Cultural Resources Existing Conditions Report, North Shore Road Environment Impact Statement, Swan and Graham Counties, North
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CULTURAL RESOURCES EXISTING CONDITIONS REPORT, NORTH SHORE ROAD ENVIRONMENTAL IMPACT STATEMENT, SWAIN AND GRAHAM COUNTIES, NORTH CAROLINA FINAL REPORT ARPA Permit GRSM 03-001 SEAC Accession No. 1850 Submitted to ARCADIS G&M OF NORTH CAROLINA, INC. 800 Corporate Center, Suite 300 Raleigh, North Carolina 27607 By TRC GARROW ASSOCIATES INC. 501 Washington Street, Suite F Durham, North Carolina 27701 Project No. 02427 Authored by Paul A. Webb with contributions by Heather L. Olson and David S. Leigh January 2004 ABSTRACT/MANAGEMENT SUMMARY Cultural resource background studies have been undertaken as part of the North Shore Road Environmental Impact Statement (EIS), which is designed to determine the feasibility of and assess the potential environmental effects associated with fulfillment of a 1943 agreement among the U.S. Department of Interior (DOI), the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA), Swain County, and the state of North Carolina, calling for the construction of a road along the North Shore of Fontana Lake in western North Carolina. This road proposal originated in the early 1940s with the construction of TVA’s Fontana Lake in Swain and Graham counties. Due to the inundation of parts of the Little Tennessee and Tuckasegee valleys, road access was cut off to some 44,000 acres lying above the reservoir pool on the north side of the lake. Rather than construct a road to access the area during wartime conditions, the TVA acquired the entire 44,000-acre area and subsequently transferred its ownership to Great Smoky Mountains National Park (GSMNP). Although limited road construction took place between 1948 and the early 1970s, construction was stopped in 1972 due to environmental and engineering concerns. The project has remained controversial since that time, with numerous alternate proposals put forth by road proponents and opponents. The North Shore Road EIS study is intended to bring this long simmering controversy to a close, and to discharge and satisfy any obligations on the part of the government that presently exist as the result of the 1943 agreement. The present cultural resources studies are an initial step towards that goal, and are designed to gather and summarize existing data concerning the known or potential cultural resources of the 121,000-acre study area for use in developing project alternatives. The North Shore Road study area has a rich history. Native Americans have occupied the area for at least the past 10,000 years, including several hundred years of Historic Cherokee presence. Although most Cherokees were forcibly removed from the region in 1838, others remained within the study area, and along with other nearby Cherokee groups formed the nucleus of the present-day Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians. Euro-Americans began to enter the area in numbers in the 1820s, living first in dispersed settlements; some of these later developed into such communities as Bryson City, Bushnell, Proctor, Almond, and Judson. The relatively self-sufficient farming/herding/hunting lifestyles of the nineteenth century began to change with the arrival of the railroad and the beginning of logging and mining operations in the 1880s and 1890s, and were modified greatly when large-scale railroad logging commenced about 1910. Lumber companies such as Ritter, Norwood, Whiting, and Montvale logged extensive parts of the study area before ceasing operations in the late 1920s. By the time the lumber companies left, the Aluminum Company of America (Alcoa) had developed plans for a reservoir along the Little Tennessee River and had begun buying up bottomland. Also in the late 1920s, the North Carolina Park Commission began acquiring parcels in the northern part of the study area for GSMNP, which was formally established in 1934. TVA took control of the proposed Alcoa reservoir in 1941, and eventually acquired 68,291 acres in the Fontana Project area. Many communities along the rivers were inundated by Fontana Lake when it was completed in 1944, and others were isolated by the reservoir construction. In total, approximately 1,320 families were displaced by the reservoir. Despite its history, relatively few cultural resource studies have been previously conducted in the study area, and the extent of the coverages and resulting data is extremely uneven. Although considerable information is available concerning cemeteries and historic structures, only an estimated 3.0 percent of the study area has been intensively surveyed for archaeological sites. In particular, essentially no intensive surveys have been conducted on the 53,600 acres of GSMNP lands in the study area. As a result, attempts to determine the likely locations and densities of sites and other resources in the study area must rely on a combination of existing information and predictions based on topographic and historical data. The resulting data will prove useful in the preliminary identification of project alternatives, but will eventually need to be supplemented by intensive inventory and evaluation studies. Almost 2,000 known or predicted potentially significant cultural resources have been tentatively identified in the study area, including 101 of 250 recorded archaeological sites, 16 other reported site ii locations, 44 structures and other aboveground resources, 97 cemeteries or former cemeteries, and 1,716 former historic structure locations derived from historic maps. (Another 149 archaeological sites have been determined ineligible for the National Register of Historic Places [NRHP]). Although some of these resources are inundated by Fontana Lake, they must be considered potentially NRHP-eligible pending further study. Many other sites and potential sites are located above the reservoir pool in GSMNP or elsewhere. Besides these recorded or potential resources, the specific locations of large numbers of prehistoric, Historic Cherokee, and earlier Euro-American archaeological sites cannot be predicted based on historic maps. Those sites are considered most likely to occur in areas of 15 percent or less slope, however, although some specialized site types may occur on steeper areas. In addition, the locations of some other types of potential resources, such as Traditional Cultural Properties (TCPs) and cultural landscapes, cannot be readily predicted based on physiographic variables. Despite these limitations, the combination of known and potential resource locations and slope data offers the best way to predict likely site locations in the absence of extensive field surveys. In order to facilitate the selection of preliminary project alternatives, a series of maps have been prepared showing the known and potential resource locations (including known and potential archaeological sites, structures, and cemeteries, as well as likely areas of 15 percent or less slope) within the study area. iii ACKNOWLEDGMENTS This study has benefited from the assistance of many individuals, agencies, and institutions. In particular, the work was greatly facilitated by the cooperation of the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) and GSMNP. Jack Van Dop, Contracting Officer’s Technical Representative at the FHWA, provided oversight throughout the project, as did Imelda Wegwerth, Project Manager for GSMNP. Several other GSMNP staff members provided crucial data, including David Chapman, Erik Kreusch, and Maryann Neubert of the Cultural Resources Office and Annette Hartigan of the Library and Archives. Other help was provided by GSMNP staff members Bob Miller, Tobias Miller, George Minnigh, Richard Schultz, Steve Shular, and Mike Tomkosky. Bennie Keel of the National Park Service (NPS) Southeast Archeological Research Center (SEAC) is thanked for providing an Archaeological Resources Protection Act (ARPA) permit for work within the Park. Many other federal, state, and tribal resource managers also provided assistance and information, including representatives of the TVA Cultural Resources Office (Eric Howard and Richard Yarnell), the Appalachian National Scenic Trail (Don Owen), the North Carolina State Historic Preservation Office and Office of State Archaeology (Steve Claggett, Dolores Hall, Linda Hall, John Mintz, Susan Myers, and Tony VanWinkle), the National Forests in North Carolina (Scott Ashcraft, Lorie Hansen, and Rodney Snedeker), and the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians Tribal Historic Preservation Office (Lee Clauss and Russell Townsend). The work was aided by archivists and other librarians at several other institutions, including Hunter Library at Western Carolina University, the Marianna Black Library in Bryson City, the North Carolina Collection and Southern Historical Collection at UNC-Chapel Hill, the TVA Land Department in Chattanooga, the Forest History Society, the North Carolina Geological Survey, and the National Archives and Records Administration in College Park and East Point. Steve Bush of the Duke Power Company is thanked for providing access to early land acquisition maps. Morgan Sommerville of the Appalachian Trail Conference also provided information on the study area. A special debt is owed to those local residents and other interested persons who took time to share information on the study area, including Gary Carden, Wade Cook, the late Leroy Fox, Lance Holland, Linda Hogue, Bill Millsaps, David Monteith, Duane Oliver, and Tommy Thompson. Lance Holland, David Monteith, and Duane Oliver also are thanked for providing permission to reprint photographs and maps from their collections or publications, as are the North Shore Historical Association and Hunter Library.