KNOXVILLE, Tennessee (WATE) – As we approach the end of the year, take a look back in time at Great Smoky Mountains National Park. Getting a national park into the Smoky Mountains wasn’t a quick process. The idea began in the late 1890s according to the National Park Service.
Great Smoky Mountains National Park through the years
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1937: Old cable mill at Cades Cove, Great Smoky Mountains National Park. (Photo via National Parks Service) -
April 23, 1947: Hatchery and service building, with breeding ponds in the foreground, Fish Culture Station, Kephart Prong. Location: Great Smoky Mountains National Park (Photo via National Park Service) -
1950: Camp Heintooga. Arrival at the campsite in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park. (Photo via National Parks Service) -
As before: Park visitors at a museum with exhibits on the pioneers in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park. (Photo via National Parks Service) -
1959: Building with exiting visitors and an information sign and an arrow to the door in the Great Smokey Mountains National Park. (Photo via National Park Service) -
Native American standing outside a teepee in front of a store in Cherokee, North Carolina, in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park. (Photo via National Parks Service) -
August 1973: collection of fees. Visitors around the Sugarland Visitor Center at the Great Smoky Mountains National Park. (Photo via National Parks Service) -
An NPE employee on stage at Elkmont Campfire Talk in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park. (Photo via National Parks Service) -
Visitors camping in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park. (Photo via National Parks Service) -
1973: An NPS employee talks to visitors on a bike ride before leaving the Sugarland Visitor Center in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park. (Photo via National Parks Service) -
Mission 66 structure in front of the mountains in Great Smoky National Park. (Photo via National Park Service) -
1975: NPS personnel hurtle down a mountain in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park. (Photo via National Parks Service) -
NPS personnel learn different knots. (Photo via National Parks Service) -
1975: Helicopters take off in Great Smoky National Park. (Photo via National Parks Service) -
Person crushing sorghum in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park. (Photo via National Parks Service) -
Visitors standing on a lookout with a parking lot behind them at Newfound Gap in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park. (Photo via National Parks Service) -
Bear in charge at Great Smoky Mountains National Park. (copy of the NPS Information Office file).
In May 1926, a bill was signed by President Calvin Coolidge which provided for the creation of the Great Smoky Mountains National Park and the Shenandoah National Park. By 1928, enough money had been raised to purchase the park land. However, the purchase of the land was difficult.
The creation of the park meant that hundreds of families were asked to leave their homes. According to the National Park Service, some went there voluntarily and others fought against it, but most of the families moved immediately.
Those who were too old or too sick to move were granted leases for life. This includes the Walker sisters, who lived in the park until their deaths in the 1960s. Others were granted short-term leases. However, they could not chop wood, hunt, and trap at will as they previously did.
The park was officially opened in September 1940. President Franklin Roosevelt spoke from the Rockefeller Memorial at Newfound Gap, straddling the Tennessee-North Carolina border.
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Franklin D. Roosevelt consecrated the Great Smoky Mountains National Park on September 2, 1940, “for the continued enjoyment of the people.” (Photo via National Parks Service) -
The CCC works on the Rockefeller Memorial at Newfound Gap. (Photo via National Parks Service)
To learn more about the history of the park, click here.
