Clay County Progress

Clay County Progress is a weekly newspaper in Hayesville, North Carolina, and Clay County. It covers Clay and Cherokee counties in North Carolina and Towns County, Georgia.

The Progress is owned by Athens, Georgia-based Community Newspapers, Inc., which also operates the Cherokee Scout in Murphy, the Graham Star in Robbinsville, and the Smoky Mountain Times in Bryson City, amongst other publications in the southeastern United States.

History
The Clay County Progress was preceded by two other newspapers. The Clay County Courier launched in 1902 and operated through at least 1909. It was published by G.W. Sanderson and edited by G.H. Haigler. The Clay County News launched Sep. 17, 1926. James Andrew Gray began publishing it with his wife as associate editor. Subsequent editors included Alvin Penland (1937-1938), Eula Gray (1938-1939), and Lucille Padgett (1939-1942). L. E. Hollifield, Jr., bought the newspaper in March 1942 and then sold publishing rights to Cross Printing Co., of Clayton, Georgia, by October 1942. At that time L. P. Cross took over duties as editor and the paper was printed in Clayton. The Clay County News stopped printing in 1943, only to be briefly revived by Rev. L. P. Smith, Guy Padgett and Hattie Jarrett in 1947 before closing for good the following year.

In November 1951, Rev. J. K. Hutchings, pastor of a baptist church in Hiawassee, Georgia, and publisher of the Towns County Herald, started the Clay County Progress. Publishing rights were sold to The Cherokee Scout in nearby Murphy in 1961 and the Scout printed a combined Cherokee Scout and Clay County Progress edition between 1961 and 1980. The Progress has been printed on the Scout's press ever since.

The Progress has twice faced competition. In 1975, the Mountain News opened an office in Hayesville. It is uncertain how long the paper printed locally. Between 1987 and January 2012, weekly newspaper The Smoky Mountain Sentinel operated out of Hayesville. The Sentinel had a circulation of 4,000 when it shut down due to the publisher falling ill. Since it closed, the Progress has been the only newspaper in Clay County.

In the 1980s, The Progress was headquartered on the town square at 57 Main Street before moving to Moore's Plaza on Business Highway 64. In 2003, the newspaper moved to a brick building on the square at 43 Main Street. In October 2023, the paper returned to Moore's Plaza but did not explain why it moved.

The Progress has sponsored Clay County's annual Christmas parade since its inception in 1987. The newspaper's website, ClayCountyProgress.com, launched by February 2002. The Progress began publishing "Reader's Choice" awards in 2022.

Publishers

 * 1) J. K. Hutchings (1951–1952)
 * 2) Paul G. Cutright (1952–1953)
 * 3) Lucille Padgett (1953–1954)
 * 4) Gene Robinson (1954–1957)
 * 5) Denzle Whitehair (1957–1961)
 * 6) Cherokee Scout (1961–1980)
 * 7) Lonnie Britt (c. 1986)
 * 8) Becky Long (1992–present)