BLACK MOUNTAIN SOURWOOD FESTIVAL
Black Mountain is about ten miles East of Asheville and slightly higher and cooler at the foot of the Craggy Mountains, just before the continental divide which was a major hurdle for early settlers and which cut Asheville off from the original eastern settlements until the arrival of the railway which was built with Black prison labor at a great cost of lives.
It was home to a number of summer retreats by a number of religious denominations including the huge Southern Baptist Ridgecrest Conference Center with its giant cross and the stately YMCA Blue Ridge Assembly which was the first home of Black Mountain College before moving to its new home on Lake Eden on the edge of town. My mother and father both lived out their last year at Highland Farms, also on the edge of town.
In the last 50 years downtown Black Mountain has become a tourist town with many restaurants and beautiful shops and large crowds of tourists on the weekend, much to the disgust of my barber and his community who are long term residents here and are now being squeezed out and and outvoted by the northern liberals coming here to live. On Saturday the town closed off a number of roads for the yearly Sourwood Honey Festival which is really an excuse to have a street fair with tented booths of vendors from all over the Southeast. On a hot windless day it was great fun. I am starting with the photographs a day early and will show more tomorrow.
BILLYBABA’S WANDERING 