Each Saturday, Tim “The Storyteller” Hall broadcasts his 9 AM radio show live from The Station Restaurant in downtown Bryson City. Above, Tim reads one of writer John Parris’ classic tales of Appalachia while diners enjoy their bacon and eggs. The show “Crossroads The Radio Program” is broadcast locally on WBHN 1590 AM and simulcast worldwide on Live365.com.

Tim, who is currently renovating Bryson City’s historic Citizens Bank Building for The Storytelling Center of the Southern Appalachians at Bryson City, will broadcast a special edition of “Crossroads” during the town’s annual Christmas Parade at 1:30 PM on December 6. After the parade, there’ll be storytelling and singing on the porch of the Calhoun House on Everett Street until 7 PM when the town’s annual Spirit of Christmas event begins.

Most days he assists customers at the N.C. Clampitt Hardware Store on Main Street in Bryson City. But come mid-October, Frank O’Neil is transformed into his alter-ego — the award-winning pumpkin artist. Above, Frank shows off four of his ‘ghastly’ jack-o-lanterns on the front porch of the Charleston Station gift shop.

Today, handmade brooms and corn-shuck dolls are collectable crafts. But a century ago, in the Smoky Mountains of remote Appalachia, they were just two staples of everyday life – necessities for house-cleaning and entertaining the children.

Fortunately, such heritage crafts have not been lost over time. David Higgins, a Whittier broom maker, grows his own broom corn from heritage seeds. And he gives the corn silks to Annie Lee Bryson to use as hair on her handcrafted corn silk dolls. Above, David and Annie demonstrated their crafts at the 2008 Mountain Life Festival at the Mountain Farm Museum in Great Smoky Mountains National Park. In Bryson City, their brooms and dolls are available at The Cottage Craftsman.

Founded by Clark Whittier in 1885, the town of Whittier, North Carolina once flourished as a lumber center before succumbing to the Great Depression. No longer incorporated, the quiet little community on the banks of the Tuckaseigee river is mostly residential.

If you’d like a glimpse of the original Whittier, stop by Gloria Nolan’s “Stuff’ & Such” consignment shop across from the Whittier Post Office. Working from old photos, Gloria has created a scale model of Whittier as it was in 1895. Above, Whittier resident Ann Hill studies the model, imagining her Smoky Mountains community the way it used to be.

Did Lizzie Borden kill her father and stepmother with an axe? Judge for yourself when the Smoky Mountain Community Theater presents the play “Lizzie Borden of Fall River”  July 25-28.

Upcoming performances this year include Neil Simon’s “I Oughta Be In Pictures” in October, and a holiday play “Three Wise Men and a Baby” in December. The Bryson City theatre group was organized in 1981 and moved into the town’s old Gem Theatre building in 1989.

On a recent visit to the Smokies, Susan Murphy spent the morning photographing daughters Alana (left) and Mary Caitlin with each of the sixteen colorfully painted bears that now grace Cherokee’s streets and plazas. Each bear was created by a local tribal artist as part of a public art program sponsored by the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians.