Roaring Fork is a stream in the Great Smoky Mountains of Tennessee, located in the Southeastern United States. After a small Appalachian community site, today the stream area is home to the Roaring Fork's Natural Roaring Fork Trail and Roaring Fork Historical District .
Like many mountain streams, the Roaring Fork is unstable. While the river is present as a droplet of peace on a certain day, it quickly becomes water raging quickly after a light rain shower. The "roar" of water is reinforced by an echo in the surrounding mountains.
Video Roaring Fork (Great Smoky Mountains)
Geography
Roaring Fork's source is located nearly 5,000 ft (1,500 m) along the northern slope of Mount Le Conte, where several small springs gather. The highest of these springs, known as the Basin Spring, provides a water source for LeConte Lodge. From its source, Roaring Fork drops 2,500 feet (760 m) more than just two miles (3 km), spills over Grotto Falls and absorbs Surry Creek before settling in the narrow valley between Mount Winnesoka and Piney Mountain. Roaring Fork's mouth is located at the northern tip of Gatlinburg, where it is located on the West Fork of the Little Pigeon River.
The Roaring Fork Valley is based on Precambrian sandstone from Ocoee Supergroup, a rock formation formed from ancient ocean deposits nearly a billion years ago. Roaring Fork Sandstone is found throughout the mid-level elevation of the northern Smokies, and is very common in Greenbrier in the east and Sugarlands in the west. For thousands of years, erosion forces have brought rocks consisting of this sandstone down from the boulder that lies higher along the ridge. This process has left Roaring Fork grounds and flats in a Roaring Fork valley that is almost covered by sandstone of various sizes. Farmers living in the Roaring Fork, Sugarlands and Greenbrier continue to move and pile up these stones, creating the distinctive rocky walls still intersecting in these areas today.
Maps Roaring Fork (Great Smoky Mountains)
Roaring Fork Historical District
Between 1800 and 1810, the first permanent European-American settlers arrived at the White Oak Flats area around what is now Gatlinburg. In the following decades, their descendants spread to the surrounding bays and valleys. Richard Reagan (1776-1829), the son of one of these pioneers, settled on a large plot of land just south of Gatlinburg along LeConte Creek. Some Reagan children settled in the west at Sugarlands, while some of them moved east to the valley along the Roaring Fork, later known as "Spruce Flats." In 1900, Reagan's three grandchildren, Alfred Reagan (1856-1928), Aaron Reagan, and John H. Reagan were still farming along the river, just above Gatlinburg.
The Bales family settled on the top of the Roaring Fork around the 1830s or earlier. Caleb Bales (1839-1913), apparently a son or nephew of the first Bales settled in the Roaring Fork, owned a farm south of Reagan. Caleb's sons, Jim Bales (1869-1939) and Ephraim Bales (1867-1936) will spend most of their lives on Roaring Fork farmlands inherited from their fathers.
When Balà © and Reagan's family lived on adjoining ground, it was not surprising that they were married. Caleb Bales married one of Richard Reagan's granddaughters, Elizabeth, in 1861. Ephraim Bales married the great grandson of Richard Reagan, Minerva, in 1889. Caleb's daughter Martha married Alfred Reagan in 1879.
The most important thing at Roaring Fork, near where the stream absorbs Surry Creek, is the Clabo family farm, Gilbert Ogle, and Jasper Mellinger. Former homes can usually be identified by the dominance of young tuliprees (rather than the more common hemlock or oak), as tuliprees are the fastest to reclaim previously planted land.
Around 1850, Roaring Fork residents built a rough road connecting the area with the White Oak Flats (this old street now stops along the Roaring Fork Motor Nature Trail). By 1900, the community had matured into a mountain village with its own schools, churches, public shops, and bathtub factories.
In 1976, Roaring Fork Historical District was listed on the National Register of Historic Places.
The Jim Bales Place
The first historic stop along the Roaring Fork Motor Nature Trail is Jim Bales Place, a farm that Jim inherited from his father, Caleb. Jim, born James Wesley Bales in 1869, lived here for most of his life. He married Emma Ogle, the grandson of Gilbert Ogle, whose farm is located just above Bales Place. As Bales grows older, the farm is passed on to other families, one of which builds a modern skeleton house on the ground (known as a "luxury house") where they entertain visitors.
When the Park Service controlled the land in the 1930s, the skeletal house was torn down. The Alex Cole Cabin, which is more representative of the pioneer days of Appalachia, was transferred to a farm from Sugarlands. Nevertheless, the corn meal and the Bales granaries remain.
The Ephraim Bales Place
Just below where Jim Bales is the farm of Ephraim and Minerva Bales. Ephraim, brother of Jim Bales, farms about 30 acres (120,000 m 2 ) from his 70-acre (280,000 m 2 ) plot. The other 40 hectares (160,000 m 2 ) are mostly forested, which the Bales family uses for building materials and firewood.
Cabin Bales is a double cabin with a hallway known as "dog running" in between. Dog cabin cabins, which are fairly common throughout the southeastern US, usually involve two adjacent cabins with about 10 feet (3.0 m) in between, but with one roof continuously. The space between the two halves is relatively cool in summer and warm in winter, making it attractive to dogs. Both parts of the cabin have their own chimney. With the exception of the back porch, the cabin remains mostly like when the Bales family lived here in the early 1900s. Along with the cabin, Bales cornballs, pig pens, and barns are still standing today, just a few yards from the cabin. The stone walls and railings behind the cabin represent two major barriers used in the Northern Smokies in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.
The Alfred Reagan Place
Alfred Reagan, a descendant of the first settlers in the area, has a small farm just below Ephraim Bales Place. Reagan is a jack-of-all-trade, operating the Roaring Fork blacksmith shop, general store, and the most consistent grain mill. Reagan was also a part-time preacher at Roaring Fork Church, where he donated land and helped build.
Of all the buildings on Reagan's farm, only the cabins and factories are left today. Because of the panel panels and layers of paint, Reagan's cabin stands out between the historic structures in the Smokies today. The cabin design is known as the "saddlebag" design, which involves two cabins built around a single chimney. Kitchen area was added later.
The Reagan factory is a standard tub, with a flume shifting water from the Roaring Fork to drive the tub-wheel turbine. Turbines change the grindstone that breaks corn and wheat into cornmeal and flour. Reagan's factory is well designed and well positioned. It is said that when other factories lack adequate water power due to low water levels, the Reagan plant will continue to operate.
Alex Cole's cabin
The Alex Cole Cabin is the last surviving structure of the Sugarlands community proper. Built by Albert Alexander Cole's mountain guides, it has been moved from its original place to Jim Bales Place along the Roaring Fork Motor Nature Trail.
Natural Trail Motor Roaring Fork
The Roaring Fork Motor Nature Trail is a narrow one-way street open to vehicular traffic (cars and small pickup trucks only) in Spring, Summer, and Autumn. Along with the historic district, the road passes through two sights and a forest that represents the mid-level elevation in the Smokies.
This trail begins just past the Rainbow Falls Trailhead on the Cherokee Orchard Road, and gradually climbs into Piney Mountain, up to the top on the northern slopes of the mountain (elevation elevation of about 3,000 feet/914 meters). After passing the road, the road passes through many large trees made of chestnut trees. These trees, which often grow with a diameter of 5-6 feet, were killed by blight in the 1930s.
When the road down Piney Mountain, past the parking lot at Trillium Gap Trailhead. This hiking trail leads past Grotto Falls and Trillium Gap to the top of Mount Le Conte. The Trillium Pass - the gap between Brushy Mountain and Le Konte's main massif - was named by Horace Albright, who observed trillium-filled areas in the 1920s.
Past the Trillium Gap Trailhead, the road goes on as it enters the top of the Roaring Fork cavity. The trail of young tuliprees marks the former Clabo and Ogle farms. As soon as the road crosses Roaring Fork, Jim Bales Place is visible on the right (east). The Grapeyard Ridge Trail, which links the Roaring Fork to the Greenbrier, begins just behind the barn. Past Place Jim Bales is Ephraim Bales Place and Alfred Reagan Place.
The road continues to decline past the historic district, passing along the parking lot allowing to see the sights of the Roaring Fork. The thin waterfall known as "The Thousand Drops Place" is the last stop along the motorway before re-entering Gatlinburg.
See also
- Noah Ogle Place
- List of rivers in Tennessee
References
External links
- Great Smoky Mountains National Park Autumn Drive - Contains information about Natural Trail Roaring Fork Motor
- Great Smoky Mountains National Park Waterfalls - Contains information about Grotto Falls
- Great Smoky Mountains National Park: Plan Your Visit: Roaring Fork
- Great Smoky Mountains National Park: Maps
Source of the article : Wikipedia
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