MACON COUNTY

County History: Formed in 1828 from Haywood County.  Named for Nathaniel Macon, North Carolina politician and president of the state's Constitutional Convention in 1835.

"To Walhalla [SC; Oconee County] therefore, Mr. Reid and his friend went [from Louisville, KY].  They tried to strike a beeline to it, through a wilderness of mountain ranges, by trails known only to the trappers; taking them as their guides, and sleeping in their huts at night.  After two weeks of climbing among the clouds, of solitary communion with Nature, of unmitigated dirt, fried pork, and fleas, they came in sight of Walhalla. (Davis, Rebecca Harding. "Walhalla," Scribner's Monthly. Vol. 20. June / May 1880.)

"They had reached Macon county, North Carolina, where the Appalachian range, which stretches like a vast bulwark along the eastern coast of the continent, closes abruptly in walls of rock, jutting like mighty promontories into the plains of Georgia and South Carolina." (Davis, Rebecca Harding. "Walhalla," Scribner's Monthly. Vol. 20. June / May 1880.)