Southern Appalachian Digital Collections

Western Carolina University (20) View all

Jackson County Courthouse, 1915

  • wcu_travel-13.jp2
  • In May 1913 the voters in Jackson County, N.C., approved a measure to relocate the county seat from Webster to Sylva. While the town of Webster had been designated as the original county seat in the early 1850s, Sylva had benefited from the arrival of the railroad in the mid-1880s and grown quickly in importance. Work soon began on a new courthouse based upon design of the courthouse that had been built in Madison County, N.C., only a few years earlier. By early 1914 the new Jackson County Courthouse was completed on a hill overlooking Sylva, offices were occupied in February, and on March 2 the town was pronounced the new county seat. This photograph was taken during the September 18, 1915, dedication of the Civil War monument on the steps leading from Sylva's Main Street to the new Courthouse.