Historic information about the Great Smoky Mountains National Park.
In classrooms throughout North Carolina and Oklahoma, students are learning about the periodic table of elements or the origins of the Civil War. However, in some classrooms, the lessons are a bit more personal — Cherokee students are learning the history and language of their people. Cherokee speakers have made great efforts to keep their
It was 1923, when Willis Davis, President of Knoxville Iron Company, and his wife Anne Davis began a crusade for the establishment of a National Park in the Smoky Mountains region of Tennessee and North Carolina. Inspired by their trips to Parks in the Western U.S., the Davises became instrumental in what eventually became Great
This year (2021) is the bicentennial of the Cherokee Syllabary – a system of writing the Cherokee language developed over years by Sequoyah in the early 1800s. “Searching for Sequoyah”, produced by James M. Fortier and LeAnne Howe, will air on PBS stations nationwide starting in November and examines not only that major accomplishment but
A group of hikers in the mid-1920s pose around Abrams Falls near Cades Cove in the Great Smoky Mountains. (Photo Credit: Thompson Collection, Calvin M. McClung Historical Collection)
It was March 18, 1976 when a park ranger in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park responded to a report of what appeared to be an abandoned automobile. The station wagon in question was found in a secluded parking lot in the Elkmont section of the Smokies. Upon further investigation the car was traced to
In 1915, after a heated argument with his father, a 12-year-old boy ran away from his home in Blount County, determined to reach his grandparents who lived on the other side of the Smoky Mountains. Following an old wagon road that roughly traced the route of today’s U.S. Highway 441 through the park, the boy
There are many historic pioneer structures remaining in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park and most of them are well known and heavily visited. One lonely cabin remains somewhat hidden however and is a bit of a secret from many of the millions of visitors to the Great Smokies. This wonderful treasure is known as
Making it through winters here in the Smokies region isn’t that big a deal. The lower elevations where most live don’t normally get a lot of snow and the temperatures only occasionally dip below zero. However, once you get as far north as Boone or Blacksburg, Va., that scenario starts to change drastically. The early
During his thirty years tracking lost souls through the Smokies and beyond McCarter rescued twenty-six people, many of them children. These days he’s still in the mountains, often thinking about those he found—and the few he didn’t. The last lost boy he found was named Phillip Roman. Phillip, who was ten years old, had wandered away from
In 1992, Lynn Faust read an article in Science News written by mathematician Steven Strogatz. The Article explained the subject of synchronized flashing of fireflies known to exist in Southeast Asia. Lynn was somewhat disappointed that the fireflies at Elkmont near her summer cabin had not been mentioned, so she wrote a letter to Strogatz.
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