Who says you can’t go home again? Revisiting a university campus

When I was a freshman at Appalachian State University in 1971, there were 7,800 students. Before I graduated four years later, the university chancellor had announced that enrollment would be permanently capped at 10,000.

Fast forward to the 2024-2025 academic year, and Appalachian has more than 21,000 students. I visited the campus last week, and I can testify to that!

View of Rich Mountain from Appalachian State University Campus

The campus is in a valley at the foot of beautiful Rich Mountain and Howard’s Knob. It’s where Daniel Boone camped sometimes and the mountain is supposedly named for one of his friends with the surname Rich.

Photo of outside of Belk Library and Information Commons — A view of Belk Library and Information Commons

My sister and I were treated to a tour of Belk Library and Information Commons during our visit last week. Marie, being a Library Science major alum of ASU, she was particularly interested to see the great leaps in technology the library offers since her student days there in the mid-1960s.

Photo of lobby at main entrance to Belk Library and Information Center — Lobby at main entrance to Belk Library and Information Center

3-D printers in the library’s Makerspace

Photo of statue of little boy lying on his stomach and reading Jack Tales — Statue outside library. The little boy is reading Jack Tales.

The library where I spent many hours reading materials that various professors would put on reserve there for on-site-only reading has been converted to classrooms.

Anne Belk Hall (formerly, Belk Library in the 1970s

The building where I majored in Political Science in the 1970s has been replaced by one of many parking decks on campus. Parking decks weren’t needed when my sister and I were students. Very few students could afford to have a car. We walked everywhere we went and thought nothing of it, since none of our friends had a car.

All four of the dormitories I lived in while a student are still there – even East Residence Hall, which I suppose is now the oldest dormitory on campus.

Whereas almost all students back in the day lived in dormitories, most of them now live in apartments. The town of Boone is covered in apartments and restaurants, and much of the old charm of the college town is gone. In the 1960s and 1970s, all the students were on a meal plan and ate in the cafeteria. There was no money for eating out except for the occasional going in together in the dorm on a Saturday night and ordering a pizza.

When someone in the dorm had a birthday, their friends would chip in and buy a square Pepperidge Farms cake at the Winn-Dixie just off campus.

The downtown Boone business district hasn’t changed as much as the campus and the rest of the town in 50 years. Mast General Store still beckons shoppers and The Appalachian movie theater has been refurbished and still offers students and the public the latest in movies as well as other cultural programs. I doubt admission is still 50 cents, though.

My favorite memory of The Appalachian Theater was going to see “Dr. Zhivago” there for 50 cents and having to sit on the front row. Talk about feeling like you are in the middle of the action! (And in the middle of a blizzard in Russia!)

The student infirmary where I worked the night shift on Fridays and Saturdays my last three months on campus was in the former hospital. The nurse I worked with was very compassionate. We were rarely very busy. If we had no patients coming in by around 2:00 or 3:00 a.m., she would let me take a nap. It wasn’t easy to sleep, though, because the pipes carrying the heat from the campus heat plant to the radiators were constantly banging above my head.

When my shift ended 7:00 a.m. I would trudge through the snow to my dorm where I would immediately fall into bed. Minimum wage was around $2.00 an hour then, but that $32 I made on those 10 to 12 weekends was a Godsend and helped me start socking away money to pay for graduate school.

The Daniel Boone Inn still draws crowds of repeat diners for family-style old-time country and mountain cooking. I couldn’t afford to eat there as a student, but my friends took me out for dinner there on my last Saturday on campus at the end of winter quarter in 1975. We enjoyed a huge meal of fried chicken, mashed potatoes and gravy, country ham, green beans, corn, slaw, stewed apples, and cornbread as we watched snow falling outside.

I wrapped up all the leftover fried chicken on the serving platter and took it to the student infirmary when I went there to work at 11:00 that night. It was, of course, my last night to work there. The nurse I worked with and I would drool over the Kentucky Fried Chicken commercials on our little black-and-white TV every weekend night, so I thought it was apropos for me to take fried chicken for the two of us to munch on that night. The joke was on both of us, as she showed up that night with a bucket of Kentucky Fried Chicken! We ate chicken until we were about to explode! What memories!

I didn’t get to eat at the Daniel Boone Inn last week. At this point in my life, I just don’t need to pig-out on so much food. But I have the memories of that night in 1975 with my friends, the nurse at the infirmary, and all that fried chicken!

Until my next blog post

I hope you have a good book to read. I’ve read some good ones already this month!

If you haven’t already purchased a copy, I invite you to buy The Blue Ridge Mountains of North Carolina, the vintage postcard book I wrote for Arcadia Publishing. If you’ve spent time in the Appalachian mountains, no doubt these postcards will trigger some memories for you. The book is available as an e-book and in paperback from Amazon.

Make time for friends and family, and make sure they all have a copy of my book!

Don’t forget the people of Ukraine.

Janet

Great Smoky Mountains, Revisited! (Part 2 of 2)

Today’s blog post is a continuation of my blog post last Monday, https://janetswritingblog.com/2019/10/21/great-smoky-mountains-revisited-part-1-of-2/. It is about my recent trip to Great Smoky Mountains National Park and is illustrated with pictures of several of the postcards included in my vintage postcard book, The Blue Ridge Mountains of North Carolina, and photographs I took on my trip in September.

Black Bears!

Here’s a picture of one of the many black bear postcards in my vintage postcard book, The Blue Ridge Mountains of North Carolina.

**PHOTO OF LINEN-FINISH POSTCARD OF A BLACK BEAR IN GREAT SMOKY MOUNTAINS NATIONAL PARK**

And here are pictures of the bears I saw on this trip to the Great Smoky Mountains. The first picture is of a black bear, probably about two years old, after it crossed the road in front of our car. It completely ignored us, which was fine with us! (All these bear photos were taken from inside our car and using the zoom feature on my cell phone camera. As I stated in last Monday’s blog post, it’s against the law to willingly get within 150 feet of an elk or black bear in Great Smoky Mountains National Park.)

#BlackBears in #GSMNP — **BLACK BEAR, PERHAPS TWO YEARS OLD, PHOTOGRAPHED IN GREAT SMOKY MOUNTAINS, 2019**

If the car in front of us hadn’t stopped, we might have driven right by this mother bear and her two cubs. The mother was down in a ditch. After a couple of minutes, her two cubs came running down the hill. It was difficult to get good pictures due to the trees and undergrowth.

November 2016 Fire Damage

One of the iconic places in the park is Chimney Tops. I was sad to see that the late November 2016 wildfires had engulfed this double-peaked mountain in Swain County, North Carolina. The “up side” is that today the granite folds and rough edges of Chimney Tops are visible because the trees on the mountain were destroyed in the fires.

Here, I compare the photographs I took in September 2019 with a 1936 real photograph postcard I used in my vintage postcard book:

Chimney Tops in Great Smoky Mountains National Park — **Picture of a 1936 real photograph postcard of “Newfound Gap Highway” and “Chimney Tops.”**

#ChimneyTops #Wildfire damage from 2016 as photographed in 2019 — **Chimney Tops in Great Smoky Mountains National Park in September 2019, still recovering from 2016 wildfires.**

Mountainside vegetation burned off this mountain in 2016 #wildfires. — **This mountainside, scarred by the 2016 wildfires, now shows off the rough, rocky folds that trees hid before the fires.**

Evidence of more 2016 fire damage in Great Smoky Mountains National Park.

Clouds in a Valley

Valley #cloud in #GSMNP — **Cloud in a valley in Great Smoky Mountains National Park on September 15, 2019.**

We were in the right place at the right time for this photo of white clouds down in a valley in the park.

Why are they called the Great Smoky Mountains?

As I stated in my book, “The Great Smoky Mountains are called “smoky” due to the fog that rises from the valleys and mountainsides.”

These mountains were suffering under drought conditions when I visited the park in September 2019. August, September, and early October were very dry. My sister and I couldn’t help but notice there was very little of the typical wisps of fog when we were there a month ago. In fact, we only saw a little of it on our last day in the park. Here’s a photograph I took, but it isn’t a good representation of the multitude of wisps of fog that gave this sub-range of the Appalachian Mountains their name.

How the Great Smoky Mountains got their name. — **A fair, but not great, example of how the Great Smoky Mountains got their name. Photo taken in September 2019.**

Summary

I hope you can hear the babbling brooks and smell the wildflowers of Great Smoky Mountains National Park sometime. It is truly a national treasure. In fact, it is a global treasure. I’m fortunate to live just a few hours from this national park.

**Great Smoky Mountains National Park was designated a World Heritage Site in 1983**.

**We owe a debt of gratitude to the men who served in the Civilian Conservation Corps and helped build Great Smoky Mountains National Park.**

Unlike many national parks in the United States, no admission fees are charged for entrance into the Great Smoky Mountains National Park. Many families were displaced when the park land was purchased. Before agreeing to sell their land to the U.S. Government, those families (most of whom were poor farmers) made the government agree that no admission to the park would ever be charged.

Since my last blog post

Since my last blog post, my sister and I spent several days on the coast of South Carolina. We enjoyed fresh seafood in Calabash, North Carolina.

Until my next blog post

I hope you have a good book to read. I’m reading The Beekeeper of Aleppo, by Christy Lefteri.

If you’re a writer, I hope you have quality writing time.

Thank you for reading my blog. You could have spent the last few minutes doing something else, but you chose to read my blog.

Let’s continue the conversation

Have you visited the Great Smoky Mountains? If so, what were your impressions of it? What was the highlight of your trip?

**The Blue Ridge Mountains of North Carolina on the shelf at Lake Junaluska Bookstore.**

As I stated in my blog post last Monday, https://janetswritingblog.com/2019/10/21/great-smoky-mountains-revisited-part-1-of-2/, I hate to “blow my own horn,” but I’d be remiss if I didn’t take this opportunity to tell you how you can have your own copy of my vintage postcard book, The Blue Ridge Mountains of North Carolina, published by Arcadia Publishing in 2014.

Don’t let the name fool you, it covers all the mountainous counties in western North Carolina and the three counties in eastern Tennessee that are partially in Great Smoky Mountains National Park. Electronic and paperback copies are available from Amazon.com. Paperback copies are available from the publisher at https://www.arcadiapublishing.com/, at quality bookstores, or from me personally.

Janet

Great Smoky Mountains, Revisited (Part 1 of 2)

Sign on US-441/Newfound Gap Road to alert visitors that they are entering the national park.

Several weeks ago I took a vacation from blogging, writing, and all social media. It was wonderful! I hope you can try it sometime.

My sister and I spent a week in and around the Great Smoky Mountains National Park in Tennessee and North Carolina.

For seven days, I didn’t check my blog for comments. I didn’t text. I didn’t call anyone. I didn’t Tweet. It was fabulous!

“The Great Smoky Mountains lay in the middle of the Cherokee Indians’ territory in the mid-1600s when Spanish explorer Hernando de Soto arrived.”
page 69, The Blue Ridge Mountains of North Carolina, by Janet Morrison.

“Welcome to Cherokee Indian Reservation” sign in Cherokee and in English

*The Blue Ridge Mountains of North Carolina*, by Janet Morrison

Since the park was included in my vintage postcard book, The Blue Ridge Mountains of North Carolina, I enjoy visiting the park to see what has changed and what has remained the same since my childhood and since my book’s publication in 2014.

Today and next Monday, I’ll share some highlights from my trip, including a few of the pictures I took. I’ll also include photographs of some of the vintage postcards from my book, which is pictured to the right.

Elk!

Elk were reintroduced into the Great Smoky Mountains in 2001 and 2002. I’d never seen an elk until this recent trip! What a thrill it was to see a herd of elk, including this buck, in the river that runs behind the Oconoluftee Visitor Center near the main North Carolina entrance to Great Smoky Mountains National Park just north of Cherokee, NC! This bull was a jaw-dropping sight as he surveyed his herd of female elk (cows) cooling off in this cool mountains stream. (It was late afternoon and in the mid-90s F.)

An elk bull in Great Smoky Mountains National Park

It is illegal to willingly get within 150 feet of an elk or black bear in Great Smoky Mountains National Park. Don’t worry, I was behind a fence that was guarded by a park ranger, and I used the zoom feature on my cell phone camera.

Sign reminding visitors that elk are back in the park.

For more information about the reintroduction of elk in Great Smoky Mountains National Park and the safeguards people should take when seeing them, go to https://www.nps.gov/grsm/learn/nature/elk.htm.

The Loop/Helix

One of the most famous construction features on US-441/Newfound Gap Road, which traverses Great Smoky Mountains National Park from one side to the other is “The Loop.” The highway tunnels under itself to form a helix.

Here are pictures of two of the three postcards of “The Loop” in my vintage postcard book.

This is a photo of a 1936 “real photograph postcard” of “The Loop” on Newfound Gap Road in Great Smoky Mountains National Park.

This is a photo of another 1936 “real photograph postcard” of “The Loop” on Newfound Gap Road in Great Smoky Mountains National Park.

The next two paragraphs are quotes from the captions I wrote for the three postcards on pages 80-81 of my book:

“Newfound Gap Road in Great Smoky Mountains National Park tunnels under itself, forming a helix. The design replaced two dangerous switchbacks on the old Tennessee Highway 71, which was built in the 1920.”

Signage to alert drivers that they are approaching “The Loop” on Newfound Gap Road in Great Smoky Mountains National Park

“These black-and-white glossy real-photo postcards were made in 1936. The Great Smoky National Park Roads & Bridges portion of the Historic American Engineering Record of the National Park Service gives many details about the Loop. Probably designed by Charles Peterson, the Loop was constructed in 1935 by C.Y. Thomason Company of Greenwood, South Carolina, at a cost of $77,644. Stone quarried nearby and reinforced concrete were used in the construction of the bridge portion, which is 95 feet long, 42 feet wide, and 21 feet high in the center of the arch.”

Since its construction in 1935, trees and other natural vegetation has been allowed to grow and flourish. I appreciate that; however, it makes it almost impossible now to fully see and admire this engineering feat. It might still be possible to see the entire Loop from Chimney Tops Mountain nearby, but it’s impossible to get a satisfactory photograph of it from ground level due to the trees. Therefore, I had to settle for the above picture of The Loop signage.

The first time I rode through The Loop was at the age of nine. It’s still a thrill, 57 years later!

Babbling Brooks

A stream in Great Smoky Mountains National Park

One of my favorite features in Great Smoky Mountains National Park is all the babbling brooks. Little River Road runs parallel to the Little River for many miles in the park between Sugarlands Visitor Center and Cades Cove. Little River and the other streams in the park are full of bounders and rocks of all sizes, indicating the history of these mountains from the Ice Age.

Another stream in Great Smoky Mountains National Park

Since my last blog post

It took much patience and persistence (and some grinding of my teeth), but I eventually worked out a new way of inserting photographs in my blog posts last Tuesday. What a relief, to be able to present today’s post and next Monday’s the way I had envisioned! I hope you enjoy the photographs today.

I had the opportunity to watch and listen to another free webinar about the craft of writing on Monday. It was about Author Accelerator’s “Inside Outline” tool. It piqued my interest. Of course, to use the tool I’d have to pay a fee, so I haven’t made that commitment. If you, like I, are learning to write a book, you might want to look into this tool at https://www.authoraccelerator.com/. The tool was developed by Jennie Nash.

Until my next blog post

I hope you have a good book to read. I’m reading The Ragged Edge of Night, by Olivia Hawker.

If you’re a writer, I hope you have productive writing time.

Thank you for reading my blog. You could have spent the last few minutes doing something else, but you chose to read my blog.

Watch for my blog post next Monday. It is a continuation of today’s post and will feature black bears, the double-peaked mountain called Chimney Tops, damage from the late November 2016 wildfires, babbling brooks, white clouds down in a valley one morning, and why the Great Smoky Mountains have that moniker.

A few words about my book

I hate to “blow my own horn.” I’d be remiss, though, if I didn’t take this opportunity to tell you how you can have your own copy of my vintage postcard book, The Blue Ridge Mountains of North Carolina, published by Arcadia Publishing in 2014.

Don’t let the name of the book fool you, it covers all the mountainous counties in western North Carolina and the three counties in eastern Tennessee that are partially in Great Smoky Mountains National Park. Electronic and paperback copies are available from Amazon.com at https://www.amazon.com. Paperback copies are available from the publisher at https://www.arcadiapublishing.com/, at quality bookstores, or from me personally.

Let’s continue the conversation

Have you visited the Great Smoky Mountains? If so, what were your impressions of it? What was the highlight of your trip? Did you see any black bears? Did you see elk? Did you hike? Did you go camping? The recreational opportunities in the Great Smoky Mountains are unlimited! I’d love to hear about your experiences there.

Also, please let me know how you usually view my blog. Do you look at it on your desktop computer, on a tablet, or on your phone?

I’m trying to be more cognizant of the fact that a growing number of people are reading blogs on their phones. The layout of the blog translates differently on the various formats.

For instance, what looks good on a cell phone, doesn’t look quite as good on a desktop computer. Today’s blog post falls into that category. I’ve spent a lot of time on it, trying out “spacers” and “separators.” I’ve never used those tools before. Your patience is appreciated as I learn and experiment with some new blogging techniques.

Remember, I’m a writer — not a computer whiz. This is all part of my journey as a writer, which is what my blog is about.

Thank you for sharing my blog with your friends — in person and on social media!

Janet

19 Blue Ridge Mountains Trivia Answers

How many of the Blue Ridge Mountains trivia questions I asked in last week’s blog, https://janetswritingblog.com/2019/08/11/19-blue-ridge-mountains-trivia-questions/, were you able to answer?

#BlueRidgeMtnsOfNC #PostcardBook — The Blue Ridge Mountains of North Carolina by Janet Morrison

I indicated that all the answers could be found in the vintage postcard book I wrote, The Blue Ridge Mountains of North Carolina. These trivia questions (and the answers supplied in today’s blog post) are my way of celebrating the fifth anniversary of the publication of the book by Arcadia Publishing on August 25, 2014.

Here are the questions and answers

1. Why was Grandfather Mountain named a member of the international network of Biosphere Reserves in 1992? Because it supported 42 rare and endangered species. Just on that one mountain!

2. What does Linville Falls in North Carolina have in common with Niagara Falls? They are both caprock waterfalls, meaning the top layer of rock is harder that the underlying stone. Erosion causes the waterfall to migrate upstream over time. It is believed that Linville Falls was once 12 miles downstream from its present location.

3. How did Edwin Wiley Grove make his fortune which enabled him to build the Grove Park Inn in Ashevile, North Carolina? He sold Grove’s Tasteless Chill Tonic.

4. What part did the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) play in the construction of the Blue Ridge Parkway during The Great Depression? The men who were members of the CCC assisted with the paving and landscaping of the Blue Ridge Parkway. What a magnificent gift they left us!

5. When George W. Vanderbilt purchased Mt. Pisgah in 1897, what grand plan did the mountain become part of temporarily? The 125,000-acre Biltmore Estate. (It’s no longer part of the estate.)

6. What groups of people were housed at Assembly Inn in Montreat, North Carolina in 1942? 290 Japanese and German internees.

7. Jerome Freeman bought 400 acres of land in Rutherford County, North Carolina that included the Chimney Rock around 1870 for $25. How much did the State of North Carolina pay for Chimney Rock Park in 2007? $24 million.

8. What new breed of hunting dog was developed by a German pioneer family in the late 1700s in the Plott Balsams subrange of the Blue Ridge Mountains? The Plott Hound, which just happens to be the official State Dog of North Carolina.

9. What is an early 20^th century feat of engineering on the Newfound Gap Road in Great Smoky Mountains National Park? The road crosses over itself. This example of a helix is called “The Loop.”

10. How fast can a black bear run? 30 to 35 miles per hour.

11. It is illegal in Great Smoky Mountains National Park to willfully get within how many feet of a black bear? 150 feet.

12. What is the name of the 57,000 acres of land purchased by the Cherokee in the 1800s and held in trust by the United States Government? Qualla Boundary

13. Is Qualla Boundary technically a reservation? No, a reservation is land that the United States Government gives to an American Indian tribe. The Cherokees purchased their land.

14. Did the Cherokee people lived in tipis in the 1700s and 1800s? No, they lived in houses.

15. What forest contains one of the largest groves of old-growth trees in the Eastern United States? Joyce Kilmer Memorial Forest

16. What hydroelectric dam was used in the 1993 Harrison Ford movie, The Fugitive? The Cheoah Dam

17. What is the tallest dam east of the Rocky Mountains in the United States? Fontana Dam.

18. One of the oldest postcards in my book is of Cullowhee Normal School in the mid- to late-1920s. What is the name of that school today? Western Carolina University.

19. Started in 1935, the Blue Ridge Parkway’s “missing link” was completed in 1987. What is the connecting one-fourth-mile long piece that filled the “missing link” called? The Linn Cove Viaduct.

How did you do?

How many of the 19 questions did you answer correctly? I hope you enjoyed trying to answer the questions and seeing the answers today. If you want to learn more about the mountains of North Carolina and eastern Tennessee, please ask for The Blue Ridge Mountains of North Carolina, by Janet Morrison, at your local bookstore, online at Amazon.com, or purchase it directly from the publisher at https://www.arcadiapublishing.com/. It’s available in paperback and as an ebook.

The contract I signed with Arcadia Publishing was for five years, so you’d better get a copy of the book while it’s still being published. I don’t know if my contract will be extended.

Since my last blog post

I’ve finally gotten into a rhythm for writing the scene outline according to C.S. Lakin’s template. It sounds backward to be writing the scene outline after writing the book, but the questions asked in the template, along with five questions I added after reading a couple of articles by Janice Hardy, are making every scene in the book stronger. It’s slow going, but well worth the time and effort.

Due to technical problems, I was unable to include images of any of the postcards from my book in today’s blog post.

Until my next blog post

If you’d like to follow me on Twitter, @janetmorrisonbk. If you’d like to follow my business page on Facebook, it’s Janet Morrison, Writer.

I hope you have a good book to read. I’m reading The Nickel Boys, by Colson Whitehead and still listening to Resistance Women, by Jennifer Chiaverini.

If you’re a writer, I hope you have quality writing time.

Thank you for taking the time to read my blog. You could have spent the last few minutes doing something else, but you chose to read my blog.

Let’s continue the conversation

Feel free to let me know in the comments section below or on Twitter or Facebook how you did on the trivia questions. If you have any other comments or questions for me about the Blue Ridge and Smoky Mountains, I’ll welcome and try to answer them.

Janet

19 Blue Ridge Mountains Trivia Questions

August 25, 2019 will mark the fifth anniversary of the publication of my vintage postcard book, The Blue Ridge Mountains of North Carolina. To mark this milestone, I’m testing your knowledge of some of the interesting facts I included in the book.

The book covers the 23 westernmost counties in North Carolina and the three counties in eastern Tennessee in which a portion of the Great Smoky Mountains National Park is located. If you have the book, you have my permission to cheat. That’s only fair to those of you who purchased my book. I’ll ask a few questions. You’ll find the answers in my blog post on August 19, 2019.

Although most of the original postcards are in color, they appear in black and white in both of the book’s formats. I tried to include pictures of several of the postcards in today’s blog post, but due to technical problems I was only able to post one vintage postcard image.

Here are the questions:

1. Why was Grandfather Mountain named a member of the international network of Biosphere Reserves in 1992?

#GrandfatherMtn #GrandfatherMountain — Grandfather Mountain, North Carolina

2. What does Linville Falls in North Carolina have in common with Niagara Falls?

3. How did Edwin Wiley Grove make his fortune which enabled him to build the Grove Park Inn in Ashevile, North Carolina?

4. What part did the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) play in the construction of the Blue Ridge Parkway during The Great Depression?

5. When George W. Vanderbilt purchased Mt. Pisgah in 1897, what grand plan did the mountain become part of temporarily?

6. What groups of people were housed at Assembly Inn in Montreat, North Carolina in 1942?

8. What new breed of hunting dog was developed by a German pioneer family in the late 1700’s in the Plott Balsams subrange of the Blue Ridge Mountains?

9. What is an early 20^th century feat of engineering on the Newfound Gap Road in Great Smoky Mountains National Park?

10. How fast can a black bear run?

11. It is illegal in Great Smoky Mountains National Park to willfully get within how many feet of a black bear?

12. What is the name of the 57,000 acres of land purchased by the Cherokee in the 1800s and held in trust by the United States Government?

13. Is Qualla Boundary technically a reservation?

14. Did the Cherokee people lived in tipis?

15. What forest contains one of the largest groves of old-growth trees in the Eastern United States?

16. What hydroelectric dam was used in the 1993 Harrison Ford movie, The Fugitive?

17. What is the tallest dam east of the Rocky Mountains in the United States?

18. One of the oldest postcards in my book is of Cullowhee Normal School in the mid- to late-1920s. What is the name of that school today?

19. Started in 1935, the Blue Ridge Parkway’s “missing link” was completed in 1987. What is the connecting one-fourth-mile long piece that filled the “missing link” called?

In case you’d like to take the easy way out and find the answers to all these questions in one book, you may order The Blue Ridge Mountains of North Carolina, by Janet Morrison, in paperback or e-book from Amazon.com, request it at your local bookstore, or order it directly from https://www.arcadiapublishing.com/. Time is short. I’ll supply the answers in my blog post next Monday, August 19.

The contract I signed with Arcadia Publishing was for five years, so you’d better get a copy of the book while it’s still being published.

Since my last blog post

I discovered that the links that I had on my blog to my presence on several social media networks were not working properly, except for the one to my Pinterest account. Therefore, I removed the links to Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn. I’ll announce in a future blog post when those links are up and running again.

Until my next blog post

If you’d like to follow me on Twitter, @janetmorrisonbk. If you’d like to follow my business page on Facebook, it’s Janet Morrison, Writer. If you’d like to follow me on LinkedIn, go to https://www.linkedin.com/in/janet-morrison-writer.

I hope you have a good book to read. I’m reading Searching for Sylvie, by Jean Kwok.

If you’re a writer, I hope you have quality writing time.

Thank you for taking the time to read my blog. You could have spent the last few minutes doing something else, but you chose to read my blog.

Let’s continue the conversation

Please don’t include any of the trivia answers in your comments. If you want to indicate how many of them you think you know the answers to, you may indicate that number or the numbers of the questions you think you can answer.

Read my book or read my blog post next Monday for all the answers.

Janet

A Change in Course

As of yesterday afternoon, I’m making a change in course. I mentioned in my last blog post that I had submitted a nonfiction book proposal to a publisher. It was a long shot — which I knew going in. The editor notified me yesterday that my proposed project was not a good fit for the company. Again, I knew that going in but figured I had nothing to lose by trying.

If the publisher had wanted to pursue my book proposal, that is what I would have devoted my time to over the next months or year. I will continue to write, but I plan to turn my attention back to my historical novel manuscript. There are some sewing and quilting projects calling my name, too, so I look forward to writing and sewing as winter approaches.

I share the positives as well as the negatives that I experience in my journey as a writer. Perhaps someone else who is struggling to get published will read one of my posts and find encouragement. At the least, he or she will discover that they are not alone.

It is a thrill to see one’s name on the cover of a book as the author. I was the co-compiler of three genealogy books, and Arcadia Publishing published my vintage postcard book, The Blue Ridge Mountains of North Carolina, in 2014. I hope to someday see my name on the spine of a novel published by a book publisher, but I know it won’t be easy.

One blog that I follow is Random Jottings by Richard L. Mabry, MD. He is a physician and a writer. I copied the following from one of his recent posts and have it taped to the bottom of my computer screen so I can read it every day: “Remember, it’s all a matter of timing — not yours, but God’s. And, as I’ve said before, if no one but you ever reads the words you’re putting on the page, you’ve at least reached one person. And maybe that’s the plan.” — Richard L. Mabry, MD.

Some things you just have to do for your own enjoyment and edification.

Troutman, NC Branch Library

I had the privilege of presenting a program about postcard history and my vintage postcard book, The Blue Ridge Parkway of North Carolina, at the Troutman, NC Branch Library on Thursday evening. The J. Hoyt Hayes Memorial Library – Troutman Branch – is a beautiful five-year-old facility that grew out of a grassroots effort in the Troutman community.

Front of the J. Hoyt Hayes Memorial Troutman Library

The library patrons in attendance were interested and responsive to my remarks, and I really enjoyed interacting with them. They took my trivia questions in stride with good humor.

I enjoyed the hour I spent with the patrons of the Troutman branch of the Iredell County public library system. It is always rewarding to speak at a public library that has my book in circulation! Thank you, Juli Moore, library branch manager, for inviting me, publicizing the event, and giving me such a warm welcome!

Local Author Fair in Kannapolis

Last Saturday I had the privilege of participating in a Local Author Fair in Kannapolis, North Carolina, along with 15 to 20 other Cabarrus County authors. This was the first of what we hope will be an annual event, rotating among the branches of the Cabarrus County Public Library system. I was there to sell copies of my book, The Blue Ridge Mountains of North Carolina.

Joyce and Jim Lavene, a husband and wife author team from Midland, North Carolina, also participated in the fair. It was good to see them again. They have spoken two or three times at Rocky River Readers Book Club and they have been supportive of me as a beginning writer. Joyce and Jim have written several series of mysteries.

Joyce and Jim Lavene, authors from Midland, NC, at the Local Author Fair in Kannapolis.

I enjoyed chatting with the Lavenes, Michael and Rose Eury of Concord, and Linda Leigh Hargrove of Kannapolis. Michael Eury has written several books for Arcadia Publishing and is currently writing a book of “legendary locals” of Cabarrus County. Linda Leigh Hargrove has written several novels, including The Making of Isaac Hunt: A Novel and Loving Cee Cee Johnson.

Perhaps at a future Local Author Fair I will have a novel to sell in addition to my vintage postcard book, The Blue Ridge Mountains of North Carolina!

Yet Another Rejection

Yet another rejection. This one is a real bummer. Arcadia Publishing is not interested in publishing my North Carolina Piedmont vintage postcard book.

Although my book, The Blue Ridge Mountains of North Carolina, is doing well, it seems that Arcadia is not set up to market a regional book. Arcadia’s niche is books with a tight local focus, and that is what the company does well.

It is disappointing, since I have enough vintage postcards to also do a coastal North Carolina book and a second Blue Ridge Mountains book. I’m looking at my options and other writing opportunities.

Submitted My Author Proposal to Arcadia

I have submitted my author proposal to Arcadia Publishing for a vintage postcard book covering the piedmont section of North Carolina. I sent the proposal to the acquisitions editor electronically a few minutes ago. It felt good to mark that as “DONE” on my to-do list. I have been doing the necessary research to write the postcard captions a little at a time, so I’m well on my way to having many of the captions written.

The book I have proposed to Arcadia Publishing should be a good companion book to my first vintage postcard book, The Blue Ridge Mountains of North Carolina. I anticipate that it will cover 32 counties in central North Carolina. I proposed the following three chapters in the book: Metrolina, The Triad, and The Triangle.

I’ll post on my blog as soon as I know if Arcadia Publishing gives me the go-ahead to write The Piedmont of North Carolina.

Janet's Writing Blog

Tag: Arcadia Publishing

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A few words about my book

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