in more places and frequency... "While giving a status report on border security, Noem added, “and we’re going to eliminate FEMA” " Why at that point in her report? Guess she just had a sudden brain fart.
 
The Table Rock fire has caused evacuations in the Sherwood Forest neighborhood south of Brevard, near DuPont State Forest. Not sure if anyone has been there- it’s a really cool place, a certified Audubon sanctuary with a par 3 golf course (that sometimes has llama caddies) and lots of hiking trails and fishing. My wife’s grandfather lived there when he was alive and we always enjoyed our visits there- hope everything is spared.
 
Sky no longer clear in AVL and the smell is string - same in Fairview where I am as I write this.
 
And WOW! Major RANT!!!!

"Oh, Asheville — the city that smells like patchouli, weed, and generational wealth disguised as “earthy minimalism.”
Asheville is what happens when trust fund kids discover Appalachia and decide they’re gonna “live off the land,” but only if there’s Wi-Fi and a Whole Foods within walking distance. Everyone’s either a self-proclaimed herbalist, a part-time crystal healer, or a banjo player with a gluten allergy and an Etsy store.

They say it’s a “mountain town with soul,” but let’s be honest — it’s Portland in a flannel with a Blue Ridge backdrop.
And then there’s the tourists — oh god, the tourists. Every weekend, they descend like flannel-clad locusts, clogging up the Blue Ridge Parkway with rented Jeeps and screaming “Woooo!” at waterfalls like it’s their bachelorette party. They come for the “vibe,” take selfies in front of murals they don’t understand, and leave with six jars of artisanal jam and a hangover from three sours at Wicked Weed.
You’ll find them packed into every brewery, wearing hiking boots they bought on Amazon yesterday, loudly mispronouncing “Appalachian” while asking if there’s an Uber that goes up the mountain.

Every local barista has PTSD from explaining what a cortado is to a family of four from Florida who “just love how authentic it feels here.”
The locals will tell you about the “real Asheville,” which apparently existed in a window between 1994 and 2007, before the yoga studios started charging $45 for “ancestral breath alignment” and every historic building got turned into an Airbnb with a “boho zen” aesthetic and a $300 cleaning fee.

Every guy in Asheville looks like a Civil War reenactor who microdoses mushrooms and composts religiously. Every girl is either barefoot in a field talking to her spirit guides or selling $90 turmeric face masks made from local bees and vibes.
And if you’re new in town? Don’t worry — someone will immediately invite you to an ecstatic dance circle, a foraging workshop, and a communal hot tub party “under the full moon energy.”

The men all look like they’re one artisanal axe away from starting a folk cult. The women will read your birth chart before your name and ghost you after three dates and a drum circle because Mercury told them to.
Everyone’s in an open relationship, everyone has a mountain dog named after a Norse god, and everyone’s building a tiny home out of reclaimed barn wood and denial.

The food scene? Farm-to-table. Hyper-local. Wild-foraged. Also, $17 for a plate of pickled ramps and sweet potato foam served by a guy named Sky who once fasted for 12 days to “connect with the earthworms.”

Asheville thinks it's quirky, but really it's just gentrified Appalachia with kombucha on tap and overpriced incense. The energy is like if Burning Man happened in a national park with a farmers market and way more acoustic guitars.
You haven’t truly done Asheville until you’ve been serenaded by a shirtless man with a didgeridoo while someone behind you is crying during a sound bath.

And the tourists love to say, “We’re thinking of moving here,” after one lavender latte and a walk through the River Arts District — as if the city isn’t already drowning in Airbnbs and white dudes named Chad trying to start kombucha distilleries.
It’s not “Keep Asheville Weird” — it’s “Keep Asheville Gentrified, Granola, and Deeply Confused About Its Own Identity.”
Namaste, but like, ironically."
 
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[I wrote this several years before Hurricane Helene] Until I moved to #WNC, particularly Buncombe, I didn’t properly understand the relationship between water and mountains. I’ve still a great deal to learn and a consideration of the Great Flood of 1916 is instructive. Asheville is where the French Broad is joined by the Swannanoa River and heads north (odd enough direction) to join/help create the Tennessee River near Knoxville.



Cherokee people called it Zillacoah before that first confluence and Tahkeeosteh (racing waters) after that joining. The Great Flood of 1916 was associated with two hurricanes tacking far inland and the rain they dropped. Huracán is, by the way, a Mayan word. Another ‘By The Way’ is that the French Broad is one of the 3 oldest rivers on the planet with the Nile older (and the ironically named New also in NC).



The French Broad carved its way through the Appalachians in ancient, ancient times. That name is complicated but Broad was once a common term for river and there were once French settlements to the north. When the Great naturalist activist and author Wilma Dyckman published her book, named simply ‘The French Broad’ in 1955, librarians familiar with gangster parlance must have been initially confused by the title as to the content and where to shelve (or even if they should!). No doubt many chuckles have been had down the years.



That strikingly named river is a significant player in life in ‘The Land of The Sky’ still today and the death (80) and destruction (millions in today’s value $$$) of 1916 is well-remembered. Over in Madison County I recollect the first time I noticed the Flood Marker in ‘downtown’ Marshall showing how the river had submerged much of the town on occasion. A starkly instructive yardstick over time.



Of course the water also means tubing, kayaking, and plenty of liquid base for the elixirs borne in Beer City and years back other industry and types of transit were facilitated by that water. At first thought flooding and high ground might seem impossibly unassociated but Buncombe history teaches a different lesson.



#OTD (July 14) in 1916-Flood devastated #WNC after 6 Days of Torrential Rain (22” in ONE day-Nat’l Record)-80 died, Million$ in damage, #AVL #HVL cut off from world for weeks/RR down and roads washed out. https://www.ncdcr.gov/.../the-flood-of-1916-and... Also see: https://www.ourstate.com/flood-of-1916/
 
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