Mountaineers and Rangers: A History of Federal Forest Management in the Southern Appalachians, 1900-81

During the years of the Great Depression, there was a greatly increased involvement of Federal agencies in the Southern Appalachian highlands. Before the administration of Franklin D. Roosevelt, virtually the only Federal activities there were a forest resource survey, the purchase and management of lands for National Forests, and the searches by revenuers for illegal whiskey stills. The New Deal created the Tennessee Valley Authority, a program for purchase of submarginal farmlands and relocation of the farm operators, and greatly expanded public welfare and employment programs. At the same time, National Forests were enlarged and consolidated, and new National Parks developed. More people than ever before were directly affected by programs and policies of the Federal Government. The extensive social reform plans of the early New Deal years made dramatic changes in the mountains, but curtailment of these programs in 1935 and 1937 left the people of the mountains to slower and less orderly patterns of change. Some farm reforestation aid was offered by the Norris-Doxey Cooperative Farm Forestry Act of May 18, 1937 (which was superseded by the more comprehensive Cooperative Forestry Management Act of August 25, 1950), and by the Bankhead-Jones Farm Tenant Act of July 22, 1937. [1]

Agriculture, textiles, and coal are all basic to the prosperity of the mountain people. These industries were in a period of decline and stagnation all during the 1920's. Long before the rest of the Nation experienced the shock of the New York stock market crash in the fall of 1929, many mountain areas, especially the coal fields, like the Nation's farmlands, had already entered the Great Depression. With the crash came further price declines and loss of markets for the products of the southern mountains. Coal production dropped drastically and in 1933 the number of miners employed dropped to its lowest point in 25 years. [2]

Figure 42.—Loading logs onto a truck from a roadside skidway with a steam powered rig on rails. Spot was along the Upper Tellico River, Monroe County, Tenn., south of Great Smoky Mountains National Park, on the Cherokee National Forest, in 1937. (National Archives: Record Group 95G-354360)

The peak of timber production had passed, and large-scale logging had begun to decline even before World War I. However, with the Depression, this decline was accelerated by a rapid drop in prices for lumber and related forest products. [3] The major operator, Andrew Gennett, wrote in 1934:

At the present time the lumber business is so disrupted that none of us know where we stand, and we are making no engagements of any kind until we find out what is going to happen. [4]

The market for what lumber remained in the mountains almost disappeared. In Georgia, lumber production reached its lowest point in the 20th century in 1932. Over 1,000 sawmills, most of them small, disappeared between 1929 and 1932. [5] The picture was about the same in other southern States. Production of other forest products, acidwood, pulpwood, railroad ties, fenceposts, mine props, also dropped dramatically.

Figure 43—Portable sawmill with circular saw powered by oil distillate, cutting white oak log. Laurel Lumber & Stave Company, Daniel Boone (then Cumberland) National Forest, Ky., August 1937. Smoke came from a burning pile of slabs. (NA:95G-365412)

The value of the land itself declined rapidly as well. Some of this decline was due to the condition of the land. Cutover and not reforested, farmed to exhaustion, flooded by silted-up creeks and rivers, the land in many parts of the mountains was actually deteriorating. But most of the price decline was a result of the deflationary impact of the Depression. Land valued for tax purposes at $5 per acre in 1925-26 was worth $3 per acre or even less by 1934, and the possibility of finding a buyer was not likely even at the lower prices. [6]

While large timber interests complained loudest about their losses in land value, the small landowner was also hard hit. In the mountains where the Pee Dee River rises west of Winston-Salem, N.C., over half of the farm property and a third of the forest land was tax delinquent at the height of the Depression. In some counties tax delinquency rose to 90 percent. [7]

The slack in coal mining had put another burden on the already hard-pressed agricultural lands of the Appalachian highlands. In eastern Kentucky and adjacent Virginia and Tennessee, many mountain people had left the farms to go into the mines. As the coal slump deepened, some returned to worn-out farms and steep, cutover slopes and tried to get a living once again from the soil. [8]

Figure 44.—Erosion-causing cornfields planted unwisely on very steep slopes in Knott County, Ky., August 1930. Neeley's Fork near Bailey Fork, at head of Troublesome Creek, between Redbird Purchase Unit and Kentucky portion of Jefferson National Forest. Note log cabin and zigzag rail fence. (NA:95G-247048)

Later, when the Depression began to affect all parts of the Nation, more people joined the return to the land. For years the Southern Appalachian mountains had exported people as well as timber and minerals. Thousands of southern highlanders had found new homes in mill towns and industrial cities and were scattered over much of the east-central United States. Many of these people, finding themselves unemployed and destitute, returned to old family farms, abandoned or perhaps still inhabited by elderly cousins, and sought to resume the life of their forefathers. They rechinked the old log cabin, repaired the roof a bit, planted a cornfield and garden patch, and hoped for the best. Those less fortunate "squatted" in abandoned shacks, old chicken houses and smokehouses—anything with a roof and walls. They had neither seed nor tools and little knowledge of farming or gardening. They survived on relief or they starved.

In the counties where the Daniel Boone (originally Cumberland) National Forest is now located, the situation was especially acute. Assistant Regional Forester John H. Hatton, compiling a report on the "Social Aspects of National Forest Management" in 1934, described the area:

At the same time the population has increased in the last four or five years very rapidly, which increase depends entirely on local mountain farming . . . The conditions of the valley would not be noticed from the train but one has only to leave the highway and strike up one of the very small creeks and he finds whole sections and districts wherein not a person has sufficient supplies to support themselves above want and many are actually suffering from the need of food, clothing and medical attention. There was a time when the extremely poor had neighbors who could help them, but the neighbors' condition has become such that they can no longer render aid . . . The people are of good character, and have a certain amount of dignity and pride in the midst of direst poverty, unwilling to accept direct relief until they reach the point of actual suffering. They all prefer work rather than charity and especially the form of charity which is humiliating to them. For a good many years numbers of the small land owners and tenants after putting by their crops have sought work in factories of other States and some among settlements to work tobacco crops. They had to have this money to pay taxes and to buy articles for the winter, but the factories have been closed and other employment has practically ceased. On top of all this there has been a gradual influx from the cities and manufacturing centers of about 25% of the people who were unable to get employment and have returned to their relatives and friends in the country. [9]

Evidence that mountaineers who had earlier migrated to industrial areas returned to their former farm homes during the 1930's is abundant, though exact figures depend on the definition of Southern Appalachia used. In most of the mountain counties farm acreage remained quite stable from 1930 to 1940, but the number of farms rose significantly. [10] This fact explains why mountain people were often reluctant to sell even very poor farms during the Depression years.

Because poverty, unemployment, and economic decline existed in the Southern Appalachian highlands to a degree unsurpassed in other regions of the Nation, the election of Franklin D. Roosevelt and the rapid development of "New Deal" programs designed to alleviate the symptoms of the Depression inevitably had a marked impact on the region. Even before FDR's inauguration the leadership of the Forest Service saw that National Forests would be called upon to play an important role in Federal plans for relief and recovery. Forest supervisors were willing and able to put large numbers of men to work. They began to plan as soon as Roosevelt was elected how they wanted to use additional manpower to carry out longrange plans for forest improvement. [11]

Figure 45.—Ramshackle barn used as dwelling in Estill County, Ky., under special-use permit from Daniel Boone (the Cumberland) National Forest, in late summer 1939. Upper Kentucky River watershed. This country, though forested, has very little National Forest land. (NA:95G-381247).

The role of the Forest Service as a forest resources manager was greatly enlarged by the New Deal. Roosevelt gave it large sums for land purchases, which aided economic recovery in several ways. The Government was virtually the only buyer of lands; its purchases often helped the selling individuals and companies out of financial difficulties. The new National Forest land also provided thousands of jobs, mainly through the Civilian Conservation Corps, in areas that were hard hit by the Depression.

It was an ideal time to expand the forests, since land prices were low, and opposition to Federal intervention had virtually disappeared. Many who might in other times have opposed the expansion of the National Forests were happy to unload their land onto the Federal Government and salvage what they could from the economic catastrophe.

The largest single beneficiary of the expanded purchases for National Forests in this period was the Stearns Coal and Lumber Co. of Stearns, Ky. After it cut and removed all merchantable timber from its large holding in the vicinity, mostly for its own mine props, and drift-mining most of the coal, its president, Robert L. Stearns, Jr., appeared before the National Forest Reservation Commission in Washington in 1937 to strongly urge expansion of the new Cumberland National Forest Purchase Unit beyond the Cumberland River to the Tennessee State line. Thus the unit would encompass the extensive Stearns coal lands in McCreary County. Stearns offered a 47,000-acre piece just logged, for an attractive price; however he reserved mineral (coal) rights. The Commission endorsed the expansion of the Purchase Unit and accepted his offer of the lands. The deed was dated December 18, 1937. (The Cumberland unit had been established by the Forest Service in 1930, and the first land purchases had begun in 1933.) It seemed a good deal to both parties. The Forest Service secured a large addition at a good price—the country was still in a Depression, and the company had removed all resources that it profitably could yet still held the rights for the residual coal, subject to Forest Service regulations on land reclamation for surface disturbances. [12]

The Forest Service, because of its already established role in the Highlands, was to play a very important part in the New Deal, but other New Deal agencies and programs came into the area and left their mark on the land and people as well.

Figure 46.—A mountain family in front of their new log cabin on Balls Forks of Troublesome Creek, Knott County, Ky., in November 1930. (NA:95G-250896).

The Agricultural Adjustment Administration (AAA) arrived in force in some mountain districts in 1934. The mountain people were most affected by the Land Policy Section, which sought to acquire "submarginal" farm lands and resettle the former owners or tenants on more productive farms. Much of the land being farmed in the mountains was clearly unable to produce an adequate living for its users, and thus could be labeled "submarginal." The Land Program was shifted to the Resettlement Administration, then the Farm Security Administration and later the Bureau of Agricultural Economics, where limited funding reduced it to minor importance.

The Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) with its sweeping powers to reconstruct the watershed of the Tennessee River also had considerable impact on its area. The mountains at the river's source shared to some extent in TVA programs. Land was purchased, creeks dammed, lakes formed, and power plants built. Mountain communities were disrupted and rebuilt.

Two other New Deal programs—the Civilian Conservation Corps, and the concurrent development of Great Smoky Mountains National Park and the Blue Ridge Parkway—were so important that they are covered in separate chapters.

Submarginal Farm Relocation Projects: Stinking Creek

The early New Deal programs for economic recovery in agriculture were contained in the Agricultural Adjustment Act of 1933. The act created the Agricultural Adjustment Administration (AAA), charged with finding ways to raise the prices of staple agricultural commodities.

One method of raising prices was to curtail production by removing land from agricultural use. While some of this would be only temporary, the AAA provided an opportunity to remove poorer land permanently from agricultural use by purchasing it for other uses, such as park lands, forests, or wildlife preserves.

Land deemed unsuitable for productive farming was classified "submarginal." This classification was based on (1) an estimate of the yield per acre that could be obtained from the most appropriate crop, and (2) whether capable farmers could expect to make an adequate living from the land. Since neither of these criteria was clearly defined, and both were subject to change, the definition was flexible. [13]

With the energy characteristic of the early days of the New Deal, the AAA's Land Policy Division quickly began efforts to move people off eroded and unproductive mountain lands. The mountains, with their serious social and economic problems, seemed an ideal place to start purchasing land so that it would be removed permanently from agricultural use.

Because submarginal land purchase was shifted to various agencies during its life span, records are less complete than those of more permanent Federal activities. Efforts to trace the development of specific submarginal land purchase programs in the mountains are often unrewarding. However, in one location selected, the development of the program can be traced. In the spring of 1934 a University of Kentucky agriculture professor recommended four counties where most land being farmed was submarginal and where 80 to 90 percent of the families were on relief. He pointed out that the people of Knox, Clay, Leslie and Bell Counties were accustomed to cash income from employment off the farm which was no longer available. [14] There was no way that they could make a decent living from their lands alone, even in more prosperous times.

Since local leaders in Knox County gave evidence of some support for Federal purchase of submarginal land in their county, plans for land acquisition in the county began in the spring of 1934. The Stinking Creek watershed in Knox County was designated as part of a proposed Kentucky Ridge Forest Project which included purchase areas in Bell and Harlan Counties as well. Since there were no plans to establish State forests in Kentucky at that time, it was hoped that the land could be turned over to the Forest Service as part of the proposed Cumberland National Forest. [15] The only drawback to this plan, from the viewpoint of local political leaders, was the fear of loss of county tax revenue if the land remained in Federal ownership.

The people of Stinking Creek accordingly began to receive visits from land acquisition agents in August 1934. Some of these agents had become familiar with the mountain country and its people while engaged in their previous jobs—locating and destroying moonshine whiskey stills during Prohibition. The identification of Federal agents as destroyers of one of the most profitable businesses in the mountains may have helped to intensify the suspicion with which the land purchase program was greeted. Some land purchase agents had to spend much time explaining the purpose of their new jobs.

The people were understandably cautious about the new program, wondering whether they would get a fair price for their land, and if they would be able to get a new farm near those of their friends and neighbors. The mountain man would agree that things were pretty bad where he was, but often concluded, "I am afeard I would not be satisfied to make a change." [16]

This caution, as one field supervisor pointed out, was not based on ignorance. They read their newspapers carefully and the men discussed Federal programs with considerable awareness. They knew that New Deal agencies had a lot of money to spend. As with most of the Southern Appalachian mountaineers, the Stinking Creek people were generally shrewd and careful traders, used to driving a hard bargain to get the most for what little they had to sell. In most cases their land was their most valuable possession. In the past it had been the basis of their economic security. They were in no hurry to sell; each waited to see what his neighbors would do. [17].

The people were emotionally attached to their homes and anxious to remain close to their relatives and neighbors, but emotional attachment does not seem to have been the most important factor in their reluctance to sign options to purchase agreements. A 1934 survey of the 631 families in Knox County whose lands were included in the Kentucky Ridge Forest Project found that 157 families were unwilling to resettle, 93 were willing to move within the county and 381 were willing to move anywhere. [18]

However, they realized that resettlement plans were vague and that the money they would get for a poor mountain farm would not buy a better farm unless they were to receive Government help in obtaining the new land. Also, those who held the best land along the creek, and whose actions were most closely watched by their neighbors, soon realized that if the Government were to purchase most of the land, then the tracts remaining in private ownership would increase in value. No one wanted to sell first and see his neighbors get better prices for their land later.

The situation was further complicated by the Kentucky custom of separating ownership of the surface of the land from ownership of the minerals beneath the soil. Land acquisition agents were not sure whether they could buy land without acquiring the mineral rights, usually to coal, and the additional right to use a portion of the land and the timber on it for mining. Many mountain people had sold the mineral rights to their land years before and retained only rights to the surface. Usually even the surface rights were limited by the right of the subsurface owner to extract the minerals by any necessary means. In February 1935 it was finally decided that the Federal Government could take options for surface rights while allowing others to own the coal and timber needed to remove the coal. [19]

The people of Knox County, moving with caution, missed their chance to sell their land to the Federal Government. Other mountain landowners in neighboring Bell County had been quicker to sign options to purchase agreements, and when funds for submarginal land purchase were cut, the available money went to those who had previously agreed to sell.

The land actually acquired was not contiguous to the Cumberland National Forest, as it was finally established, but the Federal Government retained the 14,000 acres of Bell County land as a demonstration area or "Land Utilization Project." The new Resettlement Administration, which acquired management of the AAA submarginal land program early in 1935, determined that the land could best be used for growing timber. The Forest Service was responsible for managing the land as a demonstration of good timber land management for the area. This Bell County forest land was later transferred to the State of Kentucky. It is now known as Kentucky Ridge State Forest. The Forest Service chose to concentrate its purchase efforts farther west in the Cumberland region.

Most of the originally proposed Kentucky Ridge forest area was never purchased. [20] So little land had actually been optioned that the purchase of it was given a very low priority when land acquisition funds were reduced. It was considered more important to complete projects where larger consolidated areas could be acquired.

Several other land utilization projects involving watershed improvement and retirement of submarginal land were proposed but never undertaken in eastern Kentucky. [21] The evidence is incomplete, but it is possible that political pressures resulted in the spending of limited funds in other areas of the State, where a few of the proposed projects were completed.

One long-term result of these abandoned land purchase plans, combined with the actual land purchases for the Cumberland National Forest, has been the persistent folk belief that during the New Deal the Federal Government had a secret plan to buy all the mountain land in eastern Kentucky.

The story surfaced in the summer of 1979 during a study of a proposed wilderness area in the Daniel Boone National Forest (now the name of the Cumberland). Oldtimers in the area still fear that the Forest Service is a partner in a "creeping federal land grab." [22]

The fate of the families who lived in the Bell County area actually purchased for the Kentucky Ridge Forest indicates that the mountain people on Stinking Creek may have been wise when they decided to hold onto their land. In September 1936, a resettlement report showed 115 families on the land purchased by the Federal Government. All but one of the families were tenants. Only 30 families qualified for rural resettlement. The report noted that the project area contained no farm land and that it was difficult to find good farm land in the area at a price the Government would pay. The people were right when they wondered where they would be able to find farms to replace those they were asked to sell.

Of the remaining families at Kentucky Ridge, 5 were judged mentally deficient, 15 physically unable to farm, and 25 were held to be "morally unfit" to receive help from the rural rehabilitation staff. The report concluded that:

the remaining heads of families (40) competent to assume obligations, are a stranded industrial people, with no experience in the management of agricultural units . . . to be rehabilitated in industrial locations. [23]

The classification of mountain families as "stranded industrial people" illustrates the problem the Resettlement Administration had in dealing with them. Agriculture specialists did not see the mountain people as farmers. A corn patch and a garden scratched out of a mountain slope were not, in their eyes, a "real farm." Therefore, as rural rehabilitation, resettlement, and subsistence homestead schemes were shuffled from one agency to another during the middle period of the New Deal, it was easy to forget about the mountain people. By the end of 1936, agricultural resettlement projects in the Southern Appalachians were in limbo. Formal plans were largely abandoned. The Park Service and the Forest Service were left with the responsibility for the people who had been living on the lands they now owned. [24] The Park Service moved everyone off its lands. The Forest Service allowed people to remain as tenants.

In the Kentucky Ridge purchase area, in 1938 the local project manager was required to move the remaining people off the Land Utilization Project lands. Finally, in April 1939, he was able to report that 116 families had moved themselves without any Government aid. One family had been moved "through the efforts and personal expense of the project manager." He considered all these families to be "in the direst need of assistance," but saw little hope of any Government help for them. [25] Two additional families had moved onto the Government-owned land between 1936 and 1939.

The final result of submarginal land purchase and relocation programs in eastern Kentucky was the purchase of a few mountain farms and the eviction of the former owners and tenants. There was only one resettlement project in the area, called Sublimity, covered later in this section, and few of those whose lands were purchased by the Federal Government actually moved there.

In North Carolina the story was different because of the long established Pisgah and Nantahala Forests in that State's mountains. Both forests were expanded and consolidated during the 1930's. One important justification of these forest developments was the contribution made by the National Forests toward stabilizing the local economy. The Forest Service would provide part-time work for local farm and small community dwellers and would also make possible the continuation of employment in wood-using industries by regrowing forest on the cutover land. [26]

The AAA Land Policy Section in North Carolina tried to work closely with the Regional Forester to plan its land purchase programs. In 1934, under pressure to move quickly in the purchase of submarginal farm lands, land policy agents obtained information on the number of farms and acres of farm land within the forests and related purchase units. The Regional Forester stated that:

Under the Forest Service purchase policy no valuation is placed upon improvements such as houses, barns, and fences, since they are of no value in the future management of the National Forests. For this reason, ordinarily small tracts which contained cultivated lands and improvements could not be purchased even though the cultivated lands were submarginal because the Forest Service could not offer a high enough price. Furthermore, under the policy which has been in effect, it would probably have been unwise to purchase a large part of the farms listed because there were no provisions made to take care of the people living upon them and in many cases these men would not secure enough for their lands to allow them to purchase good farms elsewhere. [27]

He included a table showing 3,774 farms which could be added to the Pisgah and Nantahala National Forests and 2,255 which could be made part of the Cherokee National Forest in Tennessee. The Regional Forester offered the assistance of the Forest Service in locating farms and negotiating for their purchase, since the Forest Service was eager to acquire small farms within existing forests and purchase units.

Since the AAA Land Policy Division was not to keep the land it purchased, but had to find a State or Federal agency to administer and develop it, buying land for the National Forests simplified the job, both in locating land to be purchased and in disposing of the land after acquisition.

In spite of the obvious dovetailing of interests between the Forest Service and AAA Land Policy, negotiation of a working agreement between them took over a year. Decisions had to be reached about who would survey and value the farms and how to determine which portions would be paid for by the Forest Service and which by the AAA. The development of the Blue Ridge Parkway also affected the land situation in the North Carolina mountains. An additional complication was provided by the desire of the Cherokee Indians to benefit from the Parkway and Great Smoky Mountains National Park. Since the Cherokee Indian Reservation is located between the Nantahala forest and Great Smoky Mountains National Park, the land interests of the Indians were affected by Federal purchases.

Not until May 1935 was a Memorandum of Understanding signed between the Forest Service and the AAA Land Policy Section, by then under the new Resettlement Administration. The memorandum was too late to produce any results. In July 1935, the Land Policy Section Director for the region informed the Regional Forester that funds for land purchase had been greatly curtailed and the priorities of his organization had been changed. The Land Policy Section would therefore have to drop out of the land purchase plan just agreed upon. "We are reluctant," he wrote, "to break faith with the people who have optioned their land, but there appears to be little we can do about it." [28] Many of the farms were later acquired by the Forest Service through its regular land acquisition program.

In April 1935 the Resettlement Administration headed by "braintruster" Rexford Tugwell had been given control of the rural rehabilitation and land programs. Funding remained low. In all, only 4,441 families, nationwide, were actually resettled. Early in 1937 its successor with much of the same staff, the Farm Security Administration, took over. Again funding for the agency was low. The only project related to the Southern Appalachians was Sublimity, in Kentucky, discussed later. [29]

Later in 1937 the work was transferred to the Land Utilization Division, Bureau of Agricultural Economics. It developed several land plans for the North Carolina mountain areas during the period 1937 to 1939. Since relocation programs were not being funded adequately by the Federal Government, the plans were developed on a different premise than the submarginal land program first set up by the AAA. After 1935 it was assumed that little or no money would be available for resettlement.

An important element of the plans was the part-time employment provided by the National Forests. A great effort was made to work out plans which would make it possible for the greatest number of mountain people to remain on their lands. This desire conflicted with sound economics and good farm management practices, but the land-use planners justified their approach by concluding that the people were there, most of them wanted to stay, and there was a real need to improve their economic lot where they were. Studies showed that in North Carolina, as in Kentucky, mountain people enjoyed a comfortable standard of living when they were able to combine subsistence farming with part-time employment off the farm. [30]

Most of the studies remained in administrative file drawers. Funds were not available to carry out Federal development plans. The financial, political, and social problems they addressed were too complex for quick solution. The submarginal land and the relocation programs were curtailed before they were able to have much positive impact, but a few of their goals were achieved by the Forest Service as a byproduct of expanding the Southern Appalachian National Forests.

Figure 47—Nantahala River Gorge above junction with Little Tennessee River and Fontana Lake, the Tennessee River Authority power and flood control reservoir built during World War II which borders Great Smoky Mountains National Park. Note Winding Stair Road at right, and road, railroad, and town in valley. Nantahala National Forest, Swain County, N.C., 1935. (NA:95G-310077)

The Tennessee Valley Authority

The most famous and in many ways the most important of the New Deal development programs was the Tennessee Valley Authority. While the impact of TVA on eastern Tennessee as a whole was very great, most mountain people were on the fringes of the development during the 1930's. TVA made its presence felt most strongly in the mountain valleys that were flooded by its dams, including many small farms. The Tennessee River and its tributaries rise in the Appalachian Highlands, so mountain people in Tennessee, Kentucky, North Carolina, Georgia, and Alabama encountered TVA as a land acquisition agency.

Unlike the Forest Service, TVA could not wait until people were ready to sell, since dams could not be completed until all of the land they would flood was acquired. To speed up the process of land acquisition, TVA developed its own procedure. As soon as the engineering staff had determined what land would be needed, the Land Acquisition Division sent out field appraisers to inspect the property. The recommendations of the field appraiser were reviewed by a committee of three, who decided upon a fair price. A TVA employee then submitted the price to the landowner. If the proposal was not acceptable to the landowner, condemnation procedures would be started immediately. This was called the "no-trading policy," since TVA would not negotiate over price with the landowner. [31] The method was efficient, and in most cases fair, but it gave the mountain people an impression of arbitrariness. They were allowed no scope for their customary bargaining.

More problems arose when the farmer attempted to find a new farm home. The owner of a small farm with a cabin and a few rough outbuildings would get little for it. If he wished to remain nearby, he would be competing with others who had also lost their homes the same way. For example, about 3,000 families were moved out of the Norris Reservoir area. Vacant farms were often almost nonexistent even before the TVA purchases. In many cases the displaced mountaineer soon used up the money he had received for his land in higher daily living expenses, and his family was without both land and money. [32]

TVA land acquisitions also markedly decreased the limited amount of good farm land available in the mountains. As one wife put it, "Now the dam water will cover all the bottoms and leave just the hog ridges for farming. That dam will just about ruin this here country." [33]

One major objective of TVA land acquisition was "to leave the people . . . at least as well off as they were before TVA entered the picture." [34] This modest objective was met in some cases, but efforts to assist in the relocation of individuals and communities displaced by TVA activities were not always successful. Pressure to get the dams built limited the amount of time that could be spent in planning relocation projects, and funds for relocation assistance were limited.

Some TVA programs had positive effects on mountain people. TVA demonstration farms and reforestation projects helped to improve the use of the remaining land. Electricity generated at TVA power plants reached into some of the mountain communities, making possible a more modern way of life, including labor-saving equipment for both housewife and farmer. [35] TVA encouraged and promoted many programs for the economic improvement of all parts of the Tennessee River watershed. However, the affected communities identified TVA most clearly with dam construction and the trauma of land acquisition.

In the long run many mountain people have reaped their share of the economic development brought about by TVA. Economic developments during the war years and continuing expansion of the potential of the Valley area first recognized by TVA have contributed further economic benefits to the region. However, these benefits have rarely affected mountain communities directly, since people had to move to urban industrial centers to participate in most economic opportunities. The social and political changes that New Deal planners hoped TVA would bring failed to happen on a significant scale. TVA remained chiefly a producer of cheap fertilizer and electric power.

The TVA lakes also contributed to the slow conversion of the mountains from a place to live to a vacation or recreation area. Today children and grandchildren of mountain people who live and work in Chattanooga or Knoxville are affluent enough to own a piece of land for a second home. They spend their weekends and vacations in the mountain area where their families may once have lived. [36]

Figure 48—Swimming and boating at Lake Winfield Scott, Tennessee Valley Authority power and flood control reservoir in the Blue Ridge Mountains of North Georgia between Dahlonega and Blairsville. Located on the Chattahoochee National Forest, it has tent and trailer camping and picnicking facilities, and private summer cottages under special-use permit leases. (Forest Service photo F-458534)

New Deal Expands National Forests

In June 1933 President Roosevelt signed an Executive Order providing $20 million to purchase more land for National Forests in the East. This was the beginning of extensive forest expansion during the New Deal. While much of this money was used to develop new National Forests in regions that had, at that time, few significant publicly owned forest areas, the older National Forests of the Appalachian region were consolidated and enlarged as well. [37] Expansion of these forests provided employment for a small army of surveyors, timber experts, land purchase agents, and their attendant assistants, clerks, and secretaries. They rented or purchased locally everything from office space to mules, and were therefore welcome in the small towns where they made their headquarters.

Although the purchase process was time-consuming, the Federal Government paid for the land it optioned. Since the National Forest Reservation Commission (NFRC) had to approve land purchases for National Forests, there was an unavoidable delay of 6 to 8 months, and sometimes it was a year or more, before legal issues related to a land purchase could be settled and payment actually made. These problems remained as serious as they had been when the initial purchases were made 20 years earlier. For this reason, it was until 1935 and 1936 that the economic impact of payments for forest purchases was actually felt. Hundreds of small landowners received their payments, thus bringing some cash into the local economies. Timber, pulpwood, mining, and land investment companies also benefited from Federal purchase of lands for which there was otherwise no market.

New National Forest land meant increased employment for local mountain people, chiefly through the Civilian Conservation Corps. Emergency Conservation Work, the parent agency of the CCC, provided $10 million from its funds for forest purchases in the East in 1934. Robert Fechner, director of the program, had concluded that money spent for increased eastern forest purchases would spare CCC the problems and costs of transporting men from the East to the sparsely populated Western States where most National Forest land was located. One major purpose of this purchase fund, then, was to create employment. [38]

Figure 49—The National Forests, and Purchase Units (diagonally shaded areas), of the Southern Appalachian Mountains in 1934. Large areas are shown contemplated for addition to the National Forests, which would more than double their acreage. There is a new Purchase Unit in Kentucky, the Cumberland, which became the National Forest of that name in February 1937, and a new one in southwestern Virginia, the Clinch, which later became a Ranger District on the Jefferson National Forest. The new Sauratown Purchase Unit in North Carolina was cancelled within a year. The Shenandoah National Forest was renamed George Washington in 1932 when the National Park was formed in the same vicinity. The Natural Bridge National Forest was transferred to the George Washington in 1933. The Enoree Purchase Unit in South Carolina, plus the Long Cane (not shown) later became the Sumter National Forest. (Forest Service map and photo)

The total allotment for land purchase in 1935 was $15 million, but available funds dropped sharply in 1936. An average of $3 million per year was available nationwide from 1936 to 1941. The demands of wartime then brought about another drastic drop in forest purchase funds.

Since CCC labor was available to develop picnic areas and camp grounds, the Forest Service gave increased consideration to the acquisition of lands which would expand the recreation potential of the eastern forests. Harold Ickes, Secretary of the Interior and a member of the NFRC, believed, like other Interior officials before him, that all Federal recreation areas should be managed and controlled by the National Park Service. The role of the Forest Service, he said, should be confined to growing trees. In spite of his determined opposition, many land purchases were made which added to the scenic beauty of the National Forests and improved their facilities for hiking, camping, hunting and fishing.

In most cases the recreation benefits were played down and timber and watershed management functions of the land to be purchased were emphasized, largely to avoid Ickes' opposition. For example, the highest-priced piece of land in the Nantahala was purchased from the Gennett Lumber Co. in 1936 and 1937. This tract, which became the Joyce Kilmer Memorial Forest, contained a magnificent stand of virgin timber. In justifying the high purchase price, the Forest Service carefully calculated the value of the timber, though there was no intention ever to cut this unique stand. [39] The value of the tract for scientific study was also pointed out.

Most of the lands acquired were cutover or heavily culled, and purchase prices of badly damaged land were sometimes less than $2 per acre. These purchases fit more closely with the older Forest Service practices of getting the most land for the money and of restoring land best suited to timber production to its natural use. The purchase of damaged lands also provided work for the CCC and would contribute in the long run to watershed management, another original National Forest purpose.

Figure 50.—The National Forests and Purchase Units of the Southern Appalachians in 1935, showing the new Purchase Units in Ohio and Indiana for the first time. (U.S. Geological Survey map; Forest Service photo)

Benefits to Counties Vary Greatly

While owners of land were often glad to see the Forest Service in the market for major purchases, two issues were raised which led some to view major expansion of the National Forests with alarm. One group was led by Austin Cary, a pioneer in the development of sound forestry practices for southern forests, especially the coastal pinelands used for turpentine production. Cary had been employed by the Forest Service for many years, but had never accepted the idea of large-scale Federal ownership of land. He wanted only small experimental tracts in Government ownership and believed, like Carl Schenck before him, that private forest owners could be convinced to manage their lands responsibly. [40]

Cary served as a focal point for those who feared a Government takeover of the forests. A delegation from the Society of American Foresters, which addressed NFRC at its January 22, 1936, meeting, recommended that the Forest Service be permitted to purchase lands only if they were not likely to be properly developed by private owners. The key to much of their argument was a desire for special credits to permit forest owners to survive their present economic problems without having to sell their land. A Forest Service representative pointed out in response that the purchase program planned by the Forest Service would leave 90 percent of the forest lands in the Eastern United States in private ownership. Federal domination of timber growing did not appear to be a serious threat. [41]

Another issue raised at this meeting was far more important in its implication for the people of the Southern Appalachians. This was the problem of removal of land from the tax base of already hard-pressed counties. The Forest Service was well aware of the problem, especially in the areas of the mountains where it was acquiring new land. Forest Service payments to local governments in the past had been a percentage of revenue from the sale of timber. Much of the land now being acquired would take several generations to regrow, so the counties could expect no funds in the immediate future.

Figure 51—Construction work on State Route 106 on Scaly Mountain between Highlands, N.C., and Dillard, Ga., in summer 1937. Job was done under the Federal Emergency Relief Administration (ERA), which became the Works Progress Administration (WPA) in 1938. (NA:95G-352573)

In response to the criticism that it was bankrupting the southern mountain counties, the Forest Service prepared a group of careful studies of the finances of representative counties. One of the counties studied was Macon County, N.C., a rural, mountainous area included in the Nantahala National Forest. In 1936, when the study was made, 43 percent of the area of the county was in Federal ownership and the rest, except an area of about 1,000 acres in the towns of Franklin and Highlands, was included in the area of proposed additions to that forest. It would require many years to restock the forest in Macon County, since its American chestnuts had suffered fatal damage from the Chinese blight and other species would have to be developed to replace them. The principal forest-related occupation in the county in 1936 was the salvage of dead chestnut stumpage.

Although the State of North Carolina had taken over the major portion of school and highway costs, the county was, in effect, virtually without funds. Services were minimal, and the rates of tax delinquency very high. The condition of county records was so poor that an exact picture of its financial situation was impossible, but the report concluded that the county had probably gained more than it had lost through the presence of the National Forest. Benefits included road construction and maintenance, development of recreation areas, free-use permits granted to county residents, use of Forest Service telephone lines, and employment on the forest. The report estimated that the county had received directly $12,500, chiefly in money spent for roads, and that it could have collected, at most, $8,000 in taxes from the Nantahala National Forest lands if they had remained in private ownership. [42]

Another representative mountain county was Johnson County, Tenn. It was also completely rural, but its farms were somewhat better than those of Macon County. However, tax defaults were common, and the county was also in debt. About 21 percent of the county had been purchased for the Unaka National Forest (now the northern Cherokee). Almost all of the rest was included within the planned future Forest boundaries, but in 1936 it did not seem likely that more land would be purchased soon. The report, which was less thorough than the study of Macon County, concluded that the county had lost about $3,300 in taxes and gained roads worth $8,250 per year in the years immediately preceding 1936. Other benefits such as recreation areas and employment of local residents were not estimated in this report. [43]

While Johnson County would undoubtedly have liked more tax money for operating expenses, the presence of the forest did tend to reduce many county expenses. The principal county expenditures were for law enforcement, roads, and schools. For the 21 percent of the county land already in the National Forest, no county funds were spent on roads, and the need for both schools and law enforcement was low because few people lived there.

Figure 52—A natural area seen from Rattlesnake Rock, Cherokee National Forest, Tenn., in 1937. White pine and other conifers are mixed with northern hardwoods. (NA:95G-352605)

In spite of the conclusion that local government had generally not lost much or even had gained by the presence of National Forests, the Forest Service and other Federal land agencies continued to work on a plan for reform of the method of payment to local government. The problem was that income from the 25 percent payment plan fluctuated too greatly for counties to use the money in their financial planning, and that some counties got no money because National Forest land was not yet productive. [44] It proved impossible to come up with a new plan satisfactory to all concerned and it was to be many years before a basic change was made in the payment method.

While large tracts were purchased in the Southern Appalachians during the Depression, it was the purchase of smaller tracts to consolidate the Forests which had the most visible impact on the mountain people. The files of the NFRC for 1935 and 1936 bulge with the records of hundreds of individual land purchases, some as small as 8 acres, many less than 200 acres. These acquisitions benefited the forests by improving fire control, game management, prevention of pollution and trash problems and in many other ways. Local governments benefited since they no longer had to worry about providing schools and roads in the areas. (They generally had made no provision for sanitation.) The more affluent small landowners benefited by acquiring cash to start over elsewhere on better farm land. Tenants and the poorer landowners were a serious problem. Many of them remained and became tenants on the forest.

Figure 53—Rocky Face Mountain, overlooking forested Mill Creek valley, near Dug Gap in Armuchee Ranger District, Chattahoochee National Forest, near Dalton, Ga., in 1941. (Forest Service photo F-411617)

Many Small Landholders Pose a Problem

The acquisition of these small parcels of land was often a complex process. First, as two decades before, few of the landowners had a clear idea of the location of the boundaries of their land. Even where boundaries were indicated by a creek or a road, the owner often had no idea of the exact number of acres he held. The Forest Service could not tell a mountain man how much money he would receive for his farm until it had been surveyed, since the purchase price would be determined by establishing the value per acre and multiplying by the number of acres. Many people felt cheated when the survey showed that they held fewer acres than they thought, and the payment for their property was therefore smaller than they had expected. On the other hand, nearly as many small landowners were pleasantly surprised to discover that they held title to more land than they realized. For example, an elderly farmer in Madison County, N.C., claimed 40 acres when he agreed to sell. Survey showed that he actually possessed 106 acres. [45]

A sample of 50 purchases made in 1935 for the Cumberland National Forest in Kentucky revealed only one case in which the amount of land claimed by the seller agreed with the amount a survey showed that he possessed. Many of the differences were large in proportion to the size of the tract being sold. The numbers of overestimates and underestimates were about equal. [46] Purchases for the Unaka and Nantahala Forests in North Carolina, Tennessee, and Georgia all showed similar discrepancies—occasionally quite large—between the number of acres claimed by the seller and the number of acres determined by survey. [47]

Figure 54—New Wild Acres Hotel near Mt. Mitchell, N.C., on Pisgah National Forest, operating under a special-use permit in March 1930. (NA:95G-238080)

These confusions over land boundaries were one facet of another complicating factor. Many of the mountain people did not have clear title to their lands. Inheritance, previous sale of a portion of the land, and inadequate local recordkeeping all contributed to this problem. A landowner often wished to sell land with title defects. Since the Government could not acquire the land unless the title could be cleared, this had to be done by "friendly" condemnation.

In contrast to the land acquisition policy of TVA, the Forest Service continued to follow its established rule of never condemning the land of an unwilling seller. Most of its condemnation cases were solely to clear title. The land was acquired at a price previously agreed on, Occasionally there was conflict over the amount to be paid for a piece of land, but land was never condemned when the owner did not want to sell at all.

Consider, for example, the case of Homer Frisbie, at times a guide to hikers in Bear Creek Cove, near Hangover Mountain, Graham County, N.C. Frisbie lived with his family in a two-room log cabin on his 3-acre "farm." He had a 2-acre corn field, a garden including potatoes, beans, and rhubarb, and livestock—one cow, four calves, one pig and "about fifty chickens." Frisbie supplemented his food by hunting and fishing.

Frisbie, however, did not exactly "own" his land. County records revealed that Frisbie and his wife held a 1/30 undivided interest in a 98-acre tract optioned by Sam Sparks and others. Since the owners of the other 29/30 interests wanted to sell, a "friendly" condemnation suit had been filed. Frisbie became alarmed and obtained the help of visitors who wrote letters on his behalf, including a Chicago attorney.

One solution was for Frisbie to remain on his 3 acres and farm it with a special-use permit, but losing title to the land. Frisbie refused, wanting either to retain ownership or to obtain title to some other suitable land. North Carolina law stated that a condemnation without Frisbie's consent would be void, since he was using the tract as a home. The Forest Service might have agreed to allow Frisbie to retain title, but his plot was the last piece of a tract of nearly 30 square miles that the Forest Service had put together to establish a wildlife management area and to preserve its wildness. The tract contained the largest stand of virgin timber in the Nantahala forest. The Forest Supervisor was, naturally, eager to move Frisbie out.

Frisbie finally agreed to accept a 9.7-acre tract of Federal land in exchange. Settlement of the case took about 9 months, extensive legal correspondence, and the consideration of diverse interests. The value of the Frisbie land so acquired was only $35.00. [48]

Figure 55.—Point Lookout, a special-use roadside stand concession on old State route 10 on Pisgah National Forest east of Asheville, in March 1930. (NA:95G-238161)

One wonders what would have happened if Homer Frisbie had not received legal help. But in another case, stubbornness won out without legal help.

In 1934 Mrs. Hester Jane Truitt, a widow, signed an option to sell her land and cabin, in Swain and Macon counties, N.C., for $1.75 per acre. She was assured of help in finding a new home to buy when she received payment. Title to the 99.4-acre farm was clouded, requiring condemnation. There were delays, and payment was not ready until March 1937. By then Mrs. Truitt realized that she would not get relocation assistance, and she could not find a new farm to purchase with the money she was entitled to. So she simply refused to accept payment and remained where she was.

In November 1940, 44 months later, an attorney for the Justice Department Lands Division visited Mrs. Truitt to see why she had not accepted payment. A portion of his account of the visit follows.

Mrs. Truitt, whom I judge to be about 65 years of age, lives on the condemned property with her daughter, whom I judge to about 35 years of age. Leaving my car at the nearest road approach to the premises, I climbed a rugged mountain trail about three-fourths of a mile up to Mrs. Truitt's cabin. The cabin is located in a small field, possibly three and one-half acres in total area, in which were a few scragly fruit trees, a pig pen, and a crude cow-shelter, and apparently two acres of corn stubble. The ground indications were that the corn had been cultivated largely by use of the hoe. I saw three head of cattle and several chickens about the place. Every pound of supplies used in the house or on the land that comes from the outside has to be carried up the path by which I climbed . . . The whole appearance from a physical appraisement looked about as hopeless to sustain human occupants as any I ever came in contact with; and my own origin was in the rugged Blue Ridge Mountains.

Mrs. Truitt said she had been waiting a long time for my visit and she wondered what kind of man would come there to tell her that she must leave her home that she had helped to clear out of the woods with her own hands and where she had reared a large family of children. She just wanted me to tell her what kind of government I was working for, which through its (forestry) representatives promised her and her neighbors if they would petition for the establishment of the Government Forest they would be paid enough for their lands to enable them to get better placed in the valleys; and that after she so petitioned, would send me around to offer her less than one hundred dollars after taxes for the home she had occupied for forty years. What kind of home would that amount buy for her and her daughter, who had many years to live after she, Mrs. Truitt, would be gone, she asked?

The conclusion of the matter was that she flatly declined to touch a cent of the award; and said that when she moved from those premises she would be carried feet-foremost. [49]

It was finally decided to remove her tract from the condemnation and return the $173.95 to the U.S. [50] Lacking both an influential advocate and a legal leg to stand on, Mrs. Truitt nevertheless retained her land through sheer stubbornness.

While Mrs. Truitt actually retained title to her mountain farm, so that her daughter could also continue to live there after her death, some elderly residents sold the land to the Forest Service but reserved lifetime rights.

They continued to occupy their homes until they died, although the Government immediately acquired title to the land. The price paid for the land was reduced in such cases, and the occupants became subject to forest regulations on burning and trash disposal. Since the Government held title to the land, no State or local taxes would have to be paid. In some cases the Forest Service required that no change be made in the use of the land without the district ranger's permission. A cash payment plus the right to remain in their homes gave some financial security for such older residents in their last years. Life interests were granted only to those over 65, thus ensuring that complete control of the land would pass to the Forest Service before long. Examples occurred in all of the Southern Appalachian forests, but the number was small. [51]

Figure 56.—Bent Creek Forest Camp, overnight public recreation site on Pisgah National Forest near Asheville, N.C., in March 1930. (NA:95G-238168)

Forest Service as Landlord; Sublimity Project

As early as 1934, Forest Service administrators realized that their extensive program of forest land purchase would create problems for people, especially tenants and squatters, occupying the land. Many of these people were trying to make a living from unsuitable land only because they had no place else to go.

A policy established in September 1934 stated that all persons occupying land acquired for the National Forests could continue to live there by paying a "special-use fee." This fee generally would be slightly less than the taxes payable on the land if it were in private ownership. Holders of special-use permits for residence and cultivation would be subject to land use requirements intended to minimize damage to the land, including restrictions on fires, trash disposal, timber cutting, and whatever else the district ranger thought necessary or enforceable. [52]

At that time it was hoped that rural resettlement programs might find new and better homes for many of these people. With the end of that hope, the Forest Service became a more permanent landlord. Even in 1934 provision was made for isolated pockets of good farm land within National Forests. Permanent authorization of special use for such areas was permitted, as long as this did not interfere with forest management. [53]

The mountain forest that had the greatest number of tenants was the newly created Cumberland National Forest in Kentucky, where purchases began in 1933. The one resettlement project, Sublimity, intended to provide better homes for those who had been displaced by the establishment of the forest, was a very limited success. [54] The Sublimity Forest community was planned, constructed, and managed by the Forest Service with funds provided by the Resettlement Administration and later the Farm Security Administration.

Forest work needed by Sublimity residents to supplement their farm and garden income was never adequate. The high standards set for housing and social services made the cost per family prohibitive. Families carefully selected from a number of applications became disillusioned with the project and left. Between 1937 and 1945, 103 families lived in the project. The average period of occupancy was 18.8 months, and the average rate was 73 percent or 48 of the 66 homes in the community.

A 1947 Forest Service report on the project, written after it had been terminated, recommended that the "establishment of rehabilitation communities on or in connection with national forests be discouraged." The author of the study concluded that Sublimity had been useful as an experiment, but that organized, managed communities were not workable either socially or economically. Socially, "improvements" in the peoples' lives and attitudes were difficult to make and required constant supervision to maintain. Economically, the project closed with a net loss of $73,870, an unacceptable cost for a small project. [55]

One forest officer commented, "Sublimity to me was a nightmare, much more depressing from a psychological point of view than World War II." [56] No one wished to repeat the Sublimity experiment, including the local people who refused to apply for homes there or voted against it by simply moving out.

Lumber and shingles from dismantled CCC camps were used to improve some of the Sublimity homes. Longrange plans were made to improve homes, outbuildings, and the farmland itself, but funds for this work were always very limited. Forest Service personnel felt a responsibility to the people, but they were uncomfortable in a "social work" role.

What type of structures should the Forest Service provide its tenants? What should our standards be? The TVA, so Richards told us, has spent from $400 to $1500 for each set of improvements owned and rented by the Government under similar conditions under the TVA. Forest Service expenditures on cases sampled during our trip were from $35 to $122 per case. These expenditures resulted in placing the properties in as habitable a condition as the general run of improvements occupied by the better tenants and the smaller owners in the same neighborhood. Should we attempt to raise these standards? Should we provide something besides bare board walls inside the house and floors as well as ceilings that the housewife will be especially proud of? Should we be so "extravagant" as to provide bright colored paints for the exterior of the dwellings? In addition, what kind and what use of incentives should be used to encourage these people to raise their standards? Such problems are over the head of the average forester but are quite probably everyday matters to the trained social worker. For this reason, we would join the Region in suggesting the assignment of a sufficient number of trained social workers to this field until a satisfactory plan and procedure for handling these cases has been developed. [57]

Forest officers understandably wanted to turn the problems over to someone else.

Figure 57—Mountain farm family at their cottage in Currens Valley, Smyth County, Va., Jefferson National Forest, in November 1939. (NA:95G-390771)

Dealing With Forest Residents

While Forest Service officers may have been uncomfortable in their roles as "landlord," they were more at home in dealing with local people in other ways. Technical personnel, clerical workers, and unskilled labor were usually local residents. The district ranger (or his staff, if any) was the "boss" for these workers, a role in which the forest officers were generally comfortable and quite successful. [58]

Forest Service officers also dealt with people who requested special-use permits. The poor squatters and tenants mentioned earlier occupied their homes and land under special permits, sometimes free, sometimes paying a small fee. Similar permits were issued for a multitude of uses from resort hotels and industrial developments to cutting firewood or fenceposts. A Forest Service report in 1940 concluded that:

It is probable that all of this special use business is so much taken for granted that it has little influence on the attitudes of people except when they are refused some desired privilege. Such disapprovals result in more or less hostility and resentment. [59]

Figure 58.—Successful hunters with their buck deer after a special Forest Service-regulated hunt on Pisgah National Forest, N.C., in fall 1939. (NA:95G-397105).

Figure 59.—Guide Bud Graves of Tellico Plains, Tenn., holding his dogs as he waited to be checked into hunting area for Forest Service-regulated wild boar hunt on Cherokee National Forest in fall 1941. (Forest Service photo F-414169).

Figure 60.—This 300-pound Prussian wild boar was the largest taken in the fall 1944 hunt regulated by the Forest Service in Tellico Wildlife Management Area, Cherokee National Forest, Tenn. Hunter was L. W. Galloway of Kingsport, Tenn. (Forest Service photo F-433225).

Some hostility and resentment also stemmed from the establishment of wildlife management areas where hunting was restricted, since local residents often were accustomed to hunting as a supplement to their food supply. Hunting has never been prohibited on National Forests, but the forest lands are subject to State laws regulating hunting and fishing. Limits on the hunting season and on the hunters' bag are often resented, as are hunting license requirements.

Active game management in the Appalachian highlands generally dates from the 1930's, so this was a new source of problems at the time. The purpose of the controls was to improve hunting and fishing in the forests and preserve the possibility of such sports for the future. Game animals had been shot out or starved out of much of the newly acquired land and restocking had to take place. However, there was good hunting in the better forested older areas. No Federal fee was charged for hunting and fishing in the National Forests, but about this time residents were required to obtain a State hunting or fishing license for the first time, which was an annoyance to many.

Fire control and land acquisition remained the two principal areas of activity where forest officers came in contact with local people. Fire prevention publicity, organization of fire crews, investigation of man-caused fires for prosecution—these tasks occupied much of the time of many forest officers.

Figure 61—Blackened spots where boy is standing show how a farmer's land-clearing brush fire got away in a high wind in 1942 to burn 2,000 acres of the adjoining Cherokee National Forest, the margin of which is visible in foreground. (Forest Service photo F-419862)

Figure 62.—A local farmer serving as a fire warden for the USDA Forest Service on the Daniel Boone (then Cumberland) National Forest, Ky., in August 1940. The Forest Service furnished such wardens with a telephone in their homes, to report forest fires. (Forest Service photo F-400243)

Figure 63. —The National Forests, and Purchase Units (lighter blocks), of the Southern Appalachian Mountains in 1938 show only a few changes from 1935. The major additions were taking place in the Gulf States. (U.S. Geological Survey map; Forest Service photo)

Figure 64—The National Forests and Purchase Units of the Southern Appalachians in 1940, showing the consolidations of 1936. The forests and units in North Georgia had been combined to form the Chattahoochee, those in Tennessee to form the new enlarged Cherokee, and those in South Carolina to form the Sumter. The Unaka was divided along State lines among the Cherokee, Pisgah, and Jefferson National Forests in 1936. The units north of the Ohio River are Purchase Units, except the Shawnee, which had just been established. National Parks are also shown. (Forest Service map and photo)

Because of the extensive land acquisitions in the 1930's, related activities occupied relatively more time and led to more individual contacts with people than in recent years. It was a long, drawn-out process. As in the early years, after a purchase area was established, forest officers would interview landowners in the area regarding their interest in selling their land. Since prices offered were generally not high, much discussion would result. The forest officer would also have to explain the Forest Service process of land acquisition and forewarn the seller of the possibility of delay in consummating the purchase. Once an option was obtained from a willing seller, a survey crew would retrace old survey lines, conferring with all adjacent landowners to help locate the corners and check the accuracy of the survey. A crew would then come in to inventory the timber and classify the soil to determine the value of the land for forest purposes. The relations of these crews with local people could be touchy.

In the early states of such work, forest officers are in danger of being mistaken for 'revenuers' and most take some pains to make their identity known to residents. [60]

Further negotiations often would result, sometimes over a considerable period of time. If the landowner decided to accept the final offer made to him, a final survey would be made to establish permanent corners and mark lines. The results of this final survey could lead to trouble if the lines were not where the owner thought they should be. As we have already seen, this was often the case. Still another source of trouble remained.

Final payment is made to a man for the land he has sold. Much ill will results from preposterous delays in making final payment because of highly technical legal demands from legal authorities regarding title, squatters on land, etc. Although Forest Service has fought for years for a more rational handling of title work, little real progress has been made until just recently. [61]

On large tracts of land purchased from absentee owners there were often squatters who had been there for years and had, or thought they had, some claim to the land. Numerous grievances arose out of all these situations.

Figure 65—Tallulah (until 1931 called Clayton) Ranger Station, Clayton, Ga., in 1935. The District was then part of Nantahala National Forest. The Georgia portion of the old Nantahala was transferred to the new Chattahoochee National Forest on July 9, 1936. (NA:95G-310056)

One Week on the Job With a Ranger

A Memorandum of Inspection from the Cherokee National Forest shows how some of these interactions with people fit into the weekly routine of a district ranger. [62] Hiwassee District Ranger J.W. Cooper, accompanied by the Assistant Forest Supervisor, E.W. Renshaw, toured his district in mid-April 1938, handling a variety of problems. The first stop on their tour was Hiwassee Beach, where the operator of the beach (a special-use permit holder) had requested that the Forest Service install a telephone. The ranger pointed out that the Forest Service could only install telephones needed for fire control purposes, but he suggested that the local residents might want to build their own telephone line. They could use the existing Forest Service telephone poles if they wished.

The two officers then checked the complaint of the man who had protested that Forest Service telephone line maintenance had destroyed trees and shrubs close to his summer cabin. Cooper concluded that the CCC had probably done a little more clearing than was necessary when they built the line in 1935, but nothing could be done about it.

The next day Cooper spent several hours with a junior forester who was conducting a "visible area study," to help plan lookout tower locations. Cooper and Renshaw then proceeded to the Tumbling Creek area to investigate a boundary dispute with a landowner who claimed that an Experimental Project crew had placed a weather observatory and a weir (for stream observation) on her property. Relations with this woman had become "rather strained." There was much difficulty in checking the boundary, as the line had never been painted and the corner marker had been destroyed.

Ranger Cooper and Assistant Supervisor Renshaw then returned to a nearby Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) camp where they found that a crew had been out fighting a forest fire. The next day they went to the site of the fire to investigate. They found stumps and logs still burning, so they called the crew back to put it out, and then checked the site for clues. Clear evidence remained that the fire had started from a campfire built by fox hunters. The ranger backtracked on the hunters and found the farmer's yard where they had parked their car. The farmer identified it. Through the car's license number the hunters were traced and eventually a conviction was secured.

A district ranger, dealing with land acquisition, timber sales, fire suppression, telephone lines, lookouts, information, special-use permit complaints, and a host of other issues, was the backbone of forest administration. He generally had the greatest influence on the image held by local people of the Forest Service. During the week described above, the ranger interacted with a recreation facility operator, two vacation home owners, a CCC camp, and a group of fox hunters—possibly not local since they had come by car and thus the neighboring farmer was willing to give evidence against them. This list raises questions as early as 1938, about the kind of people who lived near, or used, National Forest land. There is little interaction with a traditional mountain community; rather, the ranger was dealing with people who had a recreational interest in the forest. The farmer, who was the only fulltime resident, was extremely helpful in the investigation of the origins of the forest fire.

Conditions varied somewhat from forest to forest, and in parts of the same forest. Perhaps at another time of year the contacts would be different. A ranger in Kentucky, where the Cumberland National Forest had a large number of tenants, would probably have been interacting more with a community of mountain people at that period. The pressure on the land to provide the necessities of life was apparently greater in the Cumberland then than in some of the longer-established forests along the crest of the Appalachians. [63]

Figure 66—Blue Ridge Ranger Station office and warehouses near Blairsville, Ga., when new in 1938. Station was moved to Dahlonega in 1952 and name was changed to Chestatee. Chattahoochee National Forest, (NA:95G-386658)

Figure 67—Ranger explaining use of anemometer (wind gauge) in forest fire control to businessmen from London and Berea, Ky., at Bald Rock fire tower, Sublimity Ranger District, Daniel Boone (then Cumberland) National Forest, in June 1938. (NA:95G-365420)

Figure 68—Steel lookout tower secured by steel cables, topped with an 8- x 8-foot lookout house and walkway on all sides, on Chestnut Mountain, Armuchee Ranger District, Chattahoochee National Forest, south of Dalton, Whitfield County, Ga., completed in 1941. (Forest Service photo F-411612)

Reference Notes

(In the following notes, the expression "NA, RG 83" means National Archives, Record Group 83, Records of the Bureau of Agricultural Economics (USDA); "NA, RG 95, OC, NFRC" means National Archives, Record Group 95, Records of the Forest Service (USDA), Office of the Chief, National Forest Reservation Commission; and "NA, RG 96" means National Archives, Record Group 96, Records of the Farm Security Administration (USDA). "WNRC, FSR" means Washington National Records Center, Forest Service records. See Bibliography, IX.)

1. 50 Stat. 188; 64 Stat, 473; 50 Stat 525. Harold K. Steen, The U.S. Forest Service: A History (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1975), pp. 327, 328.

2. Glen Lawhorn Parker, The Coal Industry: A Study in Social Control (Washington, D.C.: American Council on Public Affairs, 1940), p. 67.

3. National Archives, Record Group 83, Records of the Bureau of Agricultural Economics (BAE), USDA, Forest Service, Soil Conservation Service, and Bureau of Agricultural Economics: "Preliminary Examination Reports," Yellow Creek Watershed, 1939; Pee Dee River Watershed, 1938; New River Watershed, 1940; Roanoke River Watershed, 1941; Big Sandy River Watershed, 1940. These reports contain much useful economic information on the mountain areas where these rivers and their tributaries rise.

4. Duke University, Perkins Library, Gennett Lumber Company, Papers, Box 24, Andrew Gennett to C. W. Savage, Murphy, N.C., October 15, 1934.

5. Ignatz Pikl, Jr., A History of Georgia Forestry, p. 25. See also note 3, "Preliminary Examination Reports."

6. National Archives, Record Group 95, Records of the Forest Service, Office of the Chief, National Forest Reservation Commission, Minutes, January 11, 1934.

7. NA, RG 83 (BAE), "Preliminary Examination Reports," Pee Dee River Watershed 1938. Although counties did not make adjustments readily to the lower land values of the Depression, in most cases land was taxed at a fairly low rate.

8. Harry Caudill, Night Comes to the Cumberlands, Chapter 13.

9. Cratis D. Williams, "The Southern Mountaineer in Fact and Fiction" (Ph.D. dissertation, New York University, 1961), p. 101.

10. Washington National Records Center, Forest Service Records, Accession No. 59A1532, Forest Service Memo: "Social Aspects of National Forest Management" by John H. Hatton, Assistant Regional Forester (Region 2), June, 1934.

11. NA, RG 95, Office of the Chief, Supervision, 1929-35, General, Memo, E. A. Sherman, Associate Forester, to Regional Foresters, December 9, 1932.

12. Elwood R. Maunder, Dr. Richard E. McArdle: An Interview With the Former Chief, U.S. Forest Service, 1952-1962 (Santa Cruz, Calif.: Forest History Society, 1975), p. 84; and Robert F. Collins, A History of the Daniel Boone National Forest (Lexington, Ky.: University of Kentucky Press, 1975), pp. 262-263.

13. Edwin Nourse, Joseph Davis, and John Black, Three Years of the Agricultural Adjustment Administration (Washington, D.C., 1937).

14. National Archives, Record Group 96, Records of the Farm Security Administration, Correspondence, Records of Regional Director, Region 4, 1935-40, AAA Land Policy Section, Division of Program Planning, W.D. Nicholls, University of Kentucky College of Agriculture, to L. C. Gray, Division of Land Economics, Land Policy, Agricultural Adjustment Administration, April 14, 1934.

15. NA, RG 96, Farm Security Administration (FSA), W. D. Nicholls to L. C. Gray April 6, 1934; L. C. Gray to W. D. Nicholls April 12, 1934. See note 14.

16. NA, RG 96, Farm Security Administration (FSA), Records of the Regional Director, Region 4, Land Policy Section, Division of Program Planning, AAA, 1934-35, "My Experiences While Working on the Submarginal Land Program in Knox County, Kentucky" by W. P. Mayhew, Field Supervisor, November 10, 1934. Also similar reports prepared by Elmer Pritchard, Edward S. Amis and Dr. Wayne T. Gray, field clerks, in November, 1934.

17. NA, RG 96, FSA, Mayhew, "My Experiences in Knox County," Region 4, Land Policy, AAA, 1934-35.

18. NA, RG 96, FSA, Records of Region 4 Land Policy Section, Division of Program Planning, AAA, Report—1934, Kentucky Ridge Area.

19. NA, RG 96, FSA, Correspondence of the Regional Director, Region 4, 1935-40. Tilford E. Dudley, Chief, Legal Division, The Land Program, F.E.R.A., to Carl C. Taylor, Regional Director, Land Policy Section, AAA, February 7, 1935.

20. NA, RG 83, Bureau of Agricultural Economics (BAE), Appalachian Regional Office Records, 1935, Kentucky 184.

21. NA, RG 83, BAE, Appalachian Records, 1935, Kentucky 184.

22. Interview with Dr. Billie DeWalt, Winchester, Ky., July 27, 1979. Dr. DeWalt was employed by the Forest Service to do a community study in the Red River Gorge area.

23. NA, RG 96, FSA, Correspondence of the Regional Director, Region 4, AAA, 1935-40, Resettlement of Land Utilization Clients, Report, September 29, 1936, Kentucky Ridge Forest Project, L.U.-Ky 1.

24. NA, RG 96, FSA, Region 4, Resettlement Division, AAA, 1935-40, List of Projects, 1936, and C. B. Faris, Assistant Regional Director, to Mack J. Morgan, Resettlement Representative, Lexington, Ky., April 7, 1936.

25. NA, RG 96, FSA, Correspondence 1935-40, Land Utilization Projects, Region 4, File of letters dealing with the need to move people off all Land Utilization Project lands by May 31, 1938. W. P. Mayhew, Project Manager, Pineville, Ky., to Howard H. Gordon, Regional Director, FSA, Kentucky Ridge Forest Project.

26. WNRC, Forest Service Records, Accession No. 95780002, Report on Proposed Extension of the Pisgah National Forest, May 9, 1934.

27. NA, RG 96, FSA, Correspondence of the Regional Director, Region 4, AAA, Joseph C. Kircher, Regional Forester, to Dr. Carl C. Taylor, Regional Director, Division of Program Planning, AAA Lands, October 27, 1934.

28. NA, RG 96, FSA, Correspondence of the Regional Director, Land Policy Section, Division of Program Planning, AAA, Region 4, Paul W. Wager, Regional Assistant, Land Policy Section, AAA, to J. C. Kircher, U.S. Forest Service, May 14, 1935. Paul W. Wager, Acting Regional Director, Resettlement Administration, to J. C. Kircher, July 11, 1935. The Cherokees worked out a separate agreement with the Park Service. Conflicts over the need to help tenants and sharecroppers as well as farm landowners led to the resignation of a number of "social reformers" from the AAA in the Spring of 1935; W. E. Leuchtenberg, Franklin D. Roosevelt and the New Deal, (New York: Harper and Row, 1963), pp. 139-142.

29. Rexford Tugwell, "The Resettlement Idea," Agricultural History 33 (1959): 159-164.

30. NA, RG 83B, Bureau of Agricultural Economics (BAE), Land Utilization Projects, Regional Files, 1934-45, Appalachian Region. See especially Nantahala-Cherokee Project and Preliminary Report of Land Use Conditions in Cherokee County, North Carolina, January, 1939.

31. Marguerite Owen, The Tennessee Valley Authority (New York: Praeger Publishers, 1973), pp. 67-68.

32. Arthur E. Morgan, The Making of the TVA. (Buffalo, N.Y., 1974), pp. 75-79. Morgan and others had many ideas about social and political development of the region through TVA. Most of their ideas were never carried out. See also Clarence L. Hodge, The Tennessee Valley Authority: A National Experiment in Regionalism (Washington: American University Press, 1938), for efforts made to cooperate with and assist local communities and interest groups.

33. Brewer and Brewer, Valley So Wild, p. 259. The dam she referred to was the Fontana. See also Alfred J. Gray "Land Use Aspects of Reservoir Problems," in G. Donald Hudson, et al: "Studies of River Development in the Knoxville-Chattanooga Area, Economic Geography 15 (July, 1939).

34. Charles J. McCarthy, "Land Acquisition Policies and Procedures in TVA," Ohio State Law Journal (Winter, 1949).

35. Vladimir Eugene Hartman, "A Cultural Study of a Mountain Community in Western North Carolina" (Ph.D. dissertation, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, 1957) p. 109. See also Owen, The TVA, p. 27.

36. Interview with Russell Griffith and Bruce Jewell, headquarters, Cherokee National Forest, Cleveland, Tenn., July 17, 1979.

37. NA, RG 95, Records of the Forest Service, Office of the Chief, National Forest Reservation Commission (NFRC), Minutes, June 9, 1933. The information in the following section is chiefly derived from NFRC minutes. Specific citations will be provided where appropriate.

38. NA, RG 95, Office of the Chief, NFRC, Minutes, November 21, 1934.

39. Land Acquisition Records, National Forests of North Carolina, Asheville, N.C.

40. Roy Ring White, "Austin Cary and Forestry in the South" (Ph.D. dissertation, University of Florida, 1960), pp. 231-239.

41. NA, RG 95, Office of the Chief, NFRC, Minutes, January 22, 1936.

42. WNRC, Forest Service Records, Accession No. 60A851, Report on Macon County, North Carolina, 1936.

43. WNRC, FSR, Ace. No. 60A851, Report on Johnson County, Tenn., 1936.

44. WNRC, FSR, Acc. No. 58-A64, Memo from R. C. Hall, Director, Forest Taxation Inquiry, to R. E. Marsh, Assistant Chief, "Department Contributions Policy" June 18, 1943.

45. NA, RG 95, Office of the Chief, NFRC, Minutes, July 30, 1935, Unaka Forest Purchase Records.

46. NA, RG 95, Office of the Chief, NFRC, Minutes, July 30, 1935, Cumberland Forest Purchase Records.

47. NA, RG 95, OC, NFRC, Minutes, July 30, 1935, Unaka and Nantahala Forests Purchase Records.

48. NA, RG 95, Land Acquisition (LA), Condemnation Cases, 1939-46, Region 8, John A. Massen to Hon. Mastin G. White, Office of the Solicitor, USDA, May 31, 1940; L. L. Bishop, Assistant Forester to John A. Massen, June 1, 1940; L. F. Kneipp, Assistant Chief, F.S. to J. Kircher, Regional Forester, August 7, 1940; J. Kircher, Regional Forester, to Chief, September 10, 1940; John E. Burch, Acting Chief, Land Acquisition, to Regional Forester, September 30, 1940; Memorandum for Mr. Kneipp, Acquisition, Nantahala, September 27, 1940; Memorandum for Supervisor, Nantahala, August 13, 1940.

49. NA, RG 95, Land Acquisition (LA), Condemnation Cases, 1939-46, Region 8, Nere A. Day, Special Attorney, Department of Justice, to Attorney General, Lands Division, Condemnation Section, Department of Justice, December 13, 1940.

50. NA, RG 95, Land Acquisition. (LA), Condemnation Cases, 1939-46, Region 8, John E. Burch, Acting Chief, Forest Service, to Solicitor, Department of Agriculture, Acquisition, Nantahala, May 26, 1941.

51. NA, RG 95, Office of the Chief, National Forest Reservation Commission, Minutes, Cherokee Forest Purchase Records, July 30, 1935; Pisgah Forest Purchase Records, April 2, 1936; Nantahala Forest Purchase Records, June 30, 1941; Chattahoochee Forest Purchase Records, June 4, 1940.

52. Washington National Records Center, Accession No. 72A3386, Forest Service Records, L. F. Kneipp, Assistant Forester, to John E. Burch, Secretary, NFRC, October 17, 1934.

53. WNRC, Forest Service Records, Acc. No. 72A3386, F. A. Silcox, Forester, to Regional Foresters, September 27, 1934. See also, Collins, A History of the Daniel Boone National Forest. Chapter 30, pp. 219-224.

54. Forest Service Regional Office Records, Atlanta, Ga., Lands Division, "Notes of Observations During a Trip Through Eastern Kentucky," May 22, 1940, Supervision—Cumberland National Forest. "History of the Sublimity Forest Community Situated in Laurel County, Kentucky," prepared by W. E. Hedges, 1947, pp. 5-8, 34, 80, 81.

55. Forest Service Regional Office Records, Atlanta, Ga., Lands Division, Hedges, "History of Sublimity," 1947.

56. Edward Ritter to W. E. Hedges, Jan. 17, 1947, filed with "History of Sublimity."

57. NA, RG 95, Office of the Chief, General Integrating Inspection Reports, Region 8, 1937, by E. W. Loveridge and J. A. Fitzwater. The southern lowland forests such as the Talledega and Kisatchie had more serious tenant problems than the mountain forests.

58. Washington National Records Center, Accession No. 60A931, "A List of Different Kinds of Things the Forest Service and Forest Officers Do Which Influence Residents," August 12, 1940.

59. WNRC, Acc. No. 60A931, "A List of Different Things."

60. WNRC, "A List of Different Things."

61. WNRC, "A List of Different Things."

62. NA, RG 95, CCC Camp Records, Memorandum of Inspection, Hiwassee District, Cherokee National Forest, April 18, 1938, E. W. Renshaw, Assistant Forest Supervisor, Camp Old Hickory, Tenn.

63. Forest Service Regional Office Records, Atlanta, Ga., Lands Division, "History of the Sublimity Forest Community," p. 73. In 1938, 80 free permits were issued to destitute families living in the Cumberland Forest. Several hundred additional holders of residence permits paid a small fee.