A History Of Mt Mitchell And The Black Mountains

This volume looks at the natural and human history of North Carolina's Mount Mitchell, part of the Black Mountain range and the highest peak in the United States. It chronicles the geological forces that created this landscape, traces its environmental change and human intervention.

The Black Mountain range of the Appalachians is the highest mountain range in the eastern United States and has a diverse ecology with plants and animals usually found much further north. Heavily deforested in the late nineteenth century, the range was the site of the nation's first natural resources preservation movement in the early 20th century. Subjects discussed include intitial habitations by scientist Elisha Mitchell's exploration of the range, developing tourism in the 1850s, the Clingman-Mitchell highest peak controversy, and geographic explorations of Arnold Guyot, exploitation and preservation at the turn of the 20th century, and the return of tourism.

Short line mountain railroads are often miracles of construction. Built primarily for shipping logs, the Mount Mitchell Railroad was no exception. Within a span of 21 miles, the road climbed 3,500 feet, but utilized only three trestles and nine switchbacks, while maintaining a grade of five and a half percent. In this richly illustrated work the author brings to life a time when Mount Mitchell was dressed in virgin timber. Access to the mountain, located in Western North Carolina, was slow and difficult; but after completion of the railroad, a timbering industry was born. The railroad also provided tourists with scenic trips along its rugged contours.

The Swannanoa Valley lies to the east of Asheville, North Carolina, and is surrounded by some of the highest mountains in the eastern United States. The eastern boundary of the valley follows the crest of the Blue Ridge Mountains, and travelers entering through the Swannanoa Gap emerge into the beautiful Land of the Sky. In the 1900s, multiple large religious assemblies were founded here. Montreat, Ridgecrest, the YMCA Blue Ridge Assembly, and Christmount have preserved thousands of acres of forested mountain slopes for more than a century. The valley is drained by the Swannanoa River, which meanders 18 miles westward, finally merging with the French Broad River near Biltmore. Swannanoa Valley showcases the rich recreational and cultural history of this scenic mountain area.

The Swannanoa Valley lies to the east of Asheville, North Carolina, and is surrounded by some of the highest mountains in the eastern United States. The eastern boundary of the valley follows the crest of the Blue Ridge Mountains, and travelers entering through the Swannanoa Gap emerge into the beautiful "Land of the Sky." In the 1900s, multiple large religious assemblies were founded here. Montreat, Ridgecrest, the YMCA Blue Ridge Assembly, and Christmount have preserved thousands of acres of forested mountain slopes for more than a century. The valley is drained by the Swannanoa River, which meanders 18 miles westward, finally merging with the French Broad River near Biltmore. Swannanoa Valley showcases the rich recreational and cultural history of this scenic mountain area.

The highest peak in the eastern United States, Mount Mitchell towers 6,684 feet over its home in Yancey County, North Carolina. It has borne silent witness to great scientific and personal achievements, tragic loss of life, heated debates, and a host of controversies both great and small. Once considered forbidding and remote, it claimed the life of its namesake, Elisha Mitchell, when he fell to his death in an attempt to firmly establish the mountain’s height. In the early 1900s, entrepreneurs constructed a railroad, opening its old-growth forests to massive deforestation. This devastation stirred some of the earliest notions of environmentalism that led to Mount Mitchell’s establishment as North Carolina’s first state park. Today, it is a playground for tourists from around the world, offering some of the best hiking and views in the nation. Mount Mitchell showcases the rich history of the mountain along with the events and colorful characters that have shaped its story.

Thomas Lanier Clingman: Fire Eater from the Carolina Mountains is the first book-length biography of one of the most important, colorful, and controversial figures in nineteenth-century American life. A man of enormous intellect and intense ambition whose ultimate goal was nothing less than the presidency, Clingman was a lawyer, entrepreneur, Civil War general, inventor, amateur scientist, explorer, and, as a U.S. congressman and senator, one of the foremost champions of southern rights. Thomas E. Jeffrey's explanation of how a leading advocate of this cause could thrive within an environment where slavery was only a marginal institution provides fresh insights into the political culture of southern Appalachia, the character of the southern rights movement, and the coming of the Civil War.