Events

Upcoming Meetings and Events

Please join us at these upcoming meetings and events. Reach out if you'd like to host an event or extend an invitation.

Sign Waving Rally

Sign waving is back--join students and community members for another quick pop-up rally for the UNCA woods on Tuesday, March 10, 2026, from 4 to 6 PM!

Student members of UNCA’s Student Action Coalition, YDSA, and Sunrise Movement clubs, as well as community members, will be holding up signs at the intersection of W.T. Weaver Boulevard and Broadway Street for the Tuesday traffic rush. Bring your own signs or use some of ours as we stand up for the UNCA woods.

#savethewoods #saveuncawoods

Ben & Jerry's Night for the Woods!

Every Wednesday, Starting January 21, 2026 from 6 PM to 8 PM
Downtown Asheville Ben & Jerry's
19 Haywood St.
Asheville, NC 28801

Every Wednesday, the downtown Asheville Ben & Jerry's will donate 20% of profits to Save the Woods!

ACSC Soccer at Greenwood Field

Wednesday, March 18, 2026, 6:30 PM

General Meeting - Save the Woods

Thursday, March 19, 2026, 6:30 PM
Grace Covenant Presbyterian Church

The White Plague in the Blue Ridge: Asheville in the Tuberculosis Era

Pack Memorial Library

Pack Memorial Library Auditorium

Monday, April 6, 2026

5:30pm–6:30pm

Program Type: Educational, Lecture/Speaker, Local History/Genealogy

Age Group: Teen (ages 12-18), Adult

Program Description

Event Details

More than a century ago, Asheville was a nationally known destination for those seeking a cure from the dreaded "white plague," also known as phthisis, consumption, or tuberculosis. Health and wellness accounted for much of the city's dramatic growth from 1870-1920, yet evidence of the tuberculosis sanitarium era has since largely vanished from Asheville's physical landscape—unless you know where to look.

Join infectious disease expert and local historian Professor David O. Freedman as he shares new research into this invisible history. Learn about Dr. Joseph W. Gleitsmann's establishment of the first successful TB sanitarium in the US in Asheville in 1875 and George Vanderbilt and E.W. Grove's eventual "No Sick" campaign to rebrand the city. The story of the Winyah Sanitarium and Von Ruck Research Laboratories (the current site of the UNCA Woods) includes controversial vaccine development strategies, once debated on the floor of Congress, that are currently revived at the scientific forefront.

About the Speaker

David O. Freedman, MD, is a world-recognized expert in infectious diseases and vaccine research. A Professor Emeritus at the University of Alabama at Birmingham and an advisor to the World Health Organization (WHO), Dr. Freedman has spent his career at the forefront of global health crises, including Zika and Chikungunya. Since moving to Asheville in 2023, he has taken up a new interest in uncovering the city's medical history, recently publishing his findings in the Annals of Internal Medicine.

About Buncombe County Special Collections

The Buncombe County Special Collections Library (formerly the North Carolina Room) is located on the lower level of Pack Memorial Library in Downtown Asheville. Buncombe County Special Collections preserves and provides access to archives and reference materials about the social, cultural, and natural history of Asheville, Buncombe County, and Western North Carolina.

Go to specialcollections.buncombenc.gov to learn more and plan a visit!