Holston River

The Holston River is a 136-mile (219-kilometre) river that flows from Kingsport, Tennessee, to Knoxville, Tennessee. Along with its three major forks (North Fork, Middle Fork and South Fork), it comprises a major river system that drains much of northeastern Tennessee, southwestern Virginia, and northwestern North Carolina. The Holston's confluence with the French Broad River at Knoxville marks the beginning of the Tennessee River.

History

Maps by early French explorers in this area identified what is now known as the Holston River as the "Cherokee River", after the tribe they encountered. The United States settlers and army fought with the Cherokee over land in Tennessee, North Carolina, and further South into Georgia and Alabama. In the 1830s the government forced the Cherokee out on the Trail of Tears to Indian Territory (now Oklahoma), under the authority of the Indian Removal Act passed by Congress in 1830.

Early Tennessee historian and Tennessee Supreme Court Justice John Haywood cites in his 1823 book "The civil and political history of the state of Tennessee from its earliest settlement up to the year 1796, including the boundaries of the state" that the Holston River was identified and named on earlier produced French maps as the "Cherokee River".^[5] British colonists later named the Holston River after pioneer Stephen Holstein, a European-American settler who built a cabin in 1746 on the upper reaches of the river.^[6] Similarly, Holston Mountain was named after the Holston River.

The North Fork of the river was polluted by the "Muck Dam" break in Saltville, Virginia on December 24, 1924, which allowed the release of a huge volume of liquid chemical waste stored there by the Mathieson Alkali Company, taking the lives of nineteen people who lived along the river.^[7] The river remained polluted and virtually dead for several decades afterward.^{[8][9][10][11]}

Course

The North Fork flows 138 miles (222 km) southwest from Sharon Springs in Bland County, Virginia. The Middle Fork flows 56.5 miles (90.9 km) from near the western border of Wythe County, Virginia, joining the South Fork in Washington County, Virginia, southeast of Abingdon. The South Fork rises near Sugar Grove in Smyth County and flows 112 miles (180 km) southwest to join the North Fork at Kingsport.^[12] The Watauga River, a tributary of the South Fork Holston, flows 78.5 miles (126.3 km) westward from Watauga County, North Carolina.

River modifications

The Holston River valley has been greatly developed for electrical power generation, both with hydroelectric dams and coal-fired steam plants. In the upper reaches, some of these plants are controlled by private interests; in the downstream portion, they are owned by the United States Government's Tennessee Valley Authority.

The main stem of the Holston is impounded by the Tennessee Valley Authority's Cherokee Dam near Jefferson City, Tennessee, forming Cherokee Lake. Five other dams, also managed by TVA, impound the Holston's headwater streams: Watauga Dam and Wilbur Dam on the Watauga River, and Boone Dam, Fort Patrick Henry Dam, and South Holston Dam on the South Fork Holston River.

Among the dams and associated reservoirs on the South Fork Holston River are Boone Dam and Boone Lake, named for the explorer Daniel Boone; Fort Patrick Henry Dam and Fort Patrick Henry Lake, named for the Founding Father Patrick Henry; and South Holston Dam and South Holston Lake.

Recreation

All three forks in Virginia, South Holston Lake, and the Holston River in Tennessee below the South Holston Dam offer relatively easy-to-reach recreation opportunities. The North Fork in Virginia is known as an excellent smallmouth bass river (because of mercury contamination, fish caught in the North Fork of the Holston below Saltville, Virginia, must not be consumed).^[13] Both the South Fork in Virginia and the first 20 miles (32 km) of the Holston in Tennessee below South Holston Dam are quality brown trout and rainbow trout fisheries. The Holston River is wide and open enough to allow extensive fly fishing. South Holston Lake offers a variety of fishing opportunity as well, as it contains smallmouth bass, common carp, walleye, pike, sunfish, crappie and a few trout.

Crossings

Holston River

The following is a list of major road crossings on the Holston River:

South Fork Holston River

The following is a list of major road crossings on the South Fork Holston River:

Middle Fork Holston River

The following is a list of major road crossings on the Middle Fork Holston River:

See also

• List of Tennessee rivers
• List of Virginia rivers

References

1. ^
2. ^ United States Geological Survey, Water Resources Data Tennessee: Water Year 1983, Water Data Report TN-83-1, p. 123.
3. ^
4. ^
5. ^ The Civil and Political History of the State of Tennessee from Its Earliest Settlement up to the Year 1796, including the Boundaries of the State, John Haywood, 1823/reprinted 1891; available in full-text online at Internet Archive
6. ^ Stewart, George R. (1967 [1945]). Names on the Land: A Historical Account of Place-Naming in the United States. Sentry edition (3rd) ed. Houghton Mifflin
7. ^ Selden, Ina Lee (March 13, 1980). "The town that would not die". The Christian Science Monitor
8. ^ "The Atlanta Journal - Constitution Article on Dam". Mywebpages.comcast.net. Archived from the original on May 27, 2006. Retrieved December 7, 2011.
9. ^ "Roanoke Times Article on Dam". Roanoke.com. Archived from the original on September 18, 2012. Retrieved December 7, 2011.
10. ^ "US EPA Superfund Site". Epa.gov. June 28, 2006. Archived from the original on August 5, 2012. Retrieved December 7, 2011.
11. ^ "VA Department Environmental Quality" (PDF). Retrieved December 7, 2011.
12. ^ "Holston River - South Fork". Virginia Department of Game and Inland Fisheries. Archived from the original on 2012-09-26. Retrieved 2012-09-17.
13. ^ "Holston River - North Fork". Virginia Department of Game and Inland Fisheries.