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Map of Loop Road |
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Loop Road
Tour |
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Man became part of Cades Cove
beyond reach of human memory. Indians hunted here for uncounted centuries, but hardly any
sign of them remains. White settlers followed the Indians to the Cove and their sign is
everywhere: buildings and roads, apple trees and fences, daffodils and footpaths. Cades
Cove is an open air museum that preserves some of the material culture of those who last
lived there.
Go carefully and observantly into another place
and time, one apart from your existence today. See its sights and hear its sounds. Feel
the road rise and fall under you. Stop, get out, and sense the rocky paths under your
feet. be carried into the world of organic man, when he was a generalist and not a
specialist. He lived each day as it came, solving each problem with hands and mind in
common harness. Neither master of his environment nor victim of it, he took what Nature
allowed him to have, and made his way.
Settlers first entered the Cove legally after
an Indian treaty transferred the land to the State of Tennessee in 1819. Year after year
then funneled through the gaps, driven by whatever haunted them behind or drew them in
front, until they spilled over the floor and up the slopes. Most of them traced their way
down the migration route from Virginia into east Tennessee (more or less Interstate 81).
Tuckaleechee (modern Townsend) was the last point of supply before the leap into Cades
Cove. A few years later pioneers moved directly over the mountains from North Carolina.
They all came equipped with personal belongings, and the tools and skills of an Old World
culture, enriched with what they learned from the Indians.
The people of the Cove did not enter, settle
and become shut off from the rest of humanity. They were not discovered by Park
developers, still living a pioneer lifestyle. From the beginning they kept up through the
newspapers, regular mail service, circuit riding preachers, and buying and selling trips
to Tuckaleechee, Maryville and Knoxville. They went to wars and war came to them. They
attended church and school, and college if financially able. A resident physician was here
most of the time from the 1830ís on. Telephones rang in a few Cove homes about as early
as anywhere else (1896).
Although remote and arduous, life here was
little different from rural life anywhere in eastern America in the nineteenth century.
Household and farm labor were done according to ones age and sex. Men produced shelter,
food, fuel and raw materials for clothing. Women cooked, kept house and processed things
the husband produced.
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Cades Cove was once known as "Kate's Cove" after an Indian
chief's wife. The Cove drew the Cherokee Nation back again
and again by it's abundant wildlife and good hunting. Later,
Cades Cove's wildlife drew European descent frontiersmen to
make it their home. They and their offspring cleared the
fertile valley floor and built farms to sustain them. The
pioneer's families lived in Cades Cove for many generations
before the cove became part of The Great Smoky Mountain
National Park. Today, Cades Cove is still as full of
wildlife as before but draws not hunters, but millions of
Smokies visitors |
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The Cove has been preserved by the Great Smoky Mountain
National Park to look much the way it looked in the 1800's.
Once home to a small mountain community, whose settlers came
from mainly from Virginia, North Carolina and upper east
Tennessee, Cades Cove is today the largest open air museum
in the entire Great Smoky Mountain National Park. Cades Cove
has original pioneer homesteads, barns, businesses, pasture
and farmland--a fitting tribute to the hearty people who
lived here in the days of yesteryear |
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Most of the settlers homes and home sites will be outside of
the road you as you travel the Cades Cove loop. To the
center of the loop will be acre upon acre of grass and
wildflower fields which were once cleared by frontiersmen
for valuable for growing things such as wheat, corn and
cattle. Nearly all the buildings built by the pioneers and
preserved by the Great Smoky Mountain National Park are
outside the Cades Cove Loop. These remaining original
structures, as well as abundant wildlife, are easy to spot
as you travel the loop |
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However there were many homes in the cove which were not
preserved. Those abandoned home sites are still visible to
the trained eye. You may recognize the abandoned home sites
by obscure lonely chimney's, rock fences or landscaping
which does not seem natural to the surroundings. In addition
to the European descent Americans who lived in Cades Cove
for over a century before it was absorbed into The Great
Smoky Mountain National Park, there were also Native
Americans. The Native American tribe was, and still is the
Cherokee nation. You can see signs they left on Cades Cove
in the form of trails, many of which were developed into
roads and or hiking trails |
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This land was purchased by the state of Tennessee from the
Cherokee Indians. Land speculators, who had purchased large
tracts of land from the state, then sold smaller parcels to
families to farm. The East end of the valley was the first
to be settled. It is higher and drier than the West end, so
if you are looking for a specific type flora or fauna keep
that mind. |
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Submitted
Photographs
Click Thumbnails for
Enlargements |
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| The eleven-mile loop road follows many of the
grades and turns of the old wagon roads, fording a stream now and then. Along the way you
are likely to see wildlife: deer and wild turkey year-round, lots of groundhogs in the
summer. |
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| Children and the elderly took care of
miscellaneous loose ends when and where they could. In this way the home was an almost
self-contained economic unit. The community was an important aspect of life to the
settlers in a rural society. It was an extension of the household by marriage, custom, and
economic necessity...a partnership of households in association with each other. The
community as democratic in a general sense: there were few extremes of wealth and poverty;
there was widespread participation in community affairs; and, no clearly defined social
classes locked people in or out. There were common celebrations like family gatherings,
workings, and funerals. Politics was tied to state, regional and national affairs. Law
enforcement was personal in many ways. Justices of the Peace applied common sense, based
on common law. |
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