hiking through history

When visiting the Smoky Mountain National Park, you are surrounded by nature, seemingly untouched by man... and you think if it is this pretty now, just think what it was like before the highway and millions of visitors. But no, it was not always this beautiful or pristine. There was a time when the land was clearcut by the logging companies, fires raged, erosion was rampant, soil washed into rivers, railroad lines crisscrossed the mountains to haul out the lumber. By the time the park service got the land it was in bad shape.

Then the CCC boys came in and started the restoration, called the Tree Army they planted millions of trees back, built roads and bridges, built many of the facilities still being used today. The beginning of WWII was the end of the CCC, the boys went off to war. If the war had not started, I wonder how much longer the CCC would have been in place, what else they would have accomplished?

Now hiking through the Smokies you see very little evidence of life before the National Park. Even if you read the history of the area and see the old pictures before you hike, and look hard for evidence, it is hard to find. Either removed entirely (like the rail lines) or just being reclaimed by the forest, an entire era has disappeared and remains now only in the stories told and retold and written down for us to read.


The Smokemont area is a ghosttown now compared to what it was back in the early 1900s. The campground where we stayed was the base of the logging by Three M Lumber Company and later the Champion Fibre Company (commissary pictured above). Prior to that time the valley was home to early settlers with their 174-year-old church still there, and of course before that the Cherokee called this area home.

The 6-mile Smokemont Loop Trail in the area sounds like a great hike, but on our visit last weekend the thunderclouds were looming overhead, so we decided to do some short walks not too far from camp.


Our day started at the Smokemont or Lufty Baptist Church circa 1836, a beautiful old white clapboard structure in excellent condition. The doors were open, welcoming us inside. The pews were lined up ready for a full house. Evidence of modern cable ran overhead to hold the building together.


Next we followed the Bradley Fork Trail/Benton MacKaye Trail north which passed by the Smokemont Campground amphitheater - once upon a time it had been a great facility, but now it is all grown up and abandoned, I wonder why the park service lets things go like that? Lack of personnel or funds?


Then we crossed the 1921 concrete bridge over Bradley Fork Creek in search of a nearby cemetery. We just glimpsed it off the road/trail through the woods up a bank, no evidence of a road going into the cemetery, I guess the pall bearers had to climb the hill like the rest of us. The last burial looked like it was around 1924.


On to the Smokemont Interpretive trail, (the name sounds like one of those trails with numbers corresponding to a brochure), but no, just a 3/4 mile trip over a couple of log footbridges and up and around the mountain - saw some pretty mountain laurel.

After a day of hiking we enjoyed sitting around the campfire and watching the synchronous fireflies - a phenomenon much anticipated on the other side of the national park at Elkmont Campground every year with folks bussed in and ranger-led hikes. We were pleasantly surprised to find the bugs at our campsite far away from the crowds.


The next morning we drove up the road about 3 miles to the Kephart Prong Trail which passes by the site of the old CCC camp #411. Here we found a few relics from that time, stone frame for the camp signboard, a stone chimney, water fountain, building foundations. The camp was here from 1933 to 1942 and was home to over 200, here is the story of one man's time spent here at this Kephart camp.


Next stop - the Oconaluftee visitor center, just 4 miles away from the Smokemont campground. We drove out there to see if we could find a book on the history of the area with no luck. The new visitor center is coming along nicely, I don't know what was wrong with the current building, though it was originally built by the CCC back in the 30s, so I guess it is time for some new digs. The garden at the Mountain Farm Museum looks great! I imagine it is a challenge to keep all the critters out of there. The big meadow next to the visitor center is a great place to watch for elk, we saw only one this trip as we passed through.



Leaving the visitor center at the park boundary you enter the town of Cherokee, North Carolina and the Cherokee Indian Reservation. A quick trip through town revealed some changes made possible by the booming casino business. Road and bridge construction, river park access and improvements, and most noticeably the new Cherokee Central Schools complex, a K-12, 473,000 square foot, $108 million dollar campus recently completed, not to mention the $633 million dollar Harrah's casino/hotel/entertainment complex expansion.

It is quite a contrast to drive back into the National Park to our quiet campsite, seeing only nature and hearing only the flow of the river out the window. Thank goodness our forefathers had the foresight and vision to protect and provide this beautiful area for all of us to enjoy.

Hiking through history in the Smokemont/Oconaluftee/Cherokee area - relics, history, restored, remodeled, and new construction, a great way to spend a weekend.


~ photo album