I saw this article earlier today, and laughed. I hiked near Elkmont many times in the 1980’s, and often saw the old Wonderland Hotel on my way to Campsite #20. If you look closely at one of the pictures, you can see an outdoor floodlight on the corner of the building ... I don’t think they had those 100 years ago. The place may have been built many years ago, but it was still in use when I last saw it (in fact, it was only abandoned in the 90’s). This article makes it sound like they discovered an ancient civilization or something.
Whatever it is, the carpentering and designs tell you that it's not 100 years old. Maybe 50 or 60. Whatever it was, it could have been a church camp or girl scout camp. The white building looks like a dormitory for girls/women, and the single-story cabins for the boys/men. I'll just bet you would find a common dining room with adjunct large cooking/dish washing kitchen in the white building.
Town, with hardware store, grocery store, booze joint, a school, and other small businesses? Naaah -- geddaddahere -- no backwoods country folks would build stuff like that, especially that close together, for a town.