Tennessee Overhill

08/31/2026

Overhill Stories: The Old Line Railroad

Winding through the Hiwassee River Gorge, the Old Line Railroad has carried more than trains through the Tennessee Overhill. For more than a century, it has connected communities, supported industry, and shaped the landscape and history of southeastern Tennessee.

The railroad was built in 1890 as part of an effort to create a rail connection between Knoxville, Tennessee, and Marietta, Georgia. One of its most recognizable features, the Hiwassee Loop, was completed in 1898 around Bald Mountain in Polk County. Together with a distinctive section of track in Georgia known as the “Hook,” the Loop helped earn the railroad the nickname “Hook and Eye.” Today, the Loop remains one of the best-known landmarks along the route.

The Louisville & Nashville Railroad took control of the route in 1902. A few years later, L&N constructed a flatter, more direct route between the Etowah area and Marietta. Railroad employees began referring to the newer route as the “New Line” and the original mountain route as the “Old Line,” names that have continued for more than a century. Construction of the New Line also led to the development of Etowah as a major railroad center and planned community.

The Old Line continued serving the copper mines, marble quarries, and other industries of the region for decades. When CSX announced plans to abandon the Etowah-to-Copperhill portion of the railroad in 2001, local governments, organizations, and concerned citizens formed the Old Line Railroad Coalition to preserve it. In 2002, the Tennessee Overhill Heritage Association purchased the line with financing from Glenn Springs Holdings, helping secure an important piece of the region’s transportation history.

Repairs and rehabilitation followed, and the railroad eventually returned to passenger service. Today, the Old Line carries visitors through the Historic District of Reliance, along the Hiwassee Scenic River, through the Cherokee National Forest, around the Hiwassee Loop, and toward Copperhill as part of the Hiwassee River Rail Adventure. A 19-mile section between Reliance and Farner was placed on the National Register of Historic Places in 2007.

Want to learn more about the railroad that helped shape the Tennessee Overhill? Our next Gems of the Past: Overhill Histories will be Thursday, September 3, featuring former Tennessee Overhill Director Linda Caldwell presenting on the Old Line Railroad. The program begins at 7:00 p.m. at the Gem Theater in Etowah.

Image: ‘The Loop on the L. & N. Railroad, near Tennessee-Georgia line,’ c. 1930–1945. Published by The Asheville Post Card Co. Courtesy of the Boston Public Library, Tichnor Brothers Collection. Public domain.

08/30/2026

Sundays At Our Overhill Table
Sunday, August 30

This week, we are doing something a little different and heading to Legends & Lore Pizzeria in Madisonville for two of their more unusual creations: pickle pizza and apple pizza.

Neither is a traditional Appalachian dish, but both use flavors that have long had a place in kitchens across the region. Pickling was an important way to preserve garden produce, while apples were dried, cooked into preserves, made into apple butter, and used in familiar desserts like fried pies and stack cake.

Legends & Lore takes those familiar flavors in a completely different direction. Their pickle pizza is topped with garlic-infused pickles and plenty of melted cheese. The combination is rich, tangy, garlicky, and much better than it probably has any right to be.

Then there is the apple pizza, topped with apples, a crumb topping, icing, and caramel. It is part pizza and part apple dessert, and it is absolutely delicious.

We like finding places across the Tennessee Overhill that are willing to have a little fun with food, and Legends & Lore Pizzeria certainly does that. These may not be traditional Appalachian recipes, but they are a good example of familiar flavors finding new places at the local table.

Check out their menu here: https://www.legendsandlorepizza.com/menu

Photo Credit: Tennessee Overhill Heritage Association

08/27/2026

Tennessee Overhill is helping spread the word about an upcoming opportunity to clear out some clutter while keeping hard-to-recycle materials out of the landfill.

The Tennessee Environmental Council will host its Cleveland Recycling Roundup on Saturday, September 12, from 9:00 a.m. to 1:00 p.m. at Walker Valley High School, 750 Lauderdale Memorial Highway NW in Cleveland. The event is free and open to everyone, regardless of where you live. You do not have to be a Bradley County resident to participate. A suggested donation of $10 to $20 helps support TEC’s sustainability programs.

Bring items that can be difficult to recycle through normal household collection, including electronics, Styrofoam, scrap metal, clothing and shoes, glass, medical and pet supplies, ink cartridges, small batteries, mattresses, tires, and bottle lids.

This is a convenient way to clean out your home as summer winds down while helping reduce waste in our region. Volunteers are also needed to help make the event a success, with opportunities available for both individuals and groups.

Find the full list of accepted items and event details here: https://tectn.org/get-involved/recycling-roundups/cleveland-recycling-roundup/

Volunteer here: https://volunteer.bloomerang.co/volunteer/ #/join-party?k=9hx0wxrqcehqnh

Please help Tennessee Overhill and the Tennessee Environmental Council spread the word by sharing this event with friends, family, and neighbors throughout our region.

08/27/2026

Written of This Place
Thursday, August 27

Today we return with words from Dolly Parton, a voice born in the mountains of East Tennessee and carried far beyond them.

“I can see the light of a clear blue morning.”

Dolly Parton, “Light of a Clear Blue Morning, 1977”

Tennessee lost its brightest voice this week. Dolly belonged to the Smokies, but the faith, music, and mountain traditions that shaped her are familiar across the Tennessee Overhill. She carried those things with her into the wider world and, in doing so, carried East Tennessee with her.

For generations here, old hymns and gospel songs have given people words for sorrow and for the hope of morning after darkness. Dolly sang from that same tradition.

This week, we remember a Tennessee daughter whose voice reached far beyond these mountains, but never seemed to leave them behind.

May she now rest in the light of a clear blue morning.

Editor's Note: For anyone feeling the weight of this week and in need of something uplifting, that gospel tradition will be heard in Etowah this evening. The Original “Battle of Songs” begins at 7 p.m. at the Gem Theater, featuring The McKameys and Jeff Tolbert and Primitive Road. https://www.itickets.com/events/486232.html

Photo Credit: Briana Pagdon

08/26/2026

This installment of Gems of the Past: Overhill Histories features Dr. Brett Riggs presenting “When the Revolution Came to Great Hiwassee,” an examination of the impact of the American Revolution on Great Hiwassee and the people who lived there.

Riggs explores this important period in Tennessee Overhill history, examining how the events of the Revolution affected Great Hiwassee and its inhabitants.

Recorded July 16, 2026, at the historic Gem Theater in Etowah, Tennessee.

Watch the full lecture on YouTube here: https://youtu.be/siMvYgz3UAA

Videography and editing by Drayton Blackgrove of Delay In Block Productions

Dr. Brett Riggs presents “When the Revolution Came to Great Hiwasse...

08/25/2026

She came from a little cabin
beneath the Great Smoky Mountains.
And somehow,
she made the whole world feel like home.
She carried Tennessee in her voice.
In her stories.
In her kindness.
In every song she ever sang.
She showed the world our mountains.
Our music.
Our humor.
Our heart.
And no matter how far she went,
she never really left.
Because Dolly belonged to the world.
But she was always ours.
Today, Tennessee feels a lot quieter.
The mountains, a little emptier.
But we know her voice will echo here forever.
We will always love you, Dolly.

Photo: Alan Mayor

08/25/2026

We at the Tennessee Overhill are heartbroken to hear this news. The world won't be the same without Dolly Parton.

08/23/2026

Written of This Place
Saturday, August 22

I know I used a passage from Emma Bell Miles in the last Written of This Place, but I am still reading through her journal entries, and they are a treasure trove of poetic naturalism. Again and again, she finds language for the small sounds and lives that make up the Southern Appalachian landscape.

“Piano-tinkle of drip on pool. Delicate silvery nocturnes of the frogs.”

Emma Bell Miles
Once I Too Had Wings: The Journals of Emma Bell Miles, 1908–1918
May 24, 1908

Miles wrote these few lines during a Sunday at an old farm in Summertown, where a deserted log house stood in its orchard. Her entry is brief: water dripping into a pool, frogs calling nearby. Yet she hears them together as music, turning the sound of frogs into “silvery nocturnes.”

Her words were written on Walden’s Ridge, west of the Tennessee Overhill, but the sound she heard is familiar here. Among the frogs that inhabit Tennessee are the Gray Treefrog and Cope’s Gray Treefrog, two species so similar in appearance that they cannot reliably be distinguished by sight alone. It is their voices that tell them apart.

My wife and I were lucky enough to come across this little frog while walking the Eureka Trail in Englewood. Against the weathered wood of the railing, its mottled body nearly disappeared into the grain. It would have been easy to pass by without ever noticing it. But when evening comes, frogs like these become part of the sound of a Tennessee summer, their calls moving from the trees and woods around us.

Miles paid close attention to these small presences, giving space in her writing to lives and sounds that might otherwise pass unnoticed. My wife and I try to pay that same homage to the often overlooked lives of the Overhill, whether they move through the trees, fly through the air, swim beneath the water, or simply rest beside the trails we walk. It is an attention to place that we hope to pass on to our daughter, so that she too learns to notice the natural beauty of our world wherever she may be.

P.S. If you too would like to read her journals, I will share a link to purchase a copy in the comments.

Photo Credit: Briana Pagdon

08/20/2026

This installment of Gems of the Past: Overhill Histories features Eric Hughey, site manager of Fort Loudoun State Historic Park, sharing the history of one of the Tennessee Overhill’s most significant eighteenth-century sites.

Built in 1756 during the French and Indian War, Fort Loudoun stood in Cherokee country and became part of a complex period of diplomacy, trade, alliance, and conflict between the British and the Cherokee. Hughey explores that history and the events that led to the fort’s surrender in 1760.

Recorded July 2, 2026, at the historic Gem Theater in Etowah, Tennessee.

Watch the full lecture on YouTube below.

Videography and editing by Drayton Blackgrove of Delay In Block Productions.

This installment of Gems of the Past: Overhill Histories Lecture Se...