HARDWOOD RECORD 



33 



charge for a couple of weeks. How they are hitting it off with 

 Avery, the cool'C, I haven 't the least idea. However, Avery is a 

 diplomat, and" probably still will be holding his job. when I get 

 back. 



I coaxed E. E. Wood of the E. E. Wood Lumber Company of 

 Baltimore and of the Montvale Lumber Company of Fontana, N. 

 C, up to camp a few days ago. He arrived there in fair order, 

 considering that he had encountered a steel car wreck on the 

 Memphis Special over near Bristol the day before, and had a 

 bruised knee and a bunch of hand baggage that looked as though 

 it had been dropped off the roof of the Singer building. 



t?rs at Elkmont at six o 'clock in the morning and climbed the 

 trail up Jake's creek pfist Dripping spring and the length of Miry 

 ridge, reaehdng Colii spring in good season for a hot midday meal, 

 which Bud cooked over a hastily constructed camp fire. At three 

 o'clock we reached Silers Bald, 6,1UU feet above sea level. The 

 afternoon was perfect, and Mr. Wood and I stayed up on the 

 rock-strewn bald meadows of the mountain top until sundown, 

 viewing the glories of Clingman 's Dome, the highest mountain 

 peak in the region, in the middle distance, and the succession of 

 wooded valleys and slopes in all directions in both North Carolina 

 and Tennessee. The grass-covered meadow on the top of Silers 

 Bald is surrounded by a fringe of stunted and moss-covered 

 beech and buckeye, but there are surpassing views obtainable 



UNCLE QDILI, ROSE 



R. E. WOOD ON APEX THUNDERHEAD 



AUNT \ICEY 



I suggested to E. E. that we make a hike over the top of the 

 mountains into North Carolina and down the valley of Eagle 

 creek, which belongs to his company, and pay a visi/t to his saw- 

 mill enterprise at Fontana on the Little Tennessee river. Ed. 

 Ijams of the Elkmont Contracting & Supply Company chartered 

 a jiair of mules for us from Mat Bradley over Sugarland way, 

 and Mat and the mules met us down the logging road at Elkmont. 

 Of course we had to have Bud Lowe go along, and while Bud 

 never before had been out of the state of Tennessee, he knows 

 the mountains, the trails, how to build a night's shelter, how to 

 cook and how to keep a tenderfoot out of trouble every minute 

 on any sort of an old hike in the Great Smokies. 



Mat Bradley went along to watch Bob, the yaller mule, and 

 Jack, the black one, and to insure his sometime getting them 

 back to his clearing. The mules were loaded with pokes of oats, 

 blankets, grub for a week's hike, cooking utensils, saddle pockets 

 of photographic paraphernalia, and E. E. and myself. When a 

 mountaineer is in a hurry to go anywhere, he never fools away any 

 time with live stock. He can reach his destination afoot much 

 faster, hence there was no offense in asking our attendants to 

 walk. 



We left the Little River Lumber Company's logging headquar- 



down the valleys of Forney and Hazel creeks in Swain county, 

 North Carolina, and over the entire headwaters of the Little river 

 in Sevier county, Tennessee. To the east could be traced the 

 tortuous course of the Little Tennessee river, and rising beyond 

 in monumental masses was the great mountain region of Graham 

 and Monroe counties. North Carolina. As the night closed down 

 we walked down below the top a little ways, where Bud had a 

 hot supper prepared for us over a blazing camp fire, and had 

 constructed a substantial shake-covered shelter for the night. 

 Our appetites made short shrift of the steaming bacon and 

 cornbeef, the hot coffee and the bread and butter, and before 

 nine o'clock we were all rolled in our blankets and sound asleep. 

 The next morning opened with a fog which had settled down 

 over the mountain tops, and a slight drizzle of rain. We had 

 breakfast bright and early, but it was after nine o'clock before 

 we resumed our hike. Noon found us again at the sparkling Cold 

 spring, at the end of Miry ridge, where we encountered two other 

 parties of wayfarers. One was a duo of moonshine whisky 

 peddlers, and the second a "hick" from one of the Little Eiver 

 Lumber Company's camps, who was making the twenty-five mile 

 hike from camp No. 1.3 across the mountains to Bryson City, 

 where he had been subpoened as a witness in a murder trial. 



