2009 ShaConage Newsletter - Friends of the Smokies

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from the FriendsBY JIM HART, PRESIDENTAs 2009 draws to a close, Iam reflecting back fondly on thepark’s yearlong 75thAnniversary celebration. It hasbeen an amazing success interms of raising unprecedentedsupport, and raising awarenessof both the park’s beauty and itschallenges.Superintendent DaleDitmanson and his entire staffworked tirelessly for two yearspreparing for the celebration. Asthe celebration got underway,the April 24th Governor’s Proclamation at Clingman’s Dome, theJune 13th performance by the Knoxville Symphony Orchestra inCades Cove, the June 15th groundbreaking at OconalufteeVisitors Center; and the September 2nd Rededication atNewfound Gap were enjoyable and tremendously well-organizedevents. They seemed to move along effortlessly, but requiredHerculean efforts by many. All of us at Friends of the Smokiesthank Superintendent Ditmanson, 75th Anniversary CoordinatorAnn Froschauer, and all of the park’s employees and volunteersfor the pride and dedication they demonstrated throughout the75th Anniversary celebration.A huge word of thanks goes to Dolly Parton and Dollywood.As the official 75th Anniversary ambassador, Dolly broughtinternational attention to the historic celebration. Her love ofthese mountains is pure and undeniable. She captures the sentimentsthat so many of us feel about the Smokies in her song“My Mountains, My Home”; she wrote- “These are my mountains,my valleys, these are my rivers flowing like a song. Theseare my people, my memories. These are my mountains; this ismy home.” (You can hear this song on her CD “Sha-Kon-O-Hey! Land of Blue Smoke”; see cover story for purchase locations).The 75th Anniversary year brought about a special partnershipbetween the Great Smoky Mountains National Park andDollywood. More than $225,000 has been raised so far throughsales of the “Sha-Kon-O-Hey!” CDs and the special May 9thpremier of the musical “Sha-Kon-O-Hey! Land of Blue Smoke”.Dolly and Dollywood demonstrated tremendous leadership intheir support of the 75th Anniversary, helping to emphasize thepositive economic impact that the Smokies’ visitors have on thesurrounding communities.Our generous 75th Anniversary sponsors also deserve specialrecognition; their contributions of more than $263,000helped support the 75th anniversary activities. (See list on page7.) Additionally, the Knoxville News Sentinel donated in-kindadvertising support in excess of $65,000 in 2009.As we move forward into 2010, our challenge is to keep thismomentum going, to continue to emphasize Great SmokyMountains National Park as a place of beauty that is worth preservingand protecting for the next 75 years- and beyond. Thankyou for your faithful and generous membership support, for yourpurchase of our Tennessee and North Carolina license plates, foryour gifts of volunteer time and financial resources. It all addsto up to the fact that Friends of the Smokies makes a differencein Great Smoky Mountains National Park!© Don McGowanfor the ParkBY DALE DITMANSON, SUPERINTENDENTWhen the staff and partners ofGreat Smoky Mountains NationalPark set out to celebrate the Park’s75th Anniversary we set our sightson a celebration of our past and afocus on stewardship for our future.I could not be more pleased withthe “Celebration of the Past” whichhas taken place in and around thePark. Through a series of specialevents and media coverage, a greatmany stories have been told aboutthe Park’s creation, its natural andcultural resources and, most importantly,its people. The Smokies hasbeen the focus of worldwide newscoverage, due in part to the participation of Dolly Parton as thePark’s 75th Anniversary Ambassador. Dolly brought theanniversary tremendous visibility, but even more, she personifiedthe love and connection that people feel for the Great SmokyMountains.We have reconnected with many of those families who sacrificedtheir land, their homes, and neighbors to make way forthe Park’s creation. We have spent time with CivilianConservation Corps “boys” who talk with pride about how theybuilt much of the Park’s recognizable infrastructure. We haveworked with our partners and with all neighboring cities andcounties to plan the in-park events and to link the Park’s anniversaryto a multitude of community events throughout the year.Reconnecting with those who lived on the land and hearingthe stories of their sacrifice, and of the determination and philanthropyof supporters of the Park’s creation, has set the stage for alegacy of stewardship of the Park’s resources. In recognition ofthe Park’s 75th Anniversary, we have embarked upon two keylegacy projects with our partners, the Friends of the Smokies andGreat Smoky Mountains Association. They have teamed up tofund and construct a new, environmentally sustainable visitorOconaluftee Visitor Center near Cherokee, N.C. The exhibitsbeing developed with Friends funding will focus on the Park’scultural stories beginning with Native American heritage andcontinuing through the periods of settlement, logging and mining,and the creation of the National Park. We plan to open thedoors in early 2011. We are also making steady progress inworking with the Friends to establish a $4 million “TrailsForever” endowment to fund a permanent expansion of our trailcrews to upgrade the condition of our trails.We still face many challenges: Air pollution continues toimpact the Park’s vistas, as well as the health of forests, streams,and wildlife. A succession of non-native plants and diseases suchas the hemlock woolly adelgid is threatening the Park’s internationallyrenowned biodiversity. Many of the Park’s historicstructures are in need of preservation, traffic congestion continuesto impact visitor enjoyment in Cades Cove, and the Park’sinvaluable collection of artifacts needs a permanent home. Wealso need to be prepared to connect with visitors in a changingworld through new media, education, and ranger-led programsand to invest in updating facilities for environmental educationopportunities at Great Smoky Mountains Institute at Tremont.Great Smoky Mountains National Park has strong partnersand generous dedicated neighbors who are advocating for criticalresources, so despite these obstacles I am reassured after seeingthe outpouring of support for the Park’s anniversary year. I feelthat the will and the tools will be there so that the Smokies willbe protected and enjoyed for generations to come.NPS2is produced by Friends of Great Smoky Mountains National Park and is published three times a year.Phone: (800) 845-5665 | e-mail: fotshb@bellsouth.net | www.FriendsOfTheSmokies.org | Editor: Holly Scott
75TH ANNIVERSARY REDEDICATION EVENTBy Holly ScottOn September 2, 2009, more than 2,500 people gathered atNewfound Gap for the rededication of Great SmokyMountains National Park. Onstage were Secretary of theInterior Ken Salazar, Chief Michell Hicks of the EasternBand of Cherokee, and Superintendent Dale Ditmanson,among many other politicians and dignitaries, but all eyeswere on Dolly Parton. Before her unforgettable performance,complete with mists rising from the Sugarlands Valleylike an enormous natural fog machine, there were movingspeeches and prayers emphasizing the importance of beinggood stewards of the bounty of natural resources in GreatSmoky Mountains National Park. Senator LamarAlexander’s comments were particularly meaningful, andwe wanted to share them with our Friends.Friends Board Chair Mark Williams, Superintendent Dale Ditmanson,North Carolina Representative Heath Shuler, United States InteriorSecetary Ken Salazar.Jack WilliamsJack WilliamsJack WilliamsStatement of U.S. Senator Lamar Alexander at the75th Anniversary of the Great Smoky Mountains National Park“Governors Bredesen and Perdue, Secretary Salazar, Dolly Parton, my colleagues inCongress, fellow friends of the Smokies, in 1934 a ranger wrote a memo identifying thewildlife he had found in this new park. There were 100 black bears. Today there are1,600. There were 315 wild turkeys then. The other day I saw 21 outside my home twomiles from the park boundary. 75 years ago there were 12 whitetail deer in Tennesseeand six in North Carolina. Today they’re everywhere. Then there were no peregrinefalcons, no river otters, no elk in the Great Smokies, but they are all here today.25 years ago, as Governor, I spoke at the 50th anniversary. There was no law then controllingacid rain and no organization called ‘Friends of the Smokies.’ Today, acid rainlaws are working and the ‘Friends’ have contributed $28 million.So what should we hope for as we look to the 100th anniversary? I hope we have finishedcleaning the air so that, instead of seeing smog, we can always see the blue hazeabout which the Cherokee sang; and that we will have done more to celebrate the wayof life of families who lived here; that we will have become better students of theremarkable environmental diversity here—more different kinds of trees than in all ofEurope, new species discovered every year; that we do a better job of creating picturesqueentrances and encouraging conservation easements along the park boundariesto protect the wildlife and the magnificent views. And I hope there are more privatecontributions and federal dollars to protect and maintain one of the dozen most visitedplaces in the world.India has its Taj Mahal, Italy has its art, England its history, but we have the GreatAmerican Outdoors. Ken Burns says our national parks are ‘America’s Best Idea.’ Well,then the Great Smokies must be the very best idea of all because so many more peoplecome here.Dolly performing her closing song.75th Anniversary CoordinatorAnn Froschauer with DollyParton.Jack WilliamsJust as remarkable, I believe, is how we who live here feel about the park. We feel likewe own it because our families did. We love it because we grew up hiking here oradopted it as home. And we are proud we gave this park to the country for others toenjoy.The psalmist wrote, ‘I will lift up mine eyes unto the hills.’ There are 151 cemeteries inthe Great Smokies, usually on a hilltop, closer to God. The headstones face eastbecause, as mountaineers will tell you, ‘You don’t want to have your back to Jesuswhen he comes again.’There was a reverential feeling among the thousands who came to Cades Cove on abeautiful Sunday afternoon in June to hear fiddles imitate bagpipes as the KnoxvilleSymphony played ‘Amazing Grace.’ At the 50th anniversary, I tried to explain that feelingthis way: ‘These mountains . . . Blount County . . . my home . . . are where I enjoybeing, where I swap people for nature and feel closer to God . . . when I am here, ithelps get the rest of my life in a little better order.’That is why I celebrate the 75th anniversary of the Great Smoky Mountains NationalPark.”Elder Jerry Wolfe performing a Cherokee blessing.3
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2009 ShaConage Newsletter - Friends of the Smokies

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