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August 2009 Update |
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Wednesday, 19 August 2009 |
August TPA Update August 17, 2009
************* September First Sunday Hike: Rhyolite and Vista
** Ongoing Studies: Boone Country and St. Mary's
** Membership in the TPA: Now is a Really Good Time ** So, You Want to Suggest a First Sunday Hike
********************************** [We are obliged to MyTopo.com for providing us with Terrain Navigator Pro, the mini-GIS system we use when we need quick and easy mapping using USGS, orthographic or even Google maps. As usual, clicking on an image should enlarge it in a separate browser window. Enjoy]
[We are obliged to MyTopo.com for providing us with Terrain Navigator Pro, the mini-GIS system we use when we need quick and easy mapping using USGS, orthographic or even Google maps. As usual, clicking on an image should enlarge it in a separate browser window. Enjoy] September First Sunday Hike: Rhyolite on Red Mountain We will meet at the foot of Red Mountain in Mount Tirzah, NC at 2 PM on September  6th for the first hike of the new First Sunday Hike season. It is a bit of a drive and worth every bit of it. At Mount Tirzah, atop Red Mountain is one of the largest rhyolite quarries in the southeast. The entire mountaintop is an exposed volcanic extrusion a good part of which is rhyolite, the stone used most for tool making by Native Americans of the southeast. Some of you will have been here before and will recall the natural beauty and the owner's hospitality. Bernard Clayton, owner of the land has invited us back to his place to enjoy picking through the debitage that litters the mountain top. The scattered stone flakes and the occasional broken point left on the mountain top by generations of Native American knappers holds excitement for many. This quarry sits right next to what we believe to be the earliest channel and the high road of the Trading Path to the Catawba. Until recently, nearby we could visit the only site we've thus far found where you could actually see a packhorse road diverge or merge with its replacement wagon road. Development on the mountain is happening fast and these vestiges of the original importance of the site are fast disappearing. Join us in enjoying them while we can.  To find his place click here or just go to Google Maps and type in Mount Tirzah, NC. On the day of the hike we'll have signs placed at the store at Mount Tirzah pointing to parking and the trail head. The trudge up the hill can be wearisome but for those who have trudged their last serious trudge, we can drive all the way if necessary. The ground is rough and unimproved, so wear sturdy shoes. There will be no shade so bring water and a hat. To the right is an example of debitage from the site and also a view of some point-hunters on Red Mountain that should give you some idea of the terrain, though there should be a bit more ground cover and the wind-rowed slash is probably reduced to spongy soil by now.- This site is one of our first finds and remains a favorite for no other reason than it has the most spectacular view of the Piedmont. Plan on hanging out after the hike and enjoy some refreshments over at Mr. Clayton's restored 18th century house. His family built it and he restored it. We believe it to be the site of the first Post Office granted to NC after the Revolutionary War. The local real estate developer had provided invaluable assistance to General Greene during the 1781 Southern Campaign and we believe the grant of a Post Office was no mere coincidence. As noted above, we've visited this site in the past and can certify it is worth a few hours of your life to visit this sacred land. ** Ongoing Studies: Boone Country The Yadkin Historical Fair came and went and a good time was had by all. Perhaps the most enjoyable aspect of the event was learning in preparation for it. We haven't spent much time in the mountains and this was a chance to begin thinking about movement over that terrain. We found that in the mountains "gaps" serve the role reserved to fords in the Piedmont; they are the geopolitical chokepoints. Roads and trails and paths went from gap to gap when not hewing to the valley floor in the great valleys of the Clinch, Powell, Holston , or Watauga River. We now know that there are saddle gaps and there are water gaps, and we know that most gaps aren't even noted on USGS maps. We haven't learned yet what criteria must be met to become a named gap. As the map to left makes abundantly clear, the Clinch River was not a valley one wanted to follow anywhere. It is configured like a snake with a bellyache. So, one would want to get over and away from that stream as quickly as possible. The trick to figuring out the Clinch country will be to identify fords and their associated gaps. The map indicates that, like so many mountain streams, the Clinch River is shoaly and susceptible to fording in many places, so what ford was used will probably boil down to which gaps to the north and south of the river were most attractive. Slowly we're learning the imperatives of premodern travel. We still need to learn the earmarks of gaps attractive to people afoot, using horse, or hauling wagons. Like fords, different gaps will obviously be more or less attractive to different modes of transport. What we don't know is still a target rich environment. There is a new entry what we're learning about "Gaps" in the Beaten Paths Blog
** St. Mary's Chapel and Road We've spent a large part of this summer trying to unravel why St. Mary's is where it is and why it isn't more than it is. St. Mary's is an 18th century Anglican chapel site about five miles east-northeast of Hillsborough along St. Mary's Road, conventionally known as the Trading Path. Clearly, in the 1750s somebody thought the location was strong enough to warrant one erecting one of three Anglican churches in a new, frontier county. Then nothing happened. We've found numerous old roads vectoring in on the site of the old chapel. Why didn't that intersection become a town center? Did 'smart money' bet wrong? In the process of coming to grips with the terrain embedding the chapel, we have found at least three earlier routes of St. Mary's Road, starting with a ridge road version that bypassed or cutting high in their courses all the streams flowing into the Eno and Buckquarter Creek from the north. We have concluded that Synnott's 18th century tavern was most likely near the 19th century site of Hardscrabble plantation. And we have surmised and found sufficient remnant artifacts to give us confidence to assert the course of what was according to local lore either the "post road to Virginia" or "the road to Roxboro." We think it was both. We'll finish the work on St. Mary Chapel and Road in September.
** Membership in the TPA To initiate or renew your membership in the TPA, we now offer the following three options: Option 1: You can renew using your credit card via the Triangle Communities Foundation at: www.trianglecf.org Option 2: You can click the "Donate Now" button on the right side of the screen, and that will take you to PayPal, a secure transaction site. You'll be asked a few questions to create an account so as to protect your sensitive information, and then you'll be able to donate using a credit card or other vehicle. Option 3: The membership form can be downloaded from the website and sent in to the address below with your payment. Thanks for your continued support! **
So, you want to suggest a First Sunday Hike.....
Please, if you want to suggest a First Sunday Hike, there are a few points to bear in mind that will make preparing the hike a lot easier. For example: - We need to know the names and contact information for all property owners that will be affected,
- The site needs sufficient parking for a dozen or more cars,
- The hike needs artifact content, historic merit, something to trigger the hikers' imaginations; we need a description of the site,
- There needs to be a passable route suitable for hikers of all ages,
- The route should be less than two miles long, depending on artifact content. That is, the more there is to see, the shorter should be the hike.
- The trail head needs to be accessible without heroic driving.
If you have difficulty reading the our mailings... If your TPA newsletter is somehow illegible or readable only with great difficulty, please, let us know by phone or email. There is a tendency for most of us to presume that internet traffic problems originate in our machine. The TPA makes every attempt to preview and proof what we mail but we are dependent on at least two software and service providers to make each of these mailings and we can induce errors in a dozen different ways. The only way we know there are problems is when a friend lets us know. Please, be that friend.
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- As a "Road Scholar" for the NC Humanities Council, Tom will go anywhere in the state of North Carolina to speak on transportation and migration in the colonial backcountry of the southeast. Paid for with grants from the Humanities Council (www.nchumanities.org), these talks must be open to the public, so we'll announce here and on our website (under "Events") whenever we have a talk scheduled. Kindly notify the hosting organization of your intent to attend. trm |
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Last Updated ( Friday, 11 December 2009 )
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