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Beware the larger-than-life spiders and cemetery spooks found at this house on Dunbar Street.
Hannah Styles
hstyles@thesmokymountaintimes.com
Numerous tales and legends swirl around the Smoky Mountains and Southern Appalachia. Something about the winding trails, the night that’s almost too quiet and woods so dark that swallow people up in their imagination. In the mountains of Swain County, there lies many stories of spooks, haints, ghosts, even unexplained lights filling the misty, black sky.
Lance Holland local historian, owner of Appalachian Mercantile and newly created, Appalachian History Center in downtown Bryson City, said some seek out stories that explore the unknown and the macabre.
“I recently went through all the books and made a separate section for fictional books and with all the books about the train and dam, people love the folklore and mysterious section,” Holland said. It grabs people's attention.”
There’s something about the unexplained that fascinates people.
A dark tunnel and towns under water
At the end of Lakeview Drive, those who dare can get spooked even in the daytime as they walk through the dark tunnel. It is said to hold secrets, and many paranormal investigators have visited at night to try and find the answers.
The so-called Road to Nowhere is a significant part of Swain County history as it represents loss for many and the federal government’s unkept promise to the county. Generations of history lurks below the depths of Fontana Lake as hundreds of people who lived in the area before the lake was created, were forced to leave their homes and the road accessing their family cemeteries was covered in water.
Don’t go into the woods
With some speaking of weird experiences in the tunnel, people have claimed to have experienced a glowing orb while hiking the nearby Noland Creek Trail and one particularly gruesome creature is said to prowl the shadows. U’tlun’ta or Spearfinger is a fretful character in Cherokee folklore and is said to be an old woman with stone-like skin and one long, sharp finger on her right hand who lured away children who wandered off.
The ghost trying to hop a train
Juanitta Baldwin of Bryson City has written many books about the secrets of the Smoky Mountains. In her book “Smoky Mountain Ghostlore,” she includes several chapters about Swain County’s mysterious shadowy figures. In one chapter, she tells of a railway worker's spooky encounter with a man trying to jump on the train.
In the early 1940s, a Great Smoky Mountains Railroad engineer was making his route from Judson to Bryson City when he saw a shadowy figure standing near the tracks, only to disappear a few seconds later. He thought he was losing his mind until he started asking around, and learned it was a well-known secret. Allegedly, a man was found on the tracks after being hit by the train near the same spot.
Mule team no one else could see
Another tale from Baldwin’s book is about the Phantom Mule Team of Toot Hollow.
In 1935, a man named Frank Swain was run out of church after well-known members of the congregation swore that Swain tried to run them over with his mule team. After lots of discourse and arguing, Swain was kicked out and never returned to the church.
A few months after Swain died the two church members who accused him nearly got run over by a mule team in the churchyard… Only they were the only ones who saw or heard the mule team as the rest of the congregation laughed at their foolishness. The two men claimed to see the mule team at random times until they died.
Vampire doctor
Perhaps one of the oddest stories of our area involves a terrifying creature disguised as the town physician.
Sherman Carmichael’s “Mysterious Tales of WNC” describes the tale that in 1788 Dr. Alfort, his wife and 15-year-old son moved to the quaint town of Dillsboro and soon after odd happenings began to occur.
Two well-known men in the community visited the doctor for gout but wound up dead.
Rumors in the community began to fly, much like the creature everyone kept describing as a dark figure hovering around the town.
The town minister defended Dr. Alfort from the whisperings in town until 1979 when the minister’s wife saw a dark figure kill their daughter. Search parties scoured the town, and everyone was warned not to go out after nightfall.
The town’s people eventually saw the dark figure after killing an entire family with puncture wounds on their neck entering Dr. Alfort’s house where they allegedly found the Dr. Alfort and his wife sleeping in coffins. The town people then hung Dr. Alfort and his wife but their son was never seen again.
The presence at Fryemont Inn
According to the Fryemont Inn’s website, a couple staying in room 216 had an odd encounter that caused them to leave.
In the 1930s the couple stayed at the Fryemont Inn for the season as the man worked for Alcoa accessing the property of what would be Fontana Dam.
They became close friends with Amos and Lillian Frye often dining together and playing cards. At the end of their time there they returned home but kept in touch with the Frye’s. Amos Frye died in 1935.
Twelve years later the couple went back to visit Lillian staying in their same room, 216, when the man woke his wife up saying “Wake up! We’re leaving.”
The confused wife asked why, to which he answered, “I just woke up and Amos Frye was standing at the foot of the bed.”
Tim Hall, of The Storytelling Center of the Southern Appalachian in Bryson City, also has a wealth of stories of the unusual and peculiar pulling from resources that include a library of 850 books about Western North Carolina. Hall currently shares many stories with riders of Great Smoky Mountains Railroad.
“The unique thing about some of the stories here is they are transposed many times over and if you go back to the route and investigate it a little bit is you find out many people talked about the happenings in this area,” he said.
Island Park
The story of Iron Foot Clark on Island Park is among the stories he shares with people who take ghost walks in Bryson City with him.
Iron Foot Clark was a bandit in the late 1800s. He rode with the James-Younger Gang the stories vary but he was up in Tennessee or Kentucky, and he had his foot shot off by a guard on a train when they were doing a train robbery, Hall shared.
The problem was the foot was left by the train and the Doctor James Clark was his name and the doctor told him he could get an iron stirrup at the bottom of his leg. He needed a place to recuperate at that time it was a gathering place for families. When he showed up, they kind of didn’t go out there anymore. What happened was he stayed out there for quite a while and a flood came along the way the story goes is he climbed into a tree and people started feeling bad for him. They threw him a line and started passing blankets and food to him. When the flood waters receded, they went out there to welcome him and he had disappeared. There were no footprints. There were some reports he moved out of town, but there was no proof.
The Historic Calhoun House
What’s that knocking on our door? The Granville Calhoun family operated The Historic Calhoun House as a boarding house and hotel from the early 1900s through 1967. Well known for its historic significance of a place where Calhoun, author Horace Kephart and others met to advocate for the founding of the Great Smoky Mountains National Park, other stories are less well-known.
Still in operation today, some have reported a dinner time tradition continues. According to local legend, Granville Calhoun would stand at the foot of the stairs and announce when supper was ready. When his son took over, he would go knock on each room door. Years later, there have been reports of guests who “have experienced knocking on the door and the door will open and nobody will be there,” Hall shared.
The isolated, dark mountains of Swain County can allow your imagination to run wild, and some people love to go chasing after the unexplained. So on this Hollows Eve, be mindful if you dare to wander the dark woods and explore the Smoky Mountain’s mysterious ‘haints.
Jessica Webb, SMT publisher/editor contributed to this story