The Tennessee River, the TVA, and the Coming of Norris Dam

Once called the Cherokee River, the Tennessee is today a tamed river. The TVA did that. In the northeastern part of the state, the Clinch, French Broad, Holston, Nolichucky, Powell, and Watauga Rivers, and many streams and creeks add their waters to the Tennessee River. As the river rolls down through the Great Valley of Tennessee, it gains more water from the Little Tennessee and Ocoee Rivers.

Just below Chattanooga the river was really rough and wild. There we find these places in the river with delightful names that indicate their wildness and the perils that went with them; the Suck, Boiling Pot, Skillet, and Pan.

Then the river crossed the state line and entered Alabama, and looping westward gaining more water from the Elk River, then flowing on to Muscle Shoals and soon turning north and back into Tennessee, gaining even more water from the Duck River, and flowing into Kentucky and then adding its waters into the Ohio River.

During the Civil War, the Yankees could bring their steamboats up the Tennessee only as far as Tuscumbia and Florence Alabama - they were stopped from going further by Muscle Shoals. It is not surprising then that consideration was given to doing something about Muscle Shoals.

On 21 March 1898, long after the light bulb was invented, Alabama Representative Joe Wheeler introduced in Congress, legislation asking for “consent for the erection and operation, by an Alabama company, of a hydroelectric project at Muscle Shoals.” That effort failed. Thereafter, every session of Congress had legislation submitted dealing with Muscle Shoals. In 1903 Congress authorized the Hales Bar Dam to be built below Chattanooga. That dam and it locks were finished in 1913. Later the Wilson Dam at Muscle Shoals was built, however, the Muscle Shoals Project was not then completed.

World War I, followed by the roaring twenties, allowed Congress to argue over both the need to manage the Tennessee, how to do it, and who should pay for it.

United States Senator George W. Norris of Nebraska came forward with a proposal in 1928 to include the construction of a large storage dam on the Clinch River. This dam was to be known as the Cove Creek Dam. The proposal failed.

Then came the stock market crash in October 1929, followed by the Great Depression. Congress took a closer look.

Senator Norris again proposed the plan that the river be dammed to prevent flooding, produce electricity, and rebuild the eroded farmland. Finally on 18 May 1933, Congress passed the TVA Act which established the Tennessee Valley Authority as a federal corporation (48 Stat. 58). Senator Norris was the chief author of the 1933 act. The act authorized the TVA to control the multipurpose development of the Tennessee River. TVA’s the first dam was named Norris Dam, replacing the name originally designated name, Cove Creek.

Norris Dam is located on the Clinch down river from Union County at the Anderson-Campbell county line. The waters of the dam backed up into Union County, flooding the Clinch River Valley and the Powell River Valley.

The major effects of this flooding were, the loss of taxable farm land, the loss of fertile bottom land, and the displacement of the residents who lived on those lands. Additionally, many low lying cemeteries were relocated.

To be continued . . .