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On Balsam Divide looking towards Black Rock Knob

  • wcu_travel-135.jp2
  • A typed caption on this photograph identifies it as 'On Balsam Divide looking towards Black Rock Knob.' The photograph is featured in a report titled 'Properties of Dr. John R. Brinkley,' which contains a letter of transmittal from Ellis Clarke Soper, Consulting Engineer, dated May 1, 1937, on the economic potential of the area. The photograph shows the trunk of a tree in the left of center foreground and the mountain slope and peak in the background. Dr. John R. Brinkley (1885 - 1942), for whom the reported was compiled, was born and raised in Jackson County, N.C., and gained a reputation as a practitioner of eclectic medicine. While he became wealthy in the 1920s and 1930s from his medical practice, his methods were later widely discredited. In 1936 he bought a 9,000 acre tract of land on the Plott Balsam mountain range in Jackson County, N.C. The location was noted for the prominence of several high peaks in the range, such as Black Rock, Waterrock Knob, and Yellow Face.