The main and carriage houses were built in 1927 by Dr. B.C. and Lillian Franklin Thomasson. McKinley Edwards, a decorated WWI Marine war hero, purchased the house in 1932 where he and his wife lived until his death in 1960.The Edwards family moved to Bryson City in 1920, where Counselor Edwards began a 40 year law career, during the course of which he defended 88 first-degree murder cases without a single death-penalty conviction.
His wife Annie Angel Edwards, a prominent business woman, designed and oversaw construction of the adjacent Edwards Apartments in 1940, which she managed for 46 years. Those apartments were later transformed into the Inn's 13 spacious guest rooms.
