FLAT ROCK The Flat Rock Playhouse is North Carolina’s state theatre.
Flat Rock – Little Charleston of the Mountains For centuries before settlement of the earliest land grants in the area between 1789 and 1799, the “Great Flat Rock” was a gathering place for the Cherokees for trading and socializing among themselves and other tribes. The area was a wilderness with nothing more than foot trails along streams, in gullies and over and around ridges. In 1793, early land grantee John Earl (a.k.a., Earle) was paid to open a road from upstate South Carolina through the Saluda Gap to Flat Rock where he had a grist mill on what is now Highland Lake. Later, the 1820 completion of the Buncombe Turnpike over Native American trails and drover roads through Flat Rock 34
and into South Carolina led to trade between the two areas. In 1827, Charles and Susan Baring of Charleston bought 400 acres and built Mountain Lodge, the first of many summer residences in Flat Rock. The Barings also built a private chapel on their property and in 1836, they deeded their chapel, became St. John in the Wilderness, to the Episcopal Diocese of Western North Carolina. It is the oldest parish in the diocese and remains active today. In 1830, Judge Mitchell King of Charleston came to Flat Rock and renovated an old “two on two” trace mill house into a residence he named Argyle. This core portion of the house, which was built around
1815, makes Arg yle the oldest dwelling in Flat Rock. Argyle also has the distinction of having the longest continuous possession in the same family of any place in Flat Rock and perhaps Western North Carolina. Baring and King continued to buy tracts of land at prices ranging from 25 cents to $1 an acre. Eventually, they acquired much of the Flat Rock area and then sold the tracts to other families from the Lowcountry of South Carolina. Within 20 years, Flat Rock became a colony of summer cottages and estates, thus earning its nickname of The Little Charleston in the Mountains. Today, the Village of Flat Rock retains the quiet sophistication of its Charleston heritage interwoven with the delightful flavor of the mountains. Many of the original historic homes remain today and have been lovingly restored and preserved. Historic Flat Rock, Inc. was formed as a nonprofit in 1968 to protect continued on page 36 Hendersonville Magazine 2021–2022
