Landowner Stories - Thelma White

It was during the era of Abraham Lincoln’s Presidency that her great grandparents first settled Boone Fork Farm southwest of what is now Blowing Rock, North Carolina. Three successive generations would call this mountainous and, at one time, largely isolated property their home. “Mother and dad were married in 1919 and they built this home in 1924,” recalls Thelma. “They moved in this home in August 1924, and I came along in September. ” It is in that same house that Ms. Thelma White still lives almost eighty years later.

Thelma White with CTNC Stewardship Coordinator, Kathy Naujoks and CTNC Summer Intern, Adam Gorod

Thelma White’s property is located outside of Blowing Rock within the viewshed of the Blue Ridge Parkway and the Mountain-to-Sea public hiking trail. The property protects an ecologically significant area of diverse types of forest cover and plant species as well as the North Carolina Boone Fork Creek, a NC Native Trout Stream and Outstanding Resource Water. The property is also an important piece of the area’s rural culture and landscape. Thelma is a living part of that rural culture. Most of her life has been shaped by the property—through both her experiences and her memories on the land—and she is determined to ensure its preservation. “When I was a little girl I would take the horses and mules and go up in the fields and help my dad with things I was big enough to do. When I got older I would help mother with raising the little calves. These were just the usual chores out in the country.”

Thelma came back to live on the property where she was born when her father became ill and needed her help. After he and her mother passed away, Thelma and her brother kept the farm going. Neither Thelma nor her brother ever married or had children. Although the property is in Thelma’s name, she and her brother made all decisions jointly, including the donation of a conservation easement to the Conservation Trust for North Carolina, a North Carolina land trust. After her brother passed away in October 2001, Thelma willed the entire property to the Conservation Trust for North Carolina.

Thelma is not interested in using her property for financial gain even though it is located in an attractive and rapidly growing area around Blowing Rock. “This land is a gift to me from God. God simply entrusted it to me while I am passing through this life. We really do not have a great deal left of the mountains as they were because of them being built up. I feel a lot more people will probably eventually understand that if they don’t do something to preserve these mountains, in time there will be none.” Thelma wants to return her property for other people to enjoy. “I just feel privileged to have lived so close to God’s beauty,” Thelma said.