Cullowhee, which means “water lily” in Cherokee, is an unincorporated township comprised mostly of Western Carolina University and the surrounding businesses and residences designed to service faculty and student needs.

Professor Robert Lee Madison founded Western Carolina University – originally chartered as Cullowhee High School – in August of 1889. Beginning about 1912, the status if the school was gradually raised . The university went through several name changes as it's course offerings increased

and it wasn't until 1967 when the school was designated a regional university by the North Carolina General Assembly, that the name Western Carolina University was finally settled upon.

Near Cullowhee is the town of Forest Hills, named for the 1878-1880 postmaster's home, Forest Hill. Incorporated in 1997, the town is home to a number of university faculty members.

Today a quaint village of curio shops, crafters and family restaurants, Dillsboro has always been a center of railway activity. During the 1880s when Western North Carolina Railroad was built, the village bore a variety of names – Depot, New Webster, or Webster Station. In 1882 the Tunnel Post Office (named for the railroad's Cowee Tunnel) was established with William Allen Dills as postmaster. It was the railroads developer, A. B. Andrews – for whom the town of Andrews in Cherokee County is named – who

suggested the town adopt the name of its postmaster, becoming Dillsboro. Dills was responsible for building the Riverwood shops, which overlook the Tuckasegee River, and what later became known as the C. J. Harris house. Harris is the namesake of Harris Regional Hospital in Sylva. Dills' own home stood next to Mt. Beulah Hotel – constructed in 1884 and today known as the Jarrett House. By 1888, Dillsboro had become the most important town along the railroad in terms of industry with two sawmills, two clay mines, two livery stables, six general stores, a shoemaker and several wood yards. The railroad lives on through the Great Smoky Mountains Railroad Depot..

The Glenville community is centered on a large man made lake with 26 miles of shoreline at 3500 feet above sea level. The lake is the highest of its size east of the Mississippi River and is a favorite place for aquatic recreation. The area originally was known as the Hamburg Township, settled in 1827. In the late 1880s the area was thriving with industries including forestry, tanning

and mining. It was in 1891 that the area was renamed Glenville. The lake itself was not created until 1940-1941, when Nantahala Power and Light Company – owned by ALCOA – constructed a dam on the Tuckasegee River. The hydroelectric dam provided more electricity to help make aluminum for the war effort. The creation of the lake flooded Glenville's schools, homes, businesses and farmlands. Today the community is settled along the shores with several second and vacation homes, boating businesses and small shops.

Sylva is Jackson County's retail and professional center where day-to-day services meet unique history. The town's development rose with the construction of the Western Carolina Railroad in the 1880s. It's name came about at the suggestion of Mae Hampton, daughter of E.R. Hampton, who is credited as being the founder of Sylva. E.R. Hampton had married into the Cannon family, which owned a sawmill where William D. Sylva, an itinerant Dane, had helped saw the logs that built the Hampton;s home. The railroad's route through Sylva made it a prime location for thecounty seat – originally located in Webster – but the issue of relocation resulted in years of bitter dispute

between the two towns. The state legislation settled the dispute, giving Sylva permission to construct a courthouse so long as the town paid for the moving costs to relocate. On Feb. 28, 1914, the new Sylva courthouse, located on a hill overlooking Main Street, opened. Construction Costs totaled $30,000. Today the courthouse is reputed to be the most photographed in the country.

The town of Webster is a quiet residential community situated on top of a hill overlooking the Tuckasegee River. The town was created in the mid 1880s with the purchase of an 18 acre tract specifically designated to become the county seat. Within a few years of its settlement, a courthouse was erected. The town was incorporated in 1859, but over the next 20 years

the town government became inactive – the firstof several rises and falls in the town's municipal development, and perhaps an early indicator of the town's future. The story goes that during the construction of the Western North Carolina Railroad, county residents fully expected the railroad to run through Webster. However, the county's state government representative – said to be fond of his drink – was taken aside at a crucial moment in the voting process and plied with liquor by an individual desiring a more direct route from Sylva to Dillsboro. The location of the railroad was a primary factor in the movement to relocate the county seat from Webster to Sylva.

Whittier, Jackson County's closest community to Cherokee, was another railroad town. Upon calling the area's residents together, Clark Whittier proposed the formal establishment of a town: “It is my wish and I so move that we start operations here upon the principals and Word of God, including all morality, especially temperance and prophibition of the strongest form.” The town was incorporated in 1907 and by 1913 boasted a dry goods store, hotel, physician and

surgeon. Plus sawmills, lumberyards, three churches and a school. However, with the Great Depression the town lost much of its industry as the demand for lumber declined. By 1993 Whittier's charter was repealed and and today the community is mostly residential.