This unit is about a promise made by the Federal Government in the 1943 Agreement
to the citizens of Swain County. A promise made and never kept.
The people of The North Shore
area of Fontana Lake were forced to leave their homes because a dam was
needed to produce hydroelectric power. This resulted in the removal
of 1,311 families, of these 600 families were permanent residents of the
area before the construction of the dam began. The TVA felt little
need to help relocate the 711 families who were transients. There
were 163 families removed from the land given to the national park.
Alcoa, an aluminum plant in Tennessee, needed the electricity to produce
products for the war effort of World War II; thus the building of
the Fontana Dam. The removal
took place in Swain County from an area, The North Shore, that was covered
by the Fontana Lake. The citizens of Swain County were promised
in the "43 Agreement" by the U.S. Department of the Interior and the Tennessee
Valley Authority a road with a dustless surface, not less than twenty
feet in width, that would connect Bryson City to Deals Gap, Tennessee.
The road was the exchange to the people for the land taken on the North
Shore and Highway 288 that was submerged due to the construction of the
Fontana Dam.
The proposed road would have provided access
to the twenty-two cemeteries on the north shore of Fontana Lake.
Fifty eight years later the citizens of Swain County have only A
Road to Nowhere. To date, only six miles of
the proposed road has been completed. The road ends at a 1,200 foot
tunnel with a hiking trail at the end of the tunnel. On October
22, 1991, Senator Jesse Helms read into the Congressional Record that
the preservationist worked to halt the road construction because "extreme
cuts and fills and unstable conditions would cause environmental damage."
Senator Helms has long fought for the people of Swain County for the completion
of the road. In 2001 Congressman Charles Taylor appropriated for
Swain County sixteen million dollars for more road construction.
Environmental groups still pursue the blocking of any road being built.
They would like a one time cash settlement for Swain County. Some
people in Swain County feel a road into Tennessee as the government promised
would boost Swain County's economy like highway 441 from Cherokee into
Gatlinburg did for Tennessee, thereby giving the county a much needed
tax base to work from every year. |
. Compliments of Helen Vance
Library
of Congress
|