Tennessee's Cumberland Mountain State Park
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It's hard to believe, but in the early 1900s this area was more or less
uninhabited. Cumberland Mountain State Park was built in the 1930s and
40s by the Civilian Conservation Corps to provide recreation for the
250 or so families that were homesteaded in this area. Less than a mile
from the entrance to the park is the Tennessee Homestead Museum. We
didn't get to see it this trip (this was pretty much a working trip for
Rebecca and David's wedding), but we will be back, since they are
getting married at the park!
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The real claim to fame of this park is the largest masonry structure
built by the CCC: the Byrd Creek Dam. This is a good sized dam (we are
still looking for the specs) built to impound Byrd Lake for the park,
and includes a bridge. No hydro-power, but there should have been. Well,
it had rained the day we were there so maybe the flow was up a little,
but it looked like it would have been good for a few kilowatts or so.
This is a view of the "Mill Lodge", a group cabin good for 16
folks, with the dam in the background. See the
Byrd Creek Dam page for some more
pictures.
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The park's office building is being remodeled... it looked like it had
burned. They are in a temporary office in a trailer set up across the
parking lot behind this building.
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This is one of the "deluxe" cabins which we stayed in. They
have two different flavors of "rustic" cabins, and a few
duplex cabins, in addition to four more group lodges besides the
aforementioned Mill Lodge. The duplexes do not have fireplaces, but all
the rest do (real firewood, and its free!).
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Well, we didn't get to visit the Homestead Museum, but we did get to
"see" it. We took this shot of the building as we were leaving
Sunday morning.
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