The Home

About the Monteith Farmstead and the ‘Sisters’

The house was built by Elias Brendel Monteith and his wife Mary Magdalene Carson Monteith. The couple had two daughters: Edna Corrine, born in 1908, and Edith Irene, born in 1915. Growing up, the girls’ lives focused on education, religion, farming, household chores, needlework and their pets. As adults, during a time when it was rare for women to live alone, the two sisters shared the responsibility of caring for the home place. Fiercely proud and loyal to their family heritage, they worked hard to preserve what had been left to them by their parents. Keeping the farmstead much as it had been when their parents were alive, the two sisters maintained a simple lifestyle.

Edith managed the house and farm while Edna served for forty-five years as the Dillsboro Postmaster.  They tended their flower garden and made quilts and crafts to augment their income. In their later years, they managed on Edna’s postal service pension and by letting others grow crops on their land for half shares.

The sisters lived on the farmstead their entire lives. Together they witnessed and experienced the cultural impact of the Twentieth Century on their community: the growth of Dillsboro and Sylva, the construction of the county courthouse, the building of the Dillsboro Dam, the advent of electricity in the mountains, the activity of the railroad close by the farm, two World Wars, the depression, prohibition and the passage of the 19th Amendment which gave women the right to vote.

After the deaths of Edna the executors of the Monteith Estate offered the property to the Town of Dillsboro for purchase in the hope that the town would agree to keep the property intact and preserve the farmhouse and outbuildings. In 2003, the Town of Dillsboro entered into negotiations with the executors of the Monteith Estate. With the assistance of a N. C. Parks and Recreation Trust Fund Grant and a $50,000 donation from Duke Energy, the town purchased the Monteith Farmstead and surrounding property which has been developed as a public park with fishing and picnic areas, a greenway along the banks of Scott Creek and other recreational facilities.