Excerpt from The Laurel, 1938 During the first decades of the nineteenth century a few white pioneer settlers Came to that part of Western North Carolina now known as Madison County, clearing away the forests and planting settlements among these beautiful moun tains. For a number of years there were only a very few people who lived in and around the vicinity which we call Mars Hill today. Work was begun, how ever, and the civilization here began to grow. Educational opportunities for the children were very much limited. The dire need for schools became increasingly evident to the older people as the years passed. There were no schools nearby Where the children could attain knowledge. A boarding school was organized near Burnsville, but this was several miles away and was difficult for the students to reach over the mountain roads. Even Asheville was just a small rural settle ment without schools, and Asheville children had to be sent away to secure their education. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.