Alphonso Calhoun Avery was born in Burke County, North Carolina, on September 11, 1835. Avery was a Confederate officer, politician, judge, and leader of the Ku Klux Klan in western North Carolina. During his time as a North Carolina senator, Avery proposed the successful passage of the act which extended the Western North Carolina Railroad to Old Fort. As a conservative delegate to the North Carolina Constitutional Convention of 1875, Avery aided in revising the Reconstruction Era state constitution. Avery died on June 13, 1913.