The Charlotte Observer‘s Jack Betts appears to have the skinny on the state’s recent purchase of Chimney Rock. Meanwhile, librarians at UNC-Chapel Hill cast a loving historical eye on the sale of the scenic landmark.
Over the weekend, downtown Asheville hosted the Original Toughman Contest, turning the Civic Center into a brawl-lover’s paradise. While no Xpressers appear to have attended, the mysterious local blogger known as Ashvegas managed to catch the event.
The latest numbers are in, and it appears that residents of Western North Carolina don’t much play the numbers — the N.C. Education Lottery numbers, that is.
Madison County trails the state, with residents anteing up only $21 apiece since tickets went on sale last March. Buncombe, Graham, Polk, Yancey and Clay counties were also near the bottom of the betting barrel. By comparison, Nash Countians have gambled $166 each in the same time period. State Rep. Ray Rapp told the Asheville Citizen-Times that “Folks in rural areas tend to be a little more conservative with their money.”
What does it mean, this influx of American Idol-spawned pop acts? First Taylor Hicks plays the Orange Peel on Sunday, Mar. 12, and then Chris Daughtry follows suits with an April 16 show.
It was a slightly unlikely setting: the cold sanctuary of a former church with light streaming through a round stained-glass, beaming down on the stage on a cold winter’s night in downtown Marshall. But a sweet little crowd of folks clustered together to hear the Madison County Arts Council’s program of the evening, featuring the celestial music of the Asheville-based artist Vincent Wrenn on his self-created Radiasonic, joined by James Owen’s Pythagorean-tuning creations on lap steel.
