Ernie Pyle

“ The mountain people live within the shell of their traditional existence, but it is an empty shell. The spirit has gone out of the old log house; an unseen guard stands watch at the door over their liberties. They are gradually leaving.
It is impossible both to retain, and to exhibit publicly, a natural way of living. Two more generations, and the old mountain culture of the Smokies will live only in the museums and the empty log cabins with Government signs on them, and in the schools that teach the newly educated youngsters how to weave and spin and hew as their forefathers did. ”

“ When the Smokies became Government land, a great many people were moved out. But also a great many were left in. Today there are around 400 native mountain people still living in the Tennessee half of the park, probably an equal number on the Carolina side.
But it is hard for them. They are no longer masters of their own souls. His independence is a mountain man’s staff of life, and the reason he was here in the first place.
Today a mountain man in the park dare not go hunting. He can’t even have a gun, unless he’s a trusted old-timer allowed to keep it for sentimental reasons. ”

“ Uncle Steve Whaley is probably the most engaging man in Gatlinburg. He has always lived here; always been a farmer and a trader.
He raised a big family here on the Little Pigeon River, in good mountain fashion. And then, in his middle years, the irresistible flood of human events rolled through the Great Smoky Mountains and tinged everybody’s life with change and Uncle Steve’s life changed too.
Today he is a power in these parts. He owns a big hotel, and lots of other things. He is a business magnate. ”

“ Right now is the peak of the fall color season, and the mountains are aflame with red and yellow and green, and anybody who can see them without some kind of a gladness at being alive must be a dull soul indeed. ”

“ It lies in the mountain man’s absolute refusal to give up his land. Money as such doesn’t mean much to a mountain man. It is land that he values, and craves. Once he has land, he won’t give it up.
As a consequence, outsiders can’t buy land in Gatlinburg. No matter what they offer, the mountain man says, “I don’t want to sell. I wouldn’t have no place to pasture my cow.”
The answer to the second is simply that the mountain men of Tennessee are smart. You can’t make anything else out of it. They’re just natively smart, that’s all. ”

“ Gatlinburg is unique, there’s no question about it. Ten years ago it had a population of 75, and the mountain people just scraped along from one meal to the next.
Today Gatlinburg, thanks to tourists, has a population of 1300 and is rolling in wealth. And what is unique about it—and delightful too—is that the money is going into the pockets of the old original families here, who for so long had almost nothing.
There are now approximately 40 business establishments in town. At least half of them are owned within four families. They are families that have been here for generations. ”

“ They grew up to be a little race distinct. There is no denying that a mountain man is different from a plains or city man. I can’t exactly tell you the difference, but there is something basically rugged in his character that would be nice to have within yourself.
There are old men in these mountains who would feel embarrassed and naked if the long rifle did not rest on its nails in the wall. You can walk into the hills right behind Gatlinburg and still hear even the children saying “hit” for “it,” and “heerd” for “heard.” ”

“ The old-time visitors to Gatlinburg always stayed with Andy Huff at his Mountain View Hotel. But it is no longer an amateur affair. It is a huge place, sitting on a hillside, and they have served as many as 900 meals in a day there.
These four families are numerous with children, as mountain families usually are. As each family’s wealth grows, it is invested in some new business for one of the children.
Mountain children do go away, but somehow they always come back. ”

“ The hotels are staffed by local mountain people, and they have pride and friendliness, clear down to the lowliest charwoman, that wouldn’t permit them to do a shoddy job.
Tourists support almost every one of the 1300 people in Gatlinburg. Nobody is out of work who wants to work. Even the people out in the hills live off the tourists, through their weaving, basketry and woodwork.
We have been in most of the “faddy” places and big tourist centers in America. In not one of them have we seen the plums fall into the laps of the old-time residents of the place. Gatlinburg is the only exception. ”

“ With one exception, it is the only place within the boundaries of the Great Smokies National Park where you can stay all night. And the only way to get up here is to walk or ride a horse.
The Lodge is open about seven months of the year. In winter it gets to 40 below up here, and the buildings lie deep in snow. The hottest they remember it being in summertime is 68, and the people who work here get so used to cool summers that they almost die when they go down to the valley heat of Gatlinburg, a mile below.
The lodge can put up 44 people. They charge $4 a day for room and two meals. ”

“ Today the park is well up among the older western parks in the facilities it has created for the public, such as roads, camp grounds, hiking and horse trails. As far as I can see, every thing has been tastefully done. You have a feeling that the park is “right.”
This year visitors to the park will run more than 800,000. It is open all year, but summer and fall are the big seasons. In June, July and August you can’t even find a place to sleep in Gatlinburg if you arrive late.
PARK IS OVAL SHAPE
The Great Smokies Park is roughly 54 miles long and 19 miles wide at the widest point. ”

“ You can still find leather tanning in the homes, and weaving and spinning, and people who make their own furniture, and think it a sin to tend garden on Sundays.
It was to preserve a little of this for posterity, and also to open up the magnificent scenery of the Smokies to the great taxpaying public, that the Great Smokies National Park was created.
4
It started in 1923, when the states of Tennessee and North Carolina began buying mountain land from the big timber companies. John D. Rockefeller Jr. played an important part. He matched, dollar for dollar, every cent put up by the two states. ”

“ He loves to talk about being an ignorant hillbilly. It gets funnier and funnier as it gradually dawns on you how all-fired smart Uncle Steve really is.
“I was educated at Bear Pen Holler University,” he says. That is his name for the School of Experience. “I don’t know nothin’ about nothin’, very much.”
If a local townsman asks him the population of Gatlinburg, or the number of tourist cabins here, or who plans to do what, Uncle Steve always says “I don’t know.” ”

“ I sat there real still. Soon there was another squirrel. And then another. They were odd little fellows—only half as big as the ordinary squirrel. Later I learned the mountain people call them “boomers.”
One of them walked a fallen log right up to within six feet of me, and sat there on his haunches, eating and staring.
I gave a little whistle. He stared harder. Then I whistled again. And several more times. And maybe you think I didn’t feel silly, and a little thrilled, too, when a bird started answering me. Yessir. I’d whistle, and the bird would whistle right back. ”

“ Le Conte, a couple of weary strangers came around the corner of the lodge.
They asked for succor—for a night’s lodging and a spot of food and a touch of bandage for sore heels—and they got it, in good Smoky Mountain fashion.
They turned out to be two of the nicest strangers who ever came to a mountaintop. They were Cleveland business men, out on a vacation trip. One was John F. Wilson, white-haired general manager of the Equity Savings & Loan Co. The other was Carr Liggett, who has his own advertising agency.
A man who has just climbed a mountain feels a wonderful sense of accomplishment. ”

“ Vegetation is lush, clear to the top of the highest peak. There is no timberline in these mountains. Balsam and spruce grow thick in the upper regions. In summer the rainfall is almost tropical, and in winter heavy snows blanket the trees and slopes into a fairyland. ”

“ He cannot cut down a tree. He dare not cut balsam boughs for an outdoor bed. When a mountain schoolteacher wants to give some of the boys a whuppin’, he has to get a Park Warden to cut the switches for him. ”

“ Four of these five families control Gatlinburg. They reap most of the profit, and they likewise take the responsibility and do the good deeds.
There are four key business establishments in Gatlinburg. They 16 are the three big hotels and the huge general store. The Ogles own the store. And the Huffs, Whaleys and Maples each own a hotel. And every one of the four, in addition owns numerous tourist courts, filling stations, gift shops, saddle-horse concessions, restaurants. ”

“ Many a slick fellow has arrived here, expecting to buy out these easy marks for nothing or sign them up on a trick lease. But in every case, they say, the smart fellow has left town without his own shirt. ”

“ You know those little two-pronged stickers that come off onto your clothes by the hundreds when you walk through the weeds in the fall. In Indiana we always called them Spanish needles. Here in the mountains they call them “beggar’s lice.”
‘HEARTS-A-BUSTIN’ WITH LOVE’
Miss Laura Thornburgh lives in Gatlinburg and loves the Smokies so much she’s written a book about them. ”