Birth of a National Park in the Smokies

View of Mount Le Conte, Thompson Brothers. (University of Tennessee Libraries.)

How Knoxville Turned an Inspirational Idea into a Significant Grassroots Movement

Thursday, July 25 – Saturday, July 27 at downtown venues

This summer, KHP will mark and celebrate the 100th anniversary of when Knoxville leaders and outdoor enthusiasts took an inspirational idea by Annie Davis and created a remarkable grassroots movement to establish a new national park in the Great Smoky Mountains. We’ll tell the stories of the Knoxville civic leaders, conservationists and trailblazers who led pioneering efforts, against all odds, to make the national park a reality. This multi-day event will include screenings at the Bijou Theatre, Central Cinema and a two-day symposium at the East Tennessee History Center.

Full details to come.

“Mount Le Conte Peak” Presenting Sponsor:

STOWERS MACHINERY FOUNDATION

“Smokies Trailblazers” Sponsors:

PARTNERS:

Calvin M. McClung Historical Collection

Tennessee Archive of Moving Image and Sound

Friends of the Smokies

National Park Service/Great Smoky Mountains National Park

Smoky Mountain Radio

In 1923, Knoxville leaders and outdoor enthusiasts took an inspirational idea by Annie Davis and created a remarkable grassroots movement to establish a new national park in the Great Smoky Mountains. Late that year, Annie Davis’s husband Willis helped establish the Great Smoky Mountains Conservation Association with the help of the leaders of the Knoxville Automobile Association. This pivotal event began a decade of considerable financial, political, and personal challenges involving the acquisition of more than 6,600 separate parcels of land.

In July 2024, Col. David Chapman, vice president of VP of the new Conservation Association, sent Knoxville photographer Jim Thompson on a mission: to present the best of his superlative Smoky Mountain photographs to impress the Washington-based Southern Appalachian National Park Commissioners who were charged with recommending the location for the second national park in the eastern United States.

The Park Commissioners, who didn’t even have the Smokies on their shortlist, were so inspired by Thompson’s photos that they readily agreed to come to Knoxville, meet the city’s leaders and take a guided tour of Mount Le Conte and other majestic peaks.

After almost a decade of remarkable achievements and challenging setbacks, Great Smoky Mountains National Park officially opened in 1934 and dedicated by President Franklin Roosevelt in 1940.

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Anne Davis. (GSMNP.)

Creating a national park in the Smoky Mountains had been an idea talked about since the late 1800s. It was also certainly a hope for many who were involved in staging the National Conservation Exposition held in Knoxville at Chilhowee Park in 1913. But it wasn’t until 1923 when Willis and Annie Davis returned from a trip out west, awestruck and inspired by the grandeur of Yosemite National Park and other national parks, did the idea gain real momentum.

On the way home, Annie Davis declared to her husband, “Why can’t we have a national park in the Great Smokies?”

Willis Davis, a respected community leaders and head of Knoxville Iron Works, vowed to “see what he could do about it” and began declaring to friends and colleagues alike about the “wonderful national park they were going to get in the Great Smokies.” The idea seemed so simple.

Yet, how this national park came to be was no simple process. In fact it took on epic proportions, involving many dedicated individuals, over many years. The story is told best by one of its most ardent supporters, Carlos C. Campbell, in his book The Birth of a National Park in the Great Smoky Mountains (UT Press, 1960).

The first of two national parks to be created in the east (the other being Virginia’s Shenandoah National Park that opened in 1935), the Great Smoky Mountains National Park was only possible by purchasing thousands of private lots. This being in stark contrast to the first national parks in the West, created using federally-owned lands.

Many mountain folk, whose families had lived in the mountains for generations, were forced to sell or have their properties condemned. Many were bitter and heartbroken. Yet the great collective sacrifice helped create the most visited national park in the nation. The Great Smoky Mountains National Park now serves more than 13 million visitors per year.

The City of Knoxville played a pivotal role in leading the movement, hosting many meetings in town and contributing a third of the purchase price for 76,000 acres of land owned by the Little River Lumber Company. Knoxville school children also donated pennies and dimes. Col. David Chapman led major fundraising efforts, rallying local, state, and national support, procuring thousands of land purchases, and ultimately helping to secure a $5 million gift from John D. Rockefeller, Jr. Although sometimes a combative fellow, Chapman is regarded as the “father” of the Smokies. Mt. Chapman within the park is named for him, and the road that leads south from Knoxville to the mountains also bares his name: Chapman Highway.

Great Smoky Mountains photographed by Carlos Campbell. (Courtesy of Rebecca Campbell Arrants.)

KEY KNOXVILLIANS IN THE SMOKIES MOVEMENT

Although many Knoxvillians contributed brains and brawn to the Smokies national park movement, the following individuals are highlighted for their lasting contributions, including books, photographs, maps, drawings, as well as those who led organizations and committees, some of whom are have roads, mountain peaks, and scenic overlooks named after them.

(Honorary mentions go to those attending the founding meeting of GSMCA with Willis Davis, including Judge H. B. Lindsay, Forrest Andrews, Judge D. C. Webb, David C. Chapman, Cowan Rodgers, James B. Wright, and J. W. Brownlee.)

PAUL J. ADAMS (1901-1985)

Naturalist, explorer and trail guide, Adams served as Field Secretary for GSMCA while developing the first formal campsite on Mount Le Conte in 1925. He taught his faithful German Shephard, Smoky Jack, to fetch and carry supplies on his own using leather saddlebags on the dog’s back from the top of Mt. Le Conte down to the general store in Gatlinburg and back again. Adams’ adventures in the Smokies form two books, Mount Le Conte and Smoky Jack, both published by UT Press.

Paul Adams on University of Tennessee Libraries digital collection

HARVEY BROOME (1902-1968)

A Knoxville attorney, Broome served as President of the Smoky Mountains Hiking Club and was a staunch ally of the Smokies movement, especially during a period of political upheaval with the Tennessee Great Smoky Mountain Park Commission in the early 1930s. Along with other leading conservationists, including Benton MacKaye and Aldo Leopold, Broome co-founded the Wilderness Society in 1935. Out Under the Sky of the Great Smokies was published in 1975 featuring selections from his own journals.

CARLOS C. CAMPBELL (1892-1978)

As manager of the Knoxville Chamber of Commerce, Campbell saw the benefits to Knoxville and the region through a new national park. After hiking many times with Jim Thompson, he took up photography and shared his pictures to illustrate articles in national magazines including National Geographic. Campbell was a co-founder of the Smoky Mountain Hiking Club and a long-serving member of the GSMCA. His book, Birth of a National Park in the Great Smoky Mountains (1960), remains the definitive history of the Smokies park movement. Hi memoir, memories of Old Smoky was published posthumously in 2005. The Carlos Campbell Overlook on US Highway 441 within the park looks up to Mt. Le Conte.

COL. DAVID CHAPMAN (1876-1944)

In recognition of his tireless efforts as leader of GSMCA and helping acquire more 6,600 property parcels to establish the park, Chapman is known as the “Father” of GSMNP. As a veteran of the Spanish-American War, a community leader and civic booster, he was a tenacious organizer and fundraiser who played a pivotal role in securing the largest and most important gift to the park campaign: $5 million from John D. Rockefeller, Jr. in memory of his mother, Laura Spelman Rockefeller. Mount Chapman within the park is named in honor, as is Chapman Highway, the road that connects Knoxville to the Smokies.

BROCKWAY CROUCH (1896-1971)

Naturalist, trailblazer, and inventor, Crouch was a Knoxville florist and a staunch supporter of the Smokies movement. His business, Flowercraft, was a downtown rallying point for hikers and birders in the 1920s.

He was a co-founder of both the Smoky Mountains Hiking Club and the East Tennessee Ornithological Society and served on the Smoky Mountains Nomenclature Committee (charged with reducing the duplication of place names) with Jim Thompson and Robert Lindsay Mason.

HARRY IJAMS (1876-1954)

A respected naturalist and conservationist, Ijams began exploring the Smokies in the 1890s. As a founding member of East Tennessee Ornithological Society, he was one of the first to study birds in the Smokies during the early 1920s. But it was his artistry as an illustrator of maps and postcards that helped promote the growing public appreciation for the wonders and benefits of the proposed park.

His former home and acreage form the spiritual core of Ijams Nature Center in South Knoxville.

ROBERT LINDSAY MASON (1874-1952)

A talented artist and writer, Mason wrote the first book about the mountains, The Lure of the Great Smokies in 1927w, which included many of his own photographs. As a member of Knoxville’s Nicholson Art League (he was a young associate of Lloyd Branson and Catherine Wiley, Knoxville’s most respected artists), he established the Mason School of Art in East Knoxville.

Mason also served on the Smoky Mountains Nomenclature Committee.

BEN MORTON (1874-1952)

An early champion of automobiles and good roads, Morton is occasionally known as the “Co-Father of the Smokies.” As Knoxville Mayor during the mid-1920s, he led the City of Knoxville to contribute a third of the purchase price for the first major property acquisition – 76,507 acres from the Little River Lumber Co. in 1927. The same year he served alongside Col. David Chapman on the Tennessee Great Smoky Mountain Park Commission, charged with acquiring property for the new park.

The Ben Morton Overlook within the park is situated on US Highway 441 just below Newfound Gap.

ALBERT “DUTCH ROTH” (1890-1974)

A co-founder of the Smoky Mountains Hiking Club, Roth, like Carlos Campbell, hiked thousands of miles through the Smokies and completed more than a hundred treks up Mount Le Conte during his lifetime. Wherever he went he captured majestic landscapes through his camera lens.

Many of Roth’s photographs documenting his many hikes and adventures are viewable on UT Libraries’s digital collection: Albert “Dutch” Roth Photograph Collection as well as his Roth’s unpublished memoir, Tales from Woods.

JAMES E. (JIM) THOMPSON (1880-1976)

Knoxville’s most prolific photographer, Thompson began taking pictures in the Smokies almost a decade before the park movement. But as official photographer for GSMCA, his extraordinary photographs greatly influenced the Southern Appalachian Park Committee’s choice of location for a national park. He also worked tirelessly on the Smoky Mountains Nomenclature Committee and helped develop the Appalachian Trail section through the Smokies. Thompson left behind a remarkable visual legacy – hundreds of his photos are viewable online through the McClung Historical Collection and University of Tennessee Library digital collections.

LAURA THORNBURGH (1885-1973)

Beginning her career as a Knoxville newspaper journalist, Thornburgh became a film editor for the USDA’s picture division in 1918. After moving to Gatlinburg in the mid-1902s, she began to document the mountains and mountain folk through writings and photography.

Her book, The Great Smoky Mountains, written under the name Laura Thornborough, was published in 1937 and remained in print for decades.

LINKS TO GREAT SMOKY MOUNTAINS DIGITAL COLLECTIONS:

Mt. Le Conte, December, 1925 by Thompson Brothers. (University of Tennessee Libraries.)

Knoxville is fortunate to have two have two remarkable archives (The McClung Historical Collection, part of the Knox County Public Library; and UT Libraries) containing hundreds of photographs, postcards, and related images of the Great Smoky Mountains, especially documenting the pivotal park movement era of the 1920s and 1930s. Many of these archives’ gems are available to see online in their respective digital collections.

Calvin M. McClung Historical Collection

Great Smoky Mountains Photograph Collection – Thompson Brothers

University of Tennessee Libraries:

Thompson Brothers Photograph Collection

Postcards from the Great Smoky Mountains

Smoky Mountain Hiking Club Collection

Paul J. Adams Photograph Collection

Albert “Dutch” Roth Photograph Collection