Regardless of how small the Internet sometimes makes the world feel, reality is quick to remind us of its enormity: like with this 100-year-old abandoned town, which a hiker recently re-discovered within the Great Smoky Mountains National Park in Tennessee.
Few things are cooler than seeing the true power of nature, particularly when it wins battles against what we humans have done since we started turning everything into stuff for us. And hiker/abandoned place enthusiast Jordan Liles got a first-hand look at such business when he was hiking in the Elkmont section of the park, taking an old, unused road to a hidden gem: the disintegrating remains of the town and subsequent hotel that brought visitors to the now-abandoned area.
The town of Elkmont began as a lumber outpost, harvesting trees and transporting them down the Little River to mill the trees over in neighboring Townsend. The Little River Railroad Company — the folks that did the log transporting after the waterways method was axed — brought logging operations employees to the town and resulted in the construction of a fancy hotel and rich folk summer houses. There was even a section of the town called “Millionaires’ Row.”
But once the railroad skipped town, well, so did all the people. The Wonderland Hotel ran what was left of the place as a resort until it was purchased in the 1930′s by the New Smoky Mountain National Park, but the town itself vanished long before.
Liles was so thrilled at the discovery that he even took an in-depth video of his findings. I mean really in-depth, it’s 23 minutes long. The video includes original images of the town and hotel juxtaposed to its current state.
While the hotel itself remained operational until 1992 but the town lost its inhabitants well before then.
“About a mile up an unnamed gravel road inside Great Smoky Mountains National Park,” Liles explained on his site, “is the back way into an abandoned neighborhood and hotel, some of which was originally constructed more than 100 years ago. In the fully edited film below, ‘Tennessee Wonderland,’ I explore the houses and the remains of what was once referred to as the Wonderland Club.”
So next time you’re jaunting around the Great Smoky Mountains National Park, you know where you’re going, don’t you? Then again, why not explore different areas of the country—you never know when you’ll find an abandoned town of your own.
No Comments