Early Settlement

Early Settlement. Breaks Interstate Park. For over 10,000 years, Native Americans used The Breaks for seasonal foraging and hunting, with more permanent settlements near the Ohio River, to the north, and the New and Tennessee Rivers, to the east and south. At the time of settlement by Americans of European and African descent, known Indian paths passed south up Russell Fork via Skegg Gap on Pine Mountain, and via Grassy Creek and Hunts Creek, roughly the same as present Route 80. At that time, no one tribe claimed the area and all used it, with the Shawnee dominant to the north, and the Cherokee to the south., In 1750, Dr. Thomas Walker crossed and named Louisa (now Levisa) Fork, to the north: soon after Christopher Gist crossed Pine Mountain at Pound Gap to the west, but first visitation was by Daniel Boone and party in 1767 on a long hunt, wintering near present Prestonsburg, Kentucky., Longhunters continued to visit this area, but the first permanent settler in the Russel Fork Basin was "Fighting" Dick Colley at Sand Lick in 1810. Other settlers followed, living not unlike the Native Americans by hunting, gathering and subsistence farming. The latter was based primarily on corn, used as coin and for barter, not only for food, but also converted to the easily transportable and desired corn whiskey, i.e., moonshine., The log cabin you see here, typical of the time period, was originally built in 1838 by the Counts family, just upriver in nearby Lick Creek. Local poplar logs were sawn, dragged by a team of workhorses to its original site, and then hand-hewn. Historically, this home would have had an upstairs sleeping loft and accommodated a family of eight or more, In the late 1700's, small-homesteads like this one sprung up along the frontier as the American Revolution ended. The Cherokee and Shawnee tribes retreated to their homelands, leaving their historic hunting lands to the oncoming wave of families and settlers from the east, eager to make new lives in the Appalachian Mountains. This kudzu-covered cabin was moved in 1976 and serves to educate visitors about the way of life of the area's first settlers., (captions) , Tomahawk and Bow, 1784-5 From Thomas Pennant's Artic Zoology, vol.1 , Smithsonian Libraries, Daniel Boone with long rifle, Human face gorget, Ely Mound Lee County, VA, circa 1300 Bureau of Ethnology, Smithsonian Institution, 1881, Moonshining - Kentucky - Revenue Man Project Gutenberg, Moonshine still - 1936 By Tennessee Valley Authority