Man of the mountains

In 1933, George Masa, a pivotal figure in the establishment of the Great Smoky Mountains National Park and the creator of some of the finest black and white photographs of the region, died in Asheville from influenza. Even though more than two years had passed since the death of his best friend and mountaineering companion Horace Kephart—noted author and, like Masa, a stalwart advocate for the preservation of the Smoky Mountains—he remained devastated over that loss and some believed heartache, as much as physical maladies, contributed to his death.

The enigmatic Japanese immigrant was destitute and spent his final days in a county sanatorium instead of out under the sky blazing trails, photographing, measuring and recording peaks and distances in the rugged backcountry of the Smoky Mountains he loved more than life itself.  

Masa’s friends and fellow hiking club members wanted his life’s work on behalf of the Smokies to be memorialized. On June 4, 1939, James H. Caine of the Asheville Times wrote:  “When George Masa died some six years ago there was a movement afoot to fittingly recognize what he had done to preserve in pictorial history the scenic grandeur of the Great Smoky Mountains National Park. But like Mark Twain’s weather, nothing has been done about it.”

In 1961—after a three-decades-long crusade—a 5,685 feet-high peak in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park was named Masa Knob. The accolade was an appropriate acknowledgement of Masa’s dogged spirit and selfless contributions to safeguarding the mountains for future generations.

Masa Knob, located on the North Carolina-Tennessee state line, is about three miles from Newfound Gap and is situated between Charlie’s Bunion and Mt. Kephart. Traveling east on the Appalachian Trail from Ice Water Springs, the trail drops down through slate outcrops and across Masa Knob.  In 1929, Masa and Kephart, along with Charlie Conner, a local farmer and guide, hiked to the Sawteeth Range of the Smokies to survey intense storm damage. It was during this trip that Charlie’s Bunion, a familiar Appalachian Trail landmark, received its name.

Masa Knob is a relatively obscure peak in the Sawteeth Range. It’s safe to say that of the thousands who hike the AT annually, few know they are traversing a landmark named for a remarkable, yet mystifying, individual.

George Masa has been called “the Ansel Adams of the Southern Appalachians.” That is quite a comparison considering that Masa was a self-taught photographer who lived in proximity of the Appalachian Mountains for only the last 18 years of his life. Adams, however, who was arguably the best black and white photographer of the natural landscape and a dedicated environmentalist, was never consumed with the majesty of the Great Smokies. He only visited the Smokies once and said of the mountains, “The Smokys [sic] are OK in their way, but they are going to be devilish hard to photograph ….” 

Two decades before the legendary Adams published images from his visit—only four—George Masa ceaselessly roamed the rough terrain of the Smokies capturing vistas on film that he would sell to tourists. Small in stature and laden with a heavy tripod and bulky camera, Masa somehow managed hikes up to 20 miles in search of a suitable location to capture those views. And, much to the chagrin of those who sometimes accompanied him, he patiently would wait hours for the perfect lighting, or even a precise cloud placement or formation.  

Masa arrived in the United States in 1906 as Masahara Iizuka and sometime thereafter changed his name. He told a family in Asheville with whom he once boarded that he discontinued the use of the Iizuka and changed his first name to George when he converted to Christianity while still living in Japan. Americanizing his name to George Masa was perhaps simply a matter of convenience.  

The actual events of George Masa’s life prior to the time he moved to Asheville are cloaked in mystery. He once told a newspaper reporter that he was born in Osaka, Japan, and studied mining engineering at Tokyo’s Meiji University. He claimed to have arrived in America at the age of 24. His birth date was estimated but has never been verified. The date of birth on his grave marker, which was erected 14 years after his death, is January 20, 1881.

Interestingly, the information Masa gave for the 1920 and 1930 federal censuses revealed inconsistencies. He had somehow aged 16 years in ten, and his immigration date—first reported as 1914, had changed to 1906—a difference of eight years. When Masa died, a newspaper report stated he’d come to the United States to further his studies—mining engineering—at the University of California and had severed all ties with Japan following the death of his father, a jeweler. 

Writing in Japanese, Masa’s journal entry for January 18, 1915, said he was “launching out on an adventure today.” This journey started in San Francisco where he boarded a train headed for New Orleans. During his brief stay there, Masa recorded a small income in his journal as well as expenses but there was no source of income listed. After a gap of four months with no journal entries, he wrote, “Now I have to raise money. It can’t be helped, for I have just enough money to travel and not [a] penny extra.” 

On July 10, 1915, reportedly traveling with a group of Austrian students, Masa arrived in Asheville by train. Two days later, he was hired to work in the laundry at the Grove Park Inn. The Inn, built by pharmaceutical magnate E.W. Grove, had opened just two years earlier. Grove’s son-in-law, Fred Seely, designed the magnificent building and served as the Inn’s manager. Seely purposely recruited a group of foreigners, including Masa, to work at the hotel, feeling they created a cosmopolitan atmosphere for his wealthy clientele.  

Captivated by the beautiful mountains surrounding Asheville, Masa began taking trips to the lofty peaks with his Austrian companions. Perhaps Masa saw himself as a character in the small volume of Japanese Samurei and Ninjutsu tales he carried. The Ninja, from humble backgrounds, were devoted to living in accordance with nature; seeking enlightenment through long mountain pilgrimages. Masa frequently said that his “church” was in the mountains. Clearly, the mountain landscape was fundamental to his spirituality.

When the Austrians left Asheville, Masa remained. Within a few months, he had been promoted to the valet desk at Grove Park Inn where he enjoyed interacting with the well-to-do guests. Masa had an engaging personality and presented himself in a manner that was both respectful and engrossing. The guests were fascinated with him.

Realizing that photographs would portray a positive image of the Grove Park Inn and its clientele, Seely allowed Masa the use of his personal camera and Masa photographed the guests at the Inn and on outings in the surrounding mountains. Masa’s skill as a photographer and the quality of his film processing suggests that he had received previous training, but that is another fragment of the mystery surrounding his life. 

In November 1916, Masa wrote Seely stating he had tired of hotel work and was making plans to leave. But for some unknown reason he remained at the Inn until May 1917, when he again decided it was time to move on. He had decided to relocate to Colorado Springs to “get lessons in metal processing.”

After a short time in Colorado, he wanted to return to Asheville and work again at the Grove Park Inn. In a letter to Seely he wrote, “When you find a position to suit me, except valet, please let me know. I am glad [to] come back to work but I have to spend all my money on vacation so please let me have about couple months wages in advance.”  

Seely obliged, sending Masa $40 with a promise of a better job and a month’s vacation each summer, with half pay. Masa returned to the Inn as head porter. A short time later he worked as a craftsman in the woodcarving shop of Biltmore Industries, a business acquired by Seely from Edith Vanderbilt. 

Perhaps because of the circumstances of World War I, Seely suspected Masa might be involved in espionage and reported his presence to the U.S. Department of Justice. The charges proved baseless and Masa became one of Seely’s most trustworthy employees.

In the spring of 1918, Masa left the Grove Park Inn for good. He traveled through Virginia, West Virginia, and Washington, D.C., before returning to Asheville in October. He soon took a job with a local photographer, Herbert Pelton. Masa and Pelton formed a business partnership called The Photo Craft, setting up shop on Biltmore Avenue. Less than a year later, Pelton moved to Washington, D.C., and Masa became the sole owner and changed the name to Plateau Studios.

 The ambitious Masa took on everything from portraiture to covering news events and selling prints and colored postcards of his photographs. Gradually, he began spending more and more time in the mountains and less time in his studio. He promoted his business through advertisements in local publications, inviting readers to inspect his growing collection of scenic treasures.

Masa began financing his own projects, including a showcase of Mt. Mitchell called “The Mt. Mitchell Motor Road.” The Asheville Chamber of Commerce produced brochures promoting investment and tourism, illustrated with Masa’s images.

In his quest to capture new vistas on film to sell in his studio and to his mail-order customers, Masa was drawn farther and farther from Asheville. A charter member of the Carolina Hiking Club, he had ample opportunities to delight in, and photograph, the beauty of the Smokies.

As Masa’s reputation as a scenic photographer grew, he received an increasing number of requests from writers for images to accompany their articles about the area. Somehow, perhaps through Paul Fink—a national park advocate, banker and outdoorsman from Jonesborough, Tennessee—Masa was introduced to Horace Kephart, who would become his closest friend.

Masa was profoundly influenced by his meeting with Kephart. He studied publications recommended by Kephart and became a devoted student of the flora, fauna and the history of the mountains. The two became constant companions. They took numerous trips into the mountains, gathering photographs and information while hiking in the daylight and exchanging ideas and plans over the campfire by night.

 Along with Verne Rhodes, executive secretary of the North Carolina Park Commission, Kephart and Masa were involved in the verification and naming of geographic features in the Smokies under the direction of the U.S. Department of Interior. They are credited with recording every mountain, stream, and valley that fell within the proposed park boundary in North Carolina. From this work, the Department of Interior made a map of the future national park. It would be decades before Masa showed up on area maps, except for the ones he’d hand drawn and signed.

Masa drew detailed sketches to help with map making and painstakingly labeled each photograph. He hiked with Paul Fink and photographer Jim Thompson, both members of the nomenclature committee for the Tennessee side of the Smokies. Like Kephart and Rhodes, they relied heavily on Masa’s work.

 With exact measurements being vital, Masa cleverly devised his own measuring apparatus by attaching an odometer to the wheel of a bicycle that had been cut off just behind the front fork so that only the wheel and handlebars remained. He was often spotted in the mountains pushing that contraption along, making notes as he went. 

Witnessing firsthand the devastation caused by industrial-scale logging, Masa and Kephart immersed themselves in the campaign to create the Great Smoky Mountains National Park. As the public rallied support for the park, Masa and Kephart became noted figures in its promotion. Masa conducted on-going correspondence with government officials, including Arno Cammerer, sending them detailed letters, maps and photographs to enhance the cause.

In the fall of 1930, Masa escorted a contingent of National Park officials on an inspection trip in the Smokies. He sent First Lady Grace Coolidge a large book of photographs he had taken within the proposed park and collections to the governors of North Carolina and Tennessee. It was the print he sent to John D. Rockefeller Jr. that some say was the motivation for Rockefeller’s generous donation to the Park. 

Asheville was not spared the devastation of the Great Depression. Just weeks after Masa led the high-ranking officials through the Smokies, the Asheville banks closed. Masa lost his entire savings and had to resort to asking his friends for money. Despite his misfortune, he refused to renege on his commitment to his beloved mountains. Soon, he was engaged in another project: mapping the southern portion of the Appalachian Trail. This work consumed him and what little funds he could scrape up.

 Masa served on the board of the Appalachian Trail Conference and was one of the principle organizers of the Carolina Appalachian Trail Club. During its first year, the club scouted, measured, and marked over a hundred miles of the Appalachian Trail with Masa providing most of the data on possible routes. The first person to systematically measure many of the trails, Masa possessed an intimate knowledge of the mountains; he knew the altitude, distance, location, and topography of every location on the North Carolina side of the Smokies and many on the Tennessee side.

On April 3, 1931, Masa picked up the morning paper. The bold headline—“Horace Kephart Killed”—changed his life forever. Kephart, 68, and another author, Fiswoode Tarleton, had died the day before when the driver of the taxi in which they were riding lost control of the vehicle and it overturned three times. Unexpectedly, that same morning Masa received a letter from Kephart; it was concerning nomenclature of the Great Smoky Mountains. “It shocked me to pieces,” Masa wrote to a friend. Visibly stricken by his friend’s death, he was among the first to arrive at the funeral in Bryson City and the last to leave.

Masa was never the same after losing his dear friend, and his financial situation continued to deteriorate. Despite his grief, Masa was known for keeping sprits high among his fellow hikers. He organized a hike in memory of Kephart to be held on April 2, 1933, the second anniversary of Kephart’s death. More than 100 people participated in the hike to Mt. Kephart’s summit. Not long after that hike, Masa was stricken by an illness some described as tuberculosis.

His condition rapidly declined. Friends checked him into a county tuberculosis sanitarium. At noon on June 21, 1933, Masa died—penniless and in debt. Members of the Carolina Hiking Club and other friends pitched in to pay for his funeral and burial. Although he had expressed his wish to be buried next to Kephart, limited funds made it impossible. 

As the years passed, even with Masa Knob being a landmark along the popular Appalachian Trail, George Masa and his work essentially slipped into obscurity until a biographical film Paul Bonesteel produced in 2003 revived interest. Since that documentary and Ken Burns’ PBS epic production “The National Parks: America’s Best Idea” featuring a segment on the Smokies that profiled Masa and Kephart’s contributions, some of Masa’s personal letters have been discovered but revealed little additional information about the man who was one of the greatest photographers of the Great Smoky Mountains. With Masa Knob in close proximity to Mt. Kephart, it seems the landscape they loved has reunited the great explorers and friends.