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Great Smoky Mountains National Park is an American national park in the southeastern United States , with parts in North Carolina and Tennessee. The park straddles the ridgeline of the Great Smoky Mountains , part of the Blue Ridge Mountains , which are a division of the larger Appalachian Mountain chain.
The park contains some of the highest mountains in eastern North America, including Clingmans Dome , Mount Guyot , and Mount Le Conte.
The border between the two states runs northeast to southwest through the center of the park. The Appalachian Trail passes through the center of the park on its route from Georgia to Maine. With The park encompasses , acres Highway Newfound Gap Road in the towns of Gatlinburg, Tennessee and Cherokee, North Carolina , and also in Townsend, Tennessee.
The park is internationally recognized for its mountains, waterfalls, biodiversity, and forests. The park was chartered by the United States Congress in , and officially dedicated by President Franklin D. Roosevelt in The Great Smoky Mountains was the first national park having land and other costs paid in part with federal funds; previous parks were funded wholly with state money or private funds.
As the most visited national park in the United States, the Great Smoky Mountains National Park anchors a large tourism industry based in Sevier County, Tennessee adjacent to the park. Major attractions include Dollywood , the second-most visited tourist attraction in Tennessee, Ober Gatlinburg , and Ripley's Aquarium of the Smokies.
For thousands of years, this region was occupied by successive cultures of indigenous peoples. The historic Cherokee had their homeland here, and occupied numerous towns in the river valleys on both sides of the Appalachian Mountains. Their first encounters with Europeans were as traders, mostly coming from the colonial Carolinas and Virginia.
European Americans did not begin to settle here until the late 18th and early 19th centuries. Most of the Cherokee were also removed. For a period some, led by such warriors as Tsali , evaded removal by staying in the area now part of the Great Smoky Mountains National Park. A band on the Oconaluftee River acquired land and also remained. Their descendants make up most of the federally recognized Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians , based in Cherokee, North Carolina , and their Qualla Boundary reserve to the south of the park.
John Mingus, who built the Mingus Mill, and Ralph Hughes settled on the Oconaluftee in Other settlers soon followed and began clearing land and farming. In , John Oliver and his family were the first white settlers to move into Cades Cove.
After , more families settled in Cades Cove including the Jobes, Gregorys, Sparkes, and Cables. As the community began to grow, the Cades Cove Baptist Church was established in As white settlers arrived, entrepreneurs developed logging as a major industry in the mountains. The Little River Railroad was constructed by Colonel W. Townsend [13] in the lateth century to haul timber out of the remote regions of the area.
Colonel Townsend had purchased 86, acres of land on the Little River. The construction of the Little River Railroad set an example for larger companies like the Ritter Lumber Company , Montvale Timber Company, and Norwood Lumber to also purchase acres of land for logging. By logging was at its peak and by about two-thirds of the Great Smoky Mountains National Park area had been logged or burned by fires from logging operations.
Because cut-and-run-style clearcutting was destroying the natural beauty of the area, by the 20th century visitors and locals banded together to raise money for preservation of the land. The U. National Park Service wanted a park in the eastern United States, but did not have much money to establish one. David Chapman , a Knoxville, Tennessee business leader, was appointed in to head a commission to establish a national park here. Congress authorized the park in , but there was no nucleus of federally owned land around which to develop it.
John D. Rockefeller, Jr. Slowly, mountain homesteaders, miners, and loggers were evicted from the land. Farms and timbering operations were abolished to establish the protected areas of the park. Travel writer Horace Kephart , for whom Mount Kephart was named, and photographers Jim Thompson and George Masa were instrumental in fostering the development of the park.
Hooper of Tennessee was the principal land purchasing agent for the park, [15] which was officially established on June 15, During the Great Depression , the Civilian Conservation Corps , the Works Progress Administration , and other federal organizations hired workers to build trails, fire watchtowers, and other infrastructure improvements to the park and Smoky Mountains. The park was used for filming scenes of Disney 's hit s TV series Davy Crockett, King of the Wild Frontier.
This park was designated an International Biosphere Reserve in , was certified as a UNESCO World Heritage Site in , and became a part of the Southern Appalachian Biosphere Reserve in A 75th anniversary re-dedication ceremony was held on 2 September Among those in attendance were the four U. senators from Tennessee and North Carolina, the three US Representatives whose districts include the park, the governors of both states, and Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar.
Dolly Parton , Tennessee native, singer, and actress also attended and performed. In late November and early December , a series of wildfires engulfed a total of 17, acres 72 km 2 in the park and surrounding areas.
The wildfires killed at least 14, injured , and forced the evacuation of more than 14, people. The fires, which were initially suspected to have been caused by arson , occurred during a period of unusual drought , which accelerated the fires. The wildfires were the deadliest in the Eastern United States since the Great Fires of , and comprised one of the worst natural disasters in the history of Tennessee.
In Cassius Cash was appointed as the first African-American superintendent of Great Smoky Mountains National Park. He is the 16th superintendent of the park. In , the national park will be featured on a USPS Priority Mail Express stamp depicting a scene near the Newfound Gap. The stamp was designed by USPS art director Greg Breeding, with art from Dan Cosgrove.
The majority of rocks in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park are Late Precambrian rocks that are part of the Ocoee Supergroup. This group consists of metamorphosed sandstones , phyllites , schists , and slate.
Early Precambrian rocks are not only the oldest rocks in the park but also the dominant rock type in sites such as the Raven Fork Valley and upper Tuckasegee River between Cherokee and Bryson City. They primarily consist of metamorphic gneiss , granite , and schist. Cambrian sedimentary rocks can be found among the bottom of the Foothills to the northwest, and in limestone coves such as Cades Cove.
The oldest rocks in the Smokies are the Precambrian gneiss and schists which were formed over a billion years ago from the accumulation of marine sediments and igneous rock. In the Late Precambrian, the primordial ocean expanded and the more recent Ocoee Supergroup rocks formed from the accumulation of eroding land mass onto the continental shelf.
In the Paleozoic Era, the ocean deposited a thick layer of marine sediments which left behind sedimentary rock. During the Ordovician Period, the collision of the North American and African tectonic plates initiated the Alleghenian orogeny that created the Appalachian range. During the Mesozoic Era rapid erosion of softer sedimentary rocks re-exposed the older Ocoee Supergroup formations.
Elevations in the park range from about feet m to 6, feet 2, m at the summit of Clingmans Dome. Within the park a total of sixteen mountains reach higher than 5, feet 1, m.
The wide range of elevations mimics the latitudinal changes found throughout the entire eastern United States. Ascending the mountains is comparable to a trip from Tennessee to Canada. Plants and animals common in the country's Northeast have found suitable ecological niches in the park's higher elevations, while southern species find homes in the balmier lower reaches.
The humid, subtropical air mass typically in place over the Smoky Mountains produces large amounts of precipitation. Annual precipitation amounts range from 50—80 in 1,—2, mm , [30] with heavy winter snowfall in the higher elevations.
The difference between high temperatures is similar to the moist adiabatic lapse rate of 3. The park is affected by air pollution because of increased development. In a report by the National Parks Conservation Association , Great Smoky Mountains National Park was considered the most polluted national park. From to , the park recorded approximately unhealthy air days, the equivalent of about one month of unhealthy air days per year.
The park is almost 95 percent forested , and almost 36 percent of it, , acres 76, ha , is estimated by the Park Service to be old growth forest with many trees that predate European settlement of the area.
The variety of elevations, the abundant rainfall, and the presence of old growth forests give the park an unusual richness of biota. About 19, species of organisms are known to live in the park, and estimates as high as an additional , undocumented species may also be present.
Park officials count more than species of birds, 50 species of fish, 39 species of reptiles, and 43 species of amphibians, including many lungless salamanders.
The park is an important site for salamanders. Fish and Wildlife Services to remove the wolves from the area in Elk wapiti were reintroduced to the park in , three years after the FWS removed the red wolves from the area. Elk are most abundant in the Cataloochee area in the southeastern section of the park. It is also home to species of mammals such as the raccoon , bobcat , two species of fox , river otter , woodchuck , beaver , two species of squirrel , opossum , coyote , white-tailed deer , chipmunk , two species of skunk , and various species of bats.
Over species of trees grow in the park. The lower region forests are dominated by deciduous leafy trees. At higher altitudes, deciduous forests give way to coniferous trees like Fraser fir. In addition, the park has over 1, flowering plant species and over 4, species of non-flowering plants.
The Great Smoky Mountains National Park is a major tourist attraction in the region. It has been the most visited national park for many years, with over Surrounding towns, notably Gatlinburg , Pigeon Forge , Sevierville , and Townsend , Tennessee , and Cherokee , Sylva , Maggie Valley , and Bryson City , North Carolina , receive a significant portion of their income from tourism associated with the park.
The two main visitor centers inside the park are Sugarlands Visitors' Center near the Gatlinburg entrance to the park and Oconaluftee Visitor Center near Cherokee, North Carolina , at the eastern entrance to the park. These ranger stations provide exhibits on wildlife , geology , and the history of the park.
They also sell books, maps, and souvenirs.
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