“With the city bond proposal and some rigorous assertion of eminent domain, we could fight back against this myopic system and turn all these properties into permanent, beautiful parks — or some other development with big green spaces and little crowding.”
“I would argue not to allow government interference with a homeowner’s right to use his/her property to its highest and best use.”
Despite public outcries over his 1929 debut novel, Look Homeward, Angel, local residents were still eager to know what Thomas Wolfe had planned next. As pressure mounted to deliver his next book, Wolfe begged his mother to not leak any information to the Asheville press.
“I think the Asheville I knew died for me when Ben died,” author Thomas Wolfe wrote in a 1929 letter. Wolfe’s older brother Ben perished on Oct. 19, 1918, from complications resulting from influenza.
July marks the 20-year anniversary of the unsolved arson that nearly destroyed one of Asheville’s historic landmarks.
Not only did Look Homeward, Angel result in Thomas Wolfe’s own literary fame, but it also propelled his mother Julia to a level of local and national recognition.
