User:Orlady/Walton Road

In 1799 the Tennessee state legislature appropriated $1000 to build a road suitable for wagon travel from Southwest Point (near present day Kingston in Roane County) to Middle Tennessee. Built between 1799 and 1802, the road was over one hundred miles long and twelve to fifteen feet wide. Captain William Walton, an important settler in Smith County, surveyed the road. Due to his extensive involvement with its construction, the road came to be known as Walton's Road or the Walton Road (Boniol 1971:406-407). The 1799 act stipulated that the collection of tolls would refund the state's original contribution. Thus, in 1801 the state appointed five men to form the Cumberland Turnpike Company to collect the tolls. A traveler wrote the following description of the roadway in 1802: "It is as broad and commodious as those in the environs of Philadelphia....Little boards, painted black and nailed upon the trees indicate to travelers the distance they have to go" (Tennessee 1959:9). The corridor of the Walton Road evolved into State Route 24/U.S. 70-North and only a few remnants of the original road remain. In 1931, in response to a request by the Old Walton Road Association, the state legislature officially named U.S. 70-North from Carthage (in Smith County and home of William Walton) to Kingston the Old Walton Road (Boniol 1971:412). -- http://www.tdot.state.tn.us/environment/historic/book/chapter2.pdf (page 6 of 132 in PDF)

Cherokee Oak, Putnam County Nominated by Rebecca Gay Lane and Patrick Haller Added in 2008

The old white oak (Quercus alba) stands on the Old Walton Road, one of only two known roads in Middle Tennessee that 19th-century pioneers used as wagon roads. (The other road was the Chattanooga-McMinnville Road.) The Old Walton Road ran between Brotherton and Buck Mountain and became part of the Trail of Tears route in 1830.

According to local legend a full blooded Cherokee woman, Frances Hammock, escaped from soldiers after her wagon broke down by hiding in a cave nearby. She later married Isaac Swallows, and they made their home in Brotherton. Their union would result in hundreds of descendants in the Upper Cumberlands, many of them who live there today.

The tree also became a regular resting site for the famous Willis Hyder, one of the last U.S. mail horseback carriers, and was featured in a 1947 Nashville Tennessean article. Hyder and his horses carried the mail on his 26-mile route from 1908 until his retirement in the early 1950s. -- http://www.tufc.com/registries.html#p7HGMpc_2_4

http://www.hmsoa.org/counties/item/72731-the-walton-road