From the Introductory to the Appendix, this volume is filled with interesting information. Covering seventeen counties—Alleghany, Ashe, Avery, Buncombe, Cherokee, Clay, Graham, Haywood, Henderson, Jackson, Macon, Madison, Mitchell, Swain, Transylvania, Watauga, and Yancey—the author spent about ten years searching and gathering materials. He discusses grants, disputes and litigation, duels, the flora and fauna, geology and mining, along with manners and customs, stage coaches, railroads, newspapers, schools and everything in between. Listing pioneer preachers and prominent teachers, he also writes about the Cherokees, Daniel Boone, Abraham Lincoln and Nancy Hanks, as well as the Swepson and Littlefield fraud of the Western North Carolina Railroad. A dozen photographs are scattered within the pages and a new, expanded index contains over 3300 names. The 1913 officers of the Edward Buncombe Chapter of the D.A.R. (original Publisher of this history) are listed in the Appendix along with officers of other D.A.R. Chapters and the United Daughters of the Confederacy.