Kersh Drew Cartoons Depicting County's History

In an interview for a 1997 article Kersh told John Lanier
 "The Boom Of 1899" was his personal favorite.

Earle Kersh had a 33 year career with Life Magazine before retiring to Brevard in 1972.  Kersh had begun his career as an office boy for the magazine.  He worked his way up through the organization, ultimately becoming the art director. 

Kersh was an amateur artist and from 1974-75 used this talent to create a series of illustrated short historical anecdotes for the Transylvania Times.  The column, "Old Transylvania Times", first appeared on November 25, 1974 on the editorial page.  Kersh had created 35 sketches which ran through March 1975.  At that time Kersh decided he did not want to take on the additional work and felt that local history was being well represented in the newspaper.

Kersh’s sketches feature Native Americans, early settlers and county leaders throughout Transylvania County’s history.  They depict boarding houses, buffalo, bushwackers, corn whiskey, country stores, stagecoaches, steamboats, and more.

In 1997 the Transylvania County Joint Historical Preservation Commission (JHPC) published the columns in booklet form.  Kersh actually had to redraw the sketches for the booklet as all of the originals had been lost.  He used the old newspaper columns for this but there are occasional variations between the newspaper version and those in the booklet.

Photographs and information for this column are provided by the Rowell Bosse North Carolina Room, Transylvania County Library.  Visit the NC Room during regular library hours (Monday-Friday) to learn more about our history and see additional photographs.  For more information, comments or suggestions contact Marcy at marcy.thompson@ transylvaniacounty.org or 828-884-3151 X242.