Some downtown merchants in Franklin have clashed with town leaders in recent weeks over a perceived lack of support for new ideas and initiatives to boost commerce.

Franklin’s Main Street Program has found itself in an uncomfortable spotlight in recent weeks as Franklin merchants have complained that the town’s formal downtown association isn’t doing enough.

A side drama playing out in the downtown Franklin fracas involves an unusual public display of the tension that often exists between newspapers and the government leaders they cover.

Both sides in a downtown Franklin dispute have pledged to work together after publicly locking horns in recent weeks.

“It seems there were a lot of issues because people were bumping in the dark. Both sides really need to reach out to each other on this,” said Franklin Town Manager Sam Greenwood.

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Downtown Franklin is all sunshine, but it’s the calm before the storm.

Drifting through an array of stores and restaurants lining Main Street, the scene is quiet, but soon, with Thanksgiving falling into the rearview mirror, shoppers determined and curious will overtake the small town, in search of handmade items from regional artists. Strolling the sidewalk, one soon comes upon North Carolina Mountain Made.

Now that the children are gone, and art projects sit abandoned next to overturned desks and emptied cupboards, community members have a vision to bring life back into the old Cowee school outside of Franklin. But the community’s path to reclaiming the schoolhouse is facing growing opposition in the Macon County government as to how the initiative should be funded.

We’ve all done it.

At a middle school dance, high school prom, college formal, wedding reception, anniversary celebration, New Year’s Eve or perhaps on your kitchen floor during a lazy Saturday morning.

It’s “The Twist,” and Western North Carolina better watch out.

His name is James C. Jacobs. His friends call him J.C., “but not like Penney,” he insists. For more than 55 years, Jacobs has owned a department store in downtown Franklin, its racks and shelves lined with standard housewares and wardrobe staples.

But, like so many Main Street stores in small town America, People’s Department Store will soon fold-up shop.

The dead lay in indiscernible rows beneath the earth, their resting places marked by a jumble of faded and often illegible stone markers — the most distinguishable carrying etched dates and names, but the most nondescript void of any writing and covered in a thin layer of moss.

Members of the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians and some Franklin townspeople would like to see the Nikwasi Indian Mound back under Cherokee ownership.