The earliest published mentions of the lights begin in 1912, on the heels of the first publication of Jules Verne's 1906 novel "Master of the World" in English in 1911. An important plot point in the novel consists of a mad scientist constructing an airship inside his secret lair in Table Rock, near Morganton, North Carolina, activities which cause strange lights to appear on the summit of the mountain. The rapidly expanding electrification of the Linville Gorge area from the 1890s through the 1910s, seems to be the origin of the Brown Mountain lights legend, possibly helped by Verne's novel. A number of travelogues, including accounts of mysterious happenings and ghost stories, were published about the region prior to 1900; but there is no mention of unexplained lights in any of these historical sources. Mansfield's investigation found many locals were unaware of any strange lights until 1910 or later. Joseph Loven, who lived next to Loven's Hotel, said he had first noticed the lights in 1897, but took no interest in them, and didn't hear anyone else talking about them, until his neighbor, C. E. Gregory, began trying to draw public attention to them around 1910.