Cradled in the Great Balsam Mountains, Waynesville, North Carolina, claims its tourism heritage proudly.
Downtown Waynesville’s Main Street is a blend of shoppers, diners, sightseers and welcoming shopkeepers.
In 1936, Franklin Delano Roosevelt rode through Waynesville on his way to dedicate the Great Smoky Mountains National Park. Not long after, Waynesville leaders erected an arch over Main Street: The Great Smoky Mountains National Park - Eastern Entrance
Never mind that Waynesville sat 30 miles outside the park—and that both Maggie Valley and Cherokee were much closer to the park. From the mid-1930s until 1970, the arch spanned Main Street, laying claim to being a primary Park entrance…and proud of it.
But Waynesville’s outreach to visitors goes back well before the opening of the national park.
“Waynesville history is entrenched in tourism,” says Alex McKay, Haywood County native and chair of the Waynesville Historic Preservation Commission. “Originally we were largely a farming area. But when the railroad came here in 1883, people came.”
Along with a booming lumber industry and one of the largest tanneries in the United States, Waynesville became home to many large hotels and thriving shops.
“Families formed generational histories of vacationing here—the story was that Haywood County could cure visitors of hay fever,” McKay says with a smile.
Folkmoot, begun in 1984 and designated the official North Carolina international festival in 2003, features performers from some 200 nations over a two-week period.
We sit in the dining room of McKay’s restored Arts and Crafts home in Hazelwood Village, once an independent town but since 1995 part of the town of Waynesville. McKay’s roots go deep in Haywood County—his mother’s family back to the early 1800s and his father’s in the late 1800s. And after leaving for college, McKay is back to continue the family story.
“Our heritage means a lot to us in the mountains,” he says. “And we have a lot of things happening to draw folks here.”
Walking Hazelwood Avenue down the street from McKay’s house, you can see that in spades. There’s the longstanding Hazelwood Soap Company, a fragrant draw to anyone passing by. Blue Ridge Books, with one of the best regional book collections I’ve seen. Robin Blu, an eclectic, expansive gift shop. Smoky Mountain Coffee Roasters. A bakery, a pharmacy, a bridal shop. It’s a beautiful neighborhood to wander.
A mile or so back on Waynesville’s Main Street, the sidewalks are packed with visitors studying real estate listings and photos, pondering restaurant menus, browsing gift shop and furniture store window displays. There’s not a vacant parking space along Main Street, and it’s still early afternoon on a weekday.
Ben Wilder, the Haywood County tourism development manager, states what’s abundantly clear: “Tourism-wise, we’re strong.” But he also wonders, “How much more can we handle? And how much more do we want?”
The Waynesville Public Art Trail includes 17 displays in stone and metal, including two old-time musicians awaiting accompaniment.
But know that Waynesville’s Main Street is more than a tourist and shopping magnet. Overseen by the Waynesville Public Art Commission, the Public Art Trail runs the length of Main Street, with six of the 17 art displays in adjoining sections of town. It’s one of the most diverse and evocative art trails I’ve seen, comprised mostly of metal and stone sculptures. There’s a replica of the old “Gateway to the Smokies” sign . . . and nearby, two whimsical old-time musicians large enough for kids to pose with them. A metal mural of indigenous wildflowers, a swear-it’s-real fox, Mama Bear and her hungry cubs. A 1776 militia minuteman (Waynesville got its name from Revolutionary War General Mad Anthony Wayne), an abstract National Guard volunteer named “Always Ready,” a Log Cabin quilt block laid in brick outside the Police Station. And back on Hazelwood Avenue, a Plott hound sculpture hidden in bushes. (The North Carolina State dog originated in Haywood County.)
Venture off of Main Street, and you’ll find a couple more substantial chapters to Waynesville’s story. A short walk from downtown is the Folkmoot Friendship Center located in the former Hazelwood School. Folkmoot (old English for a meeting of the people) began in 1984 as an international dance and music festival in Waynesville, envisioned as a way to bring the world to the mountains. Designated as the official North Carolina international festival in 2003, Folkmoot has become a two-week, late-July event that’s featured more than 8,000 international performers from 200 countries since its inception.
A visit to the Folkmoot Center will get you a glimpse of crafts workshops, artists’ studios, and the Queen Auditorium, with an ongoing roster of concerts and storytelling events. Folklorist Evan Hatch is the recently hired executive director, and he sees endless possibilities for the 40,000-square-foot facility to become a sustaining force in “a creative, arts-based economy.” (For a full look at the Folkmoot Center and programs, go to folkmoot.org.)
A mile away, the Shelton House (sheltonhouse.org) will take you deep into late-19th-century farm life. Housing the Museum of North Carolina Handicrafts, the Shelton House also contains a large collection of Southwest Native American handicrafts. It’s a beautiful place, inside and out, with tended green hills rolling upward to the mountains.
All of it—the handicrafts museum, the Shelton House and surrounding farms, Folkmoot and Hazelwood Village and (of course) the surrounding mountains—offer an intriguing counterbalance to Main Street Waynesville. Spend the time to find Waynesville’s heart-center: it’s a whole lot more than “the eastern entrance to the Great Smoky Mountains National Park.”
Take the Long Way Home
There are easier ways to travel from Waynesville than on US Route 276 (Geer Highway). But if you want to prolong the mountain beauty and head south into Transylvania County, you won’t regret it. Geer Highway winds gently out of Waynesville, giving you clear views of prosperous mountain farms, cattle dotting the hillsides. You’ll follow the Pigeon River through the town of Cruso (“Nine miles of friendly people, plus one old crab”) and its unique 1928 schoolhouse community center. You’ll climb up to the Blue Ridge Parkway (where a nearby overlook gives an amazing view of Cold Mountain, immortalized by Charles Frazier’s novel), down and through the Pisgah National Forest to the worth-a-day’s visit Cradle of Forestry Center, past Looking Glass Rock and Falls and North Carolina’s largest trout hatchery. Beyond Brevard, Route 276 takes you up over the Eastern Continental Divide and crosses the South Carolina line. It’s just a few miles farther to Caesar’s Head State Park, sitting atop the Blue Ridge Escarpment with long views of three states. This road isn’t for the faint of heart—there are many hairpin turns, and not much margin for error. But you’ll be traveling an old route used by lowland travelers seeking mountain relief from summer heat, and the mountains . . . well, they speak for themselves.
The story above first appeared in our March / April 2023 issue. For more like it subscribe today or log in with your active BRC+ Membership. Thank you for your support!