contains the most extensive virgin hardwood and red spruce forests in the United States, as well as some of the oldest mountains on Earth. Sixteen peaks in the park are more than 6,000 feet high. The highest is Clingmans Dome, which towers 6,643 feet in southeastern Tennessee. The "smoke" for which both the mountains and the park are named is created by the phenomenal amount of water vapor exhaled by the thick mantle of forests draping the slopes.

In 1926, Congress passed a bill to create the Great Smoky Mountains National Park. Contributions from Tennessee and North Carolina -- along with the federal government, the Laura Spellman Rockefeller Memorial Fund, and pennies from school children -- purchased the thousands of private land parcels from the national park was created. The park was established in 1930, but was not officially dedicated until September 1940. The park straddles the border between Tennessee and North Carolina. It has an area of 516,626 acres.

The Smoky Mountains are part of the southern Appalachian Mountains, uplifted for the first time some 300 million years ago. Many geologists believe the Appalachians were created by the collision of two of the earth's great crustal plates. The compression that resulted from this massive pileup brought to the surface deeply buried rock, some a billion years old. Once the mountains were raised, at one time perhaps as high as 20,000 feet (almost as high as the Himalayas), extensive faulting turned them heels over head until their true history became extremely difficult to determine. Water then went to work on the mountains, sending building-sized boulders down hillsides and carving narrow valleys between tall, steep slopes.

There are about 1,570 species of trees, shrubs and flowering plants growing in the park area -- including almost 130 native trees -- 2,000 different fungi, more than 200 bird species, 48 freshwater fishes, 60 mammals, and 78 kinds of reptiles and amphibians. There are about 600 miles of clear, spring-fed streams, many of which end in roaring falls.

There are approximately 800 miles of hiking and horse tails in the park, including about 70 miles of the Appalachian Trail (a 2,158-mile-long hiking trail that links a chain of states from Maine to Georgia). There are also some beautiful motor routes, including the Newfound Gap Road. In 26 miles, this road climbs from 1,436 feet elevation at the Sugarlands Visitor Center in Tennessee to 5,048 feet at Newfound Gap, then down to about 2,000 feet at Oconaluftee near Cherokee, North Carolina. A spur off this road leads to the summit of Clingmans Dome.

In addition to natural history, the Great Smoky Mountains National Park is rich in human history, represented by one of country's best collections of reconstructed historic buildings.

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National Park Service. www.nps.gov/grsm/

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This page was last updated on 12/27/2009.